I think it's interesting how the superstars of a space dominate the design signal in it. Other parties trying to associate with the space are then forced to participate. The AI lab being a beige background with serif fonts and an abstract image collage with illustrations being a grungy version of Corporate Memphis is 100% downstream of Anthropic dominating the current conversation in the space and therefore Geist design being the dominant design language https://geist.co/work/anthropic
Compare the Open AI and Deepmind pages:
* https://openai.com/index/gpt-5-system-card/
* https://deepmind.google/blog/announcing-google-deepmind/
This is a topic I really enjoy thinking about and I wonder if someone has explored it. It was just before the pandemic when Balenciaga rebranded where it struck me that something crazy had happened. The top fashion houses were taking their brand inspiration from Apple! I was looking at a Rimowa and it looks like an Apple mark. And Balenciaga, and Burberry (before their most recent rebrand)
The flat geometric sans wordmark and product marks wasn't an Apple original but it is definitely given full high-quality luxury status through Apple's adoption. It could just have been an idea whose time had come (Microsoft's Metro etc. existed) but if you look at the iPhone, they were already using the flat sans Myriad font at the time.
Someone more acquainted with design and art will have to tell me if this is real because when I saw it I swear it was like everyone was trying to associate with this language that was popularized by Apple. But maybe they were just copying tech because tech were the top dogs of the age. And now perhaps everyone will copy AI labs which will all copy Anthropic because Anthropic are the big dogs of this age.
Look at it, though! It's striking how much everything looks like it descended from iPhone. People were saying the Balenciaga logo looks like a phone contact!
At least Geist looks nice. Corporate Memphis has always been ugly, beyond ugly even, its an insult to aesthetics itself, an insult to all of life.
There's a graphic illustrating the typographic homogenization of a bunch of fashion houses in the late 2010s early 20s like you described in the article below. It's come full circle and there's been a return to maximalism and signaling heritage/legacy among some brands. Largely, I think, as a reaction to ever-accelerating trend cycles, planned obsolescence, the cursed nature of millenial targeted d2c brands and especially the looming specter of big tech - all of which have some sort of association with the clean, cool/pastel, sans-serif, minimalist kind of vibe.
https://www.designandpaper.com/they-are-calling-it-a-sans-se...