Notification Alert: NHL Unveils 2019 All-Star Game Logo

It’s finally happened… a sports logo intentionally designed to resemble a mobile app icon.

That’s the explanation behind the emblem for the 2019 NHL All-Star Game, the logo for which was unveiled earlier today by the National Hockey League. With the game being played in San Jose, Calif., “the epicentre of innovation”, the logo went with a more technological feel.

Designed by NHL Creative Services, the logo is encased in a square with rounded edges (like a mobile app icon), the logo “celebrates the omnipresent ‘tech’ that is at the core of the city’s vibrant and progressive community”. Continuing this theme, the year “2019” is placed inside a red pillbox similar in style to the unread notifications indicator on an app icon. The wordmark features a custom font including the bars in each “A” replaced with shark fins, a nod to the host Sharks.

Below the wordmark we see a puck flying by with a rainbow tail, what I was hoping was a callback to the infamous glowing puck U.S.-based television viewers saw during the 1997 NHL All-Star Game, also held in San Jose. The league explains it as “a colourful and unique tech energy wave that features a shooting tech puck, inspired by today’s cloud-based, virtual tech world”. I’m going ahead and determining that a “shooting tech puck” is, at the very least, a partial callback to the ’97 glowing puck.

The 2019 NHL All-Star Game(s) will be played at the SAP Center in San Jose on Saturday, January 26, 2019; one day following the NHL Skills Competition on the evening of Friday, January 25th. It is the second time San Jose will serve as host and the third time they’ve been selected to host the game, the 1995 NHL All-Star Game was originally set to be played in San Jose but was cancelled due to the Lockout which gobbled up most of that 1994-95 season.