Ampersand underline both the responsiveness and collaborative nature of your business, but before you apply any, we recommend you to define ampersand and read about it.
Together with the ‘what is an ampersand’ one, another classic question to consider is whether your brand’s name is suitable for the purpose.
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First, think of your company’s name without the intrusive ‘and’ in the middle – it would look way nicer, wouldn’t it?
Instead, you can use an ampersand (&) and modify completely your brand design with a single step. An ampersand symbol/icon looks both elegant and old-fashioned and inspires a feeling among users that they can trust your brand.
Instead of using a small ampersand, you can always opt for a larger one, highlighting that your company built itself through collaboration and as a responsible team, capable of assisting customers.
Image source: Steve Wolf
Ampersands are perfect for formal settings, including law and financial consultancies, academic institutions, museums, and so on. Still, this shouldn’t stop you from applying the ampersand symbol for any other business where you think the ampersand meaning and function could help.
Table of contents
When to use an ampersand
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Ampersands are most of all decorative typography tools, and should thereof appear in highly-visible places, such as headings, logos, and names. In case you’re using them in the main text body, make sure the ampersand sign is replacing the word ‘and’.
Pick the style: You may think all ampersand symbols are the same, but there are many particular styles to look at before making a choice. Obviously, the style has to match the style and work with it, as Roman style does with formal settings and professional business, or Italic with light -hearted and softer contexts.
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Image source: Drew Lakin
Get to know your options: There is no common concept to follow, except maybe using the same color, typeface, or size as an ampersand you like. On the other hand, there are numerous ways to use a unique one, so don’t jump on the first solution that comes on your way.
Explore: Your font library/collection must be full of different ampersands, so odds are great you will find the right one without downloading them.
The 27th letter of the alphabet
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Nowadays, ampersands are common business symbols, and they’ve become so important users often call them ‘the 27th letter of the alphabet’. But why is it so? How did this symbol come to be so important?
First of all, ampersands are a very old symbol which appeared more than 1,500 years ago. As you know, Roman writing used to be a cursive and decorative font, which is how they came across the ampersand for the first time –while writing the word ‘et’ (and), they linked e and t in a word that resembles significantly today’s ampersands, and that can be seen using certain fonts, such as Caslon.
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On the other hand, people probably started considering it as an additional alphabet symbol much later, when it acquired its name.
English students in the early 1800s recited it interestingly enough, pronouncing it like a proper letter. They taught them to say ‘Y, Z, and per se and’ instead of saying ‘Y, Z, and’. ‘Per se’ meant ‘by itself’, but since it was so difficult to pronounce it, the mistaken pronunciation and the way it sounded inspired professionals to start calling it ampersand.
You can also find it in uncommon configurations, including the ‘&c’ one many people don’t know means etc.
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Applying ampersands
You can see them in all variants and settings, but ampersands don’t always preserve their original integrity. If you want to use them properly, try following the standard usage rules of what they represent, and how they should look.
As we mentioned, people most commonly use them to replace ‘and’ in names and short phrases, but that doesn’t mean you should use them to connect parts in a large sentence or longer text blocks. Ideally, ampersands should only connect two different parts of a single name.
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Most commonly, you will see them in web design of business settings and headlines, most of them related to consulting, law, architecture, engineering, and so on. In contrast to ‘and’, do not follow or precede the ampersand sign with commas, even when it’s used in a list.
As we said before, adding a ‘c’ to your ampersand will transform its meaning to et cetera, even if this is not as common as the original ampersand.
Styles
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You will only be able to understand how cool ampersands are after you’ve understood how many different styles are there, and what the differences between are. The basic division is between Italic and Carolingian, even if every distinctive sub-style has its own typeface and its own symbol. You can check examples to see the specific font differences – ideally, make a comparison between Italic and Adobe Caslon Pro, and the difference will be more than visible.
