Lacoste
Before a 1923 match, René Lacoste and his tennis coach Alan Muhr made a bet involving a crocodile-skin suitcase. Mr. Lacoste didn’t end up getting a suitcase, but the story led an American journalist to nickname him “The Alligator.” An image of a toothy predator was affixed to his signature polos.
Burberry
In 1901, the brand held a competition to find a new logo. The winning design: a mounted knight wearing medieval armor, an image that reflected Burberry’s desire to shield the British from bad weather via its water-wicking gabardine. (These days the label has been using a sans-serif-text wordmark.)
Brooks Brothers
To celebrate his 1430 wedding, Philip the Good established the Order of the Golden Fleece, whose symbol depicts a sheep suspended by a ribbon. The Order’s prestige came to signify fancy stuff, and European merchants used the emblem. In 1850, Brooks Brothers painted it on its door.
Lanvin
Originally a milliner, Jeanne Lanvin expanded into designing fashion after her baby daughter arrived. In 1923, Lanvin commissioned an art-deco logo that immortalized the birth of both clothing brand and child. It depicts her and her daughter dancing hand-in-hand at a costume ball in gowns and hats.
Loewe
After Jonathan Anderson took the helm of this Spanish brand, it soon adopted a logo designed by edgy Parisian creatives M/M in 2014. With its quadruply mirrored “L,” it echoes the 1970 insignia Spanish artist Vicente Vela modeled after branding irons used to mark cattle.
Nike
Co-founder Phil Knight met student Carolyn Davidson during his last week teaching college accounting. Thinking his nascent sneaker company might need an artist, he asked for her number. Two years later, in 1971, he paid Ms. Davidson $35 to design a logo conveying motion. The result: the now-ubiquitous Swoosh.
Patagonia
Back in 1968, outerwear titan Yvon Chouinard set out on a six-month journey from California to Patagonia, trekking through storm-afflicted mountains plastered in ice. The trip so inspired him it prompted the name of his fledgling clothing line, whose label depicts the purple-tinted skyline of Mount Fitz Roy.
Supreme
For its logo, this maker of hip collectibles adapted artist Barbara Kruger’s advertising-inspired aesthetic—white text set in Futura Bold Italic and boxed in red. By appropriating Ms. Kruger’s critique of consumerism in 1994 to sell stuff, the skate brand cannily perverted its meaning.
