A shell as a company emblem
Shell’s emblem is known as the pecten, after the scallop shell on which it is based. Raymond Loewy designed its 1971 revision. The familiar red-and-yellow mark connects a simplified shell form with the company’s name.
The logo is one of the most familiar commercial symbols in the world. The “pecten” name comes from Pecten maximus, the giant scallop, on which the design is based. The yellow and red are thought to relate to the colours of the flag of Spain, because Shell built early service stations in California, previously a Spanish colony.
A revision with a longer history
The name has roots in the Samuel family’s earlier seashell import business. Loewy’s contribution belongs to a longer sequence of emblem designs, so the revision should be distinguished from the origin of the shell association itself.
In 1833 Marcus Samuel Sr. founded an import business selling seashells to London collectors. His son, collecting shell specimens around the Caspian Sea in 1892, saw the potential of exporting lamp oil from the region and commissioned the world’s first purpose-built oil tanker, the Murex, named for a type of snail shell. The “Shell” Transport and Trading Company was founded in 1897 by Marcus Samuel and his brother Samuel Samuel, and in April 1907 it merged with the Royal Dutch Petroleum Company.
The company’s name has changed since the 1971 revision. The slash was removed from “Royal Dutch/Shell” in 2005, and in November 2021 the company announced it would become Shell plc.
What to compare
Compare versions of the emblem and examine how contour, internal divisions and colour organize recognition. Then view the shape without the company name. This offers a specific question about a pictorial identity: how much of its recognition comes from the drawing, and how much from repeated encounters with the brand? Keeping those factors separate avoids turning familiarity into a complete explanation of the design.
