First ever LBCC athletic logo introduced

LBCC recently announced the unveiling of a new logo, described as a black-outlined side profile of a Viking wearing a red-accented helmet. The LBCC Public Affairs & Marketing Department designed and utilized student and faculty feedback to complete the illustration.
Recently celebrating its 90th anniversary, Long Beach City College (LBCC) has always been known as the home of the Vikings, a symbolic display of the strength the Norse seafarers exhibited centuries ago.
Although the symbolism serves as a representation of all students at the community college, the school’s athletic department has never had its own personalized emblem to display in the nine decades athletes have performed– until last week.
Marinda Martin, graphic-design specialist with LBCC’s Office of Communications & Community Engagement, was the sole designer of the logo, and she said she simply used “pen and paper and my laptop” to complete a Viking drawing that took more than 30 iterations to perfect.
Officials introduced the logo to faculty and staff during LBCC College Day on Aug. 24, but it was not formally introduced to the public until Sept. 6, Martin said.
“While we wanted to create a logo that was more modern and more up-to-date with our school, we still wanted to hold on to some of that traditional imagery,” she told the Signal Tribune Wednesday, adding how elements of the logo also incorporate some aspects of the city. “The bottom of the logo, you see that kind of wave shape? It kind of looks like his fur. That could be interpreted as an ocean wave or the leaves of a palm tree or, of course, it’s his armor.”
In a joint phone interview with Martin, Joshua Castellanos, executive director with LBCC’s Public Affairs & Marketing Department, said the college’s athletic director, Randy Totorp, reached out to them around March or April about conceptualizing a unique logo for the athletic department.
“I started in January as the new executive director,” he said. “Marinda started in March. The two of us are relatively new. And, I had to go back and look. And, in our 90-year history– we just had our 90th anniversary– we’ve never had a logo. It was perfect, because one of the things that I wanted to bring back to the campus is kind of a Viking pride.”

Miranda, who moved from Georgia earlier this year, began working on a series of sketches, eventually digitizing distinct versions to present to LBCC officials. Castellanos said there were short conversations with students and faculty to garner feedback of Martin’s drawings. From there, minor tweaks and details were made to complete the final product.
“It’s been a process, really just starting from scratch,” Castellanos said. “[…] We have a really diverse population, but we also wanted to display this strong Viking image. […] I’m really proud, because this is all internal, and it came from our marketing department of public affairs.”
The athletic logo is not intended to replace the current iteration of the LBCC emblem, which was introduced in 2008, the college announced.