Sacred geometry is a map of the invisible. It’s the structures and patterns, sometimes atomic, sometimes galactic, that define forms and systems. Understanding sacred geometry can give meaning to life, and simplifies the ability to navigate your ship in an increasingly complex world. These patterns repeat themselves in species and objects, in social systems, behavior patterns, and in cycles of change. They show up as symbols—in business brands, art and architecture, mythology and religion.
From the sacred to the profane
Here are a few world-class logos and the sacred geometry imbued in their symbol. We don’t know whether these symbols were designed with this understanding in mind, but it’s because of the meaning they imbue that people are attracted to certain forms. These forms keep repeating themselves through history.
The pentagram was the symbol of the Pythagoreans, a group of Greek philosophers who thought the secrets of the universe were hidden in numbers and expressed through geometry and music. The pentagram is a universal symbol for growth and regeneration. Penta or five is the center, the mathematical middle of nine (femi-nine) coming together in a circle.
The cross is a coordinate of a vertical and a horizontal ordinate. X and Y, which stand for direction, and also designate the male and female chromosomes. It symbolizes direction and crossroads, and of course, when viewed from below it is the Christian crucifix.
The Texaco logo derives it’s power from these 2 secular symbols, the pentagram and the cross, symbols of Christ and the Devil, or crucifixion and renewal, a union of polarities.
Mastery of 3-dimensions is symbolized by the 3-pronged Mercedes-Benz logo. Two symbolizes duality. Three is a trinity, or tri-unity.
“Every tension of opposites culminates in a release, out of which comes the “third”. In the third, the tension is resolved and the lost unity is restored.–Carl Jung.
The image is also mimicked in the Hindu greeting “Namaste” which symbolizes a meeting of minds and hearts, and a union of left and right, saying “the God in me, celebrates the God in you…and you have a great car.”
The Christian fish symbol, comes from the center carved out of the intersection of two circles whose circumference just touches the center of the other. This geometry is called a Vesica Piscis—’vesica’ means bladder which could be likened to a sac containing something fluid, in this case “piscis” which means pointed oval. Two wholes, or two poles, left and right, male and female, good and evil, yin and yang — the sacred space formed by their intersection is, appropriately, the symbol of Christ. If you draw another vesica piscis inside the center and erase everything but the oval in the center, you get a pupil, a symbol used in Hindu mandalas, and geometric meditation diagrams symbolizing “vision”
TWA used the same geometry in their original logo, symbolizing the union of different worlds through travel.
And Mastercard uses it to denote the power of credit. In all these cases, the form derives it’s original power from the meaning of a union of opposites. The meanings associated with it by brand came later. Those are more individual to the brand. The power of the symbol is universal and archetypal.
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