Exploring The Underrated Alchemy Symbols In Logo Design
With the mention of alchemy, the first thing to cross our mind is philosophers’ stone with magical powers to transform metal into gold. Sorry to burst your bubble, but no gold here. But we have something that designers would find worth digging for.
Symbolism is vastly accepted to be a visually enticing form of communication. Designers from around the world search for unused symbols as inspirations in their design. Alchemy is an ancient resource in the world of symbolism that still remains untapped. To this date, very few designers have utilized or taken inspiration from this meaningful pool of symbols. Interestingly, some of these symbols resemble the geometrical patterns used in logo design which means they can be used as it is or after slight modification to convey the message of the brand.
The Forgotten World Of Alchemy Symbols
You may have heard of and perhaps used Greek, Egyptian and Roman symbols in Graphic design or logo design but when it comes to alchemy symbols, it seems to have been lost in time. Back in the medieval times, most alchemists feared persecution because their craft wasn’t accepted by the world. So in order to hide their work, they created symbols for elements and hence all their work was codified.
However, the use of signs could simply be a form of shorthand to represent different elements, tools and processes that alchemists used. Let’s go back in History to explore the origin of alchemy.
Down The Memory Lane
Alchemy was a proto-science that most likely originated from somewhere around Egypt, and is recognized as the ancestor to modern chemistry. However, more than its contribution to science, it has added to the spiritual progress of humanity. Back in the days, when Arabs Egypt, they got inspired by this newly discovered knowledge and took it back to Spain from where it traveled to different parts of Europe including France, Germany and England. As time went by, alchemy was expressed widely, from chemistry, metallurgy, pottery, glass making, architecture etc. Basically it was a search to understand nature, the cosmos, man which explains why the symbols it uses are often planetary symbols as well.
The popular term Alchemy is derived from an Arabic phrase “al-kimia” which refers to the preparation of the elixir or philosopher’s stone. While the root word for Kimia is Khem meaning the fertile black Nile delta soil. Later on, the word Khem lead to the word chemistry.
Let’s explore the standard symbols, their meanings and check out how they can be used in logo design.
While going through this article, if any other source of symbols came to your mind, or any more ideas to create logos from alchemy symbols feel free to share it with us in the comment section.
Thank you Mehreen for the knowledge. Silver is my ideal symbol, all the best for the future!.