lichess brand identity

[ariskofrain]

i have sketched out some proposals for lichess branding. this is covered in greater detail in the pdf linked below, but to summarise - i was looking to help out with some of the graphic design for lichess, but have encountered something of a stumbling block. that is to say, lichess doesn't really have much of an recognisable brand identity, and that makes creating consistent and coherent graphics pretty difficult.

i've drafted some example graphics in this pdf. i based this off some of the discussions i had over on discord about this topic. please feel free to give whatever comments, questions or feedback you have on it, and as i mention in the document itself, none of this is intended to be definitive or final in any way, so please keep that in mind. thanks !

[schlawg]

love the draw icon.

[ariskofrain]

thank you ! i think ultimately the full set of icons would be hand-made, i just used some lightly modified fontawesome icons as a placeholder for now

[TBestLittleHelper]

Fun fact, the draw icon used to be a hand before. But it was changes, since players mistook the icon as a resign option : #7167 (comment)
An advantage of the (boring) 1/2 icon, is that it's hopefully universally understandable.

[ariskofrain]

oh, that's interesting ! good to know. i know something that might be worthwhile is bringing in people willing to do user testing, in the realm of making a new account, using the core features for the first time, etc. could be a useful thing to do once getting to the point of making more capital-c Changes.

[SandroMartens]

Nice work. I really like the idea of a consistent brand design. The blue logo looks slick.

Though I think the background should stay white/gray. Making the entire site on a blue background gives me "RGB Gaming spaceship cockpit" vibes.

[leochesscom]

It is perfect as it is. those designs resemble chess24, which is horrible.

[stevage]

I like most of the suggestions in this proposal.

The only thing I didn't really love is the nose on the new logo, which is very square for some reason, and doesn't look much like a horse's muzzle anymore.

[dryguy]

I like your designs and the overall aesthetic (apart from the fonts). I just want to point out that lichess alreasy has an incredible user interface, for the simple reason that it stays out of the way and lets users focus on chess. I would liken it to the design of the Menil collection. For those unfamiliar, the museum is beautifully designed, but in a way that it goes completely unnoticed unless you focus your attention on it. The reason for this design is to let the art that is on display take up the full attention of the visitors.

I think lichess already lets the users focus on chess, and it does so beautifully. I have commented before on a number of recent changes to the user interface that detracted from this. Fortunately, most of the downsides of these changes have been addressed. I just want to drive home the point for anyone thinking of changing the lichess interface - it is already quite excellent. That means it is really hard to make it better, and really easy to make it worse!!

For a chess website, even small changes to user interface like the color scheme or the piece design have the potential to become distractions. That's not good, because chess is a game that requires focus. The strength of the lichess user interface is that it stays out of the users' way and lets them focus.