- Roman ampersand: The classic solution recognized in the entire world
- Italic ampersand: A more romantic and easy-going style for less formal settings.
- Lowercase ampersand: These are Italics in the technical sense of the word, but based on a lowercase e which is clearly visible on their shape.
- Eclectic ampersand: Ampersands are great tools to personalize your design and add character to it, so don’t be afraid to experiment with them.
Are typefaces recommended for modern restaurants?
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Generally speaking, they are, but that’s not due their original purpose and character. The lore has more to do with the early 20th century New York fuss, or the golden age of restaurants, which most brands are trying to replicate even nowadays.
An ampersand simply reminds you of that golden time when family lunch meant something, or when sons and fathers worked together over the blacksmith’s anvil or cobbler’s bench.
In fact, artisanal handcraftsmanship inspired the entire ‘ampersand name’ movement, and it was precisely then that outstanding restaurateurs conquered the market, such as New York’s Parker & Queen Refinery Hotel, whose design still evokes the 1920s today.
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Not even the menu underwent some significant changes, and you can still find heirloom chops named ‘pork from the pen’ or the delicious rotisserie ‘from the coop’ chicken. For the purpose, someone invented both Parker and Queen, neither of whom actually existed.
Having an ampersand in your name associates you with artisanal, bespoke, handcrafted movement. To be completely honest, fiction characters were a common trend back in the days and one could hardly ever read the owners’ last names’ on the establishment’s name. What we are trying to say is that the ampersand was so powerful that it made them look as if they were connected in that way.
More than beautiful, ampersands are meaningful, and the fact they were recited together with the alphabet only proves this fact. Eventually, it was concluded ampersand in the alphabet are not alphabet symbols, and they were removed from there, but that didn’t stop them from conquering popular culture and remaining on the scene.
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The cocktail and restaurant movement is what had the most to do with their gloom, in particular during the handcrafted goods’ golden age. Back then, manufacture was necessary more than it was trendy, and ampersands were one of the rare means to emphasize the brand’s expediency, and to bring businesses together.
In the 1900s, rarely would someone think of a name without an ampersand, as it was a practice which guaranteed quality and conserved resources. It was a really handy idea for an age here letterheads and labor signage used to cost an arm and a leg, so an extra letter in the name made perfect sense.
Nowadays, however, you can’t use the same justification for including an ampersand in the name of your business. Rather than connecting names, business owners today use ampersands to relate even the most faintly-related nouns in a creative and easy-to-remember name, which may or may not be associated to their activities.
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Still, before replicating the same practice for your brand, you should know ampersands are equally dangerous as they are beneficial.
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What is it so cool about ampersands nowadays?
Most people would say it is their traditional style or calligraphic curves, but we’d rather say it is minimalist design that is imposing them back. Thinking minimal refers also to applying as few symbols as possible, which is probably why ampersands still appear on logos, titles, or simply in people’s handwriting.
Image source: Damian Kidd
The truth is that ampersands are somehow intriguing, and always motivate people to discover more about brands. At the same time, an ampersand is a rare language character which stands alone, and has its own meaning regardless of the place where it appears. What we mean here is that in order to apply a single letter, it has to have a specific meaning, but that’s not the case with ampersands at all.
Small and cute, ampersands are an economical choice, as they save screen real estate. Unlike other practices with similar purposes, the ampersand will also look versatile and beautiful, and you get to use it as a separate design element.
Image source: Raul Taciu
As we mentioned numerous times in this article, ampersands are traditionally applied in brands’ names, as for instance M&Ms, A & W Root Beer, Dolce & Gabanna, Ben & Jerry’s, and many more. These companies have a long tradition of using ampersands and relating them to their logotype, but the interesting part is that they all use a unique font to emphasize the meaning of their brand.
There are many extra benefits you could prescribe to ampersands, as for instance shortening a company’s name to make it fit on the logotype. Basically, an ampersand will help you make your name legible in digital media without having to sacrifice its length.
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