Friday: Midsummer Drought

Hey y'all, and welcome to another Friday post here at HJC.  We're in the depths of summer, which means two things.  One, there's little news to report on, given that it's the offseason and teams seem to be saving their alternate reveals until we're closer to the start of the season.  Second, and more importantly for us, we see a yearly drop in concepts coming in.  I get it, out of sight, out of mind, with no hockey to watch we get less inspiration, and thus less of a drive to create designs.  Just because the season is over doesn't mean we have to stop designing.  Here is my charge to y'all: use this opportunity to dig a little deeper.  Find teams that you don't see on a regular basis and try to design new uniforms for them.  I know plenty of minor league teams that could use an update, and the multitude of leagues means that we have a veritable cornucopia to choose from.  So get out there, find some teams, and get designing.

In voting news, we have the regular COTW vote for June 6-12 with polls closing Friday at noon EDT.  I am also excited to announce that the HJC Open Round Robin is now underway.  This is the opening round of the Open, with winners from this round making it into the bracket that leads to the championship.  For more information and rules, click here.  Round Robin entries are due Thursday, July 19 at noon EDT, so be sure to get your concepts in before then.  

 COTW July 6 - 12 vote (ends Friday @ noon EDT) 

 HJC Open Round Robin Entries (due Thursday July 9 @ noon EDT) 

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Now on to today's concepts!

Alan H.- Calgary Inferno

Our first concept of the day is Alan H.'s design for the Calgary Inferno of the CWHL.  I really like the redone primary logo, the elimination of the wordmark and recoloring makes this look much better.  The design seems to be based off of the Calgary Flames' 2000-2007 template, but in the Flames' original color scheme.  The Inferno currently wear Flames clones, so I think keeping them tied in with that identity is a good call.  The choice to make yellow the main color and using red as an accent is an interesting one, but I think it actually works really well, especially to avoid yellow on white syndrome on the white jersey.  I think the use of a yoke is unnecessary, especially with how chunky the hem stripe is.  I was never a huge fan of the giant hem design on this template, and I think the yoke just adds more clutter.  Font choice is pretty good, but I would move the yellow outline closer to the red on the white jersey so it doesn't get lost in the white.  Gear looks solid, and good presentation.  Final verdict: a great logo redesign, but the jersey design needs some work.  7.5/10

Liam A.- Carolina Hurricanes

Our next and final concept of the day is Liam A.'s fix for the Carolina Hurricanes' new alternate jersey.  The current design is an absolute dumpster fire, so I think a fix is desperately needed.  Replacing the heathered striping with the warning flag pattern is a good move, it ties in much better with the home design and fits the team identity well.  I'm frustrated by the decision to keep the grey yoke, it puzzled me on the original jersey and gives it a phantom yoke feel with the striping.  Furthermore, I hate the "ghosted" shoulder patches, to me it defeats the purpose of having a shoulder patch, as they're completely unrecognizable unless you're up close.  The breezers look good with the matching striping style, but I'm not on board with the red socks and helmet.  If you're gonna go with a black jersey, you gotta go all black to really pull the look off.  My high school football team tried to pull off all black uniforms with a red helmet, and it just looked odd.  Final verdict: some steps in the right direction, but it still keeps some of the more glaring mistakes and creates some new ones.  7.5/10

That's all for me this week, see y'all next Friday!