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With All-New MUSTANG MACH 1, Ford Graphics Team Faced Same Challenge as Engineers, Designers – How to Modernize a Classic

While the design and engineering teams were busy making the all-new Mustang Mach 1 the most track-capable 5.0-liter Mustang ever built, Dave Mahoney, Ford design manager, and his team of graphic designers were obsessing about how to modernize its classic logo.

Mahoney and his team drew inspiration from their design colleagues – as they were working on the new Mach 1’s interior and exterior – who were writing a new chapter of Mach 1 history themselves by paying homage to the vehicle’s past while looking toward the future.

“From a brand standpoint, that vintage Mach 1 logo has such a classic look, there was a lot that we didn’t want to lose,” said Mahoney. “The unique letters, the outline – it was important to keep those features. What we did do is make it more modern, which really suits the new car.”

The graphic design team incorporated an updated, bolder sans-serif font to achieve a more modern look. The nod to the past comes largely in the form of the playful letter styling, which includes the easily identifiable down-sized lowercase “h.”

“When a nameplate like a Mach 1 comes back, you need to play up the heritage, but we didn’t want this to be a retro badge,” said Dean Carbis, Ford chief designer. “We wanted it to be modern, while still calling back to the original. I think the team nailed it.”

The updated logo appears in various places on the new Mach 1, including on the hood stripe, front fenders and rear appliqué, on the strut tower brace under the hood, as well as inside on the door sills, digital instrument cluster and center stack touch screen during vehicle startup. An etched dash badge shows the new logo along with every vehicle’s unique identification number.

The limited-edition 2021 Mustang Mach 1 will arrive in U.S. and Canadian Ford dealerships next spring.