Volkswagen

Volkswagen’s monogram is one of the most widely deployed automotive marks in the world, appearing on over 70,000 signs across 171 markets. The 2019 version reduces the interlocking V-over-W letterforms to thin, uniform-weight lines inside a simple circle, all rendered in VW Dark Blue (#001E50, Pantone 2766 C) on a white ground or reversed to white on blue. The monogram contains no fill, no gradient, and no chrome effect. Klaus Bischoff, Volkswagen’s Chief Designer, described his primary goal as making the W “float,” introducing a visible gap between the bottom of the V and the top of the W that gives the mark a new lightness absent from every previous version. The result is a monogram that scales from smartwatch display to factory signage without losing legibility.

Logo history

The VW monogram dates to 1937, when engineer Franz Xaver Reimspiess won an internal design competition at the Porsche design bureau in Stuttgart with a V stacked above a W inside a cogwheel. The original mark included surrounding elements tied to the political context of its era, which were removed after 1945 when the British Army took control of the Wolfsburg factory. The post-war version simplified to the V/W circle in monochrome. In 1960, the mark was set inside a square and rendered in black. The shift to blue came in 1967, and the colors inverted (white monogram on blue circle) in 1978. A semi-three-dimensional treatment arrived in 2000, followed by a fully chrome, metallic rendering in 2012. The 2019 flat redesign, unveiled at the Frankfurt Motor Show alongside the ID.3 electric vehicle, deliberately reversed this trajectory, stripping away every layer of dimensionality accumulated over two decades. The rollout involved replacing physical signage at 10,000 dealerships in 154 countries by mid-2020.

Design philosophy

The 2019 redesign was built around the concept “digital first.” Every previous VW logo had been designed primarily as a physical badge and then adapted for print and screen. The 2019 mark reversed this priority, starting from the constraints of small digital displays and scaling upward. The thin, uniform stroke weight ensures the monogram reproduces cleanly at sizes as small as a favicon, while the open gaps between the V and W prevent the letterforms from merging at low resolution. The choice to deepen the blue from the previous lighter shade to #001E50 creates higher contrast against white backgrounds on screens. The mark also introduced new flexibility: it can appear in blue-on-white, white-on-blue, or monochrome variations without losing recognition. Volkswagen’s female voice identity, replacing the male voice used for decades, complemented the visual shift, signaling a brand reorientation toward accessibility and warmth.

Brand identity

Volkswagen’s identity system is anchored by VW Head and VW Text, custom typefaces designed by Hannes von Dohren and Livius Dietzel at HvD Fonts in collaboration with MetaDesign. VW Head handles headlines and large-scale applications with compact, confident letterforms, while VW Text is optimized for body copy and screen rendering below 16 point. The type system replaced a customized Futura that had served the brand since 1997, originally developed by Erik Spiekermann and Luc de Groot. Both typefaces draw design cues from the geometry of Volkswagen’s vehicle design language, translating the clean functionalism of the cars into typographic form. The broader identity palette uses VW Dark Blue as the dominant color, supplemented by a lighter blue for secondary applications, creating a two-tone system that differentiates Volkswagen’s brand communications from the Volkswagen Group corporate identity (which uses its own Deep Space Blue, Vivid Green, and Pure White palette developed with Landor & Fitch).

Cultural impact

The VW monogram has survived more radical historical transitions than perhaps any other corporate mark still in active use, from wartime origins through post-war reconstruction, the Beetle counterculture era of the 1960s, the emissions scandal of 2015, and now the pivot to electric vehicles. That the core geometry, a V stacked above a W in a circle, has remained recognizable through each of these reinventions speaks to the strength of Reimspiess’s original composition. The 2019 flat redesign arrived explicitly as a post-Dieselgate signal: Volkswagen framed the mark as the start of “New Volkswagen,” tying visual simplification to a commitment to transparency and electric mobility. The ID.3 was the first production vehicle to carry the new logo, establishing a direct visual link between the redesigned monogram and Volkswagen’s electric future.