Raymond Loewy: the man who designed everything

What does it mean to be a celebrated designer? Is it being on the cover of Time Magazine, designing some of America's best-loved exports, or is it something as simple as being recognized with a Google Doodle? Raymond Loewy, one of the 20th century's most prolific and influential designers has now achieved all three, thanks to today's Google celebration of his 120th birthday. In the same spirit, we've compiled a few of Loewy's most memorable designs for you to peruse on this fifth day of November.

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• Air Force One livery Every time the US President takes off to faraway lands, he does so inside the Loewy-designed shell of Air Force One. The two complementary tones of blue and the Caslon typeface have remained undisturbed since the original design was put together for President Kennedy in the '60s.
• PRR S1 locomotive Though the defining characteristic of Loewy's legacy is the sheer breadth of his work, much of his early career was spent designing locomotives for outfits like the Pennsylvania Railroad company. That's what gives the 'PRR' designation to the PRR S1 steam train you see above.
• 1963 Studebaker Avanti Loewy redesigned the Studebaker car company's logo and produced famed designs like the Starlight in the 1950s and this 1963 classic, the Avanti. The Studebaker Avanti was designed in a very short period of time by Loewy’s hand-picked team of young designers, led by John Ebstein. Image credit: Bonhams auction house
• Coca-Cola vending machines, soda dispensers, delivery trucks, and bottles In an extensive partnership with Coca-Cola, Loewy was responsible for a significant redesign of the iconic glass bottle, though his most original work came when designing vending, soda, and ice dispensing machines. Image credit: Richard Lipack / Wikimedia Commons
• Lucky Strike's red and white packaging Along with Marlboro, Lucky Strike cigarette packs are among the most easily recognizable around the globe. Raymond Loewy was responsible for their look, changing the original tobacco green background color to white and making the bullseye logo more prominent. Though they've undergone subtle alterations over the years, Lucky Strikes have remained faithful to Loewy's basic design ever since. It was only this year that the company underwent a major redesign, bringing in some throwback elements and changing up the typeface.
• Shell logo Over its long and storied history, the Royal Dutch Shell company has always been represented by the image of a seashell, but it wasn’t until 1971 that its logo took on the more geometric form by which it is known around the world today.
• Streamlined Pencil Sharpener Legendary enough to have been commemorated with a US Postal Service stamp in 2011, the streamlined pencil sharpener was one of Loewy's earlier designs. Loewy later had another encounter with the USPS in designing a memorial stamp for John F. Kennedy.
• Greyhound Scenicruiser As with Studebaker, Loewy's work with the Greyhound Lines bus company involved both the creation of a new streamlined logo and bold new designs like the Scenicruiser. Image credit: Roy Hall / www.greyhoundcoach.com
• NASA Skylab In designing Skylab, its 1973 precursor to the International Space Station that orbits the Earth today, NASA called on the help of Raymond Loewy and other industrial designers. Loewy advised on the arrangement, size, and even color scheme of the living quarters for the astronauts aboard the space station. Image credit: NASA
• 1941 Lincoln Continental Loewy's love of wheeled vehicles found a gorgeous expression in this 1940s redesign of the already well loved Lincoln Continental. Image credit: Craig Howell / Flickr Creative Commons
• Exxon logo Shown above are Loewy's sketches that led to the creation of the Exxon logo with its signature interlinked Xs. Image credit: US Library of Congress
• Studebaker Champion The closest thing to a rocketship car that you could've bought back in the 1950s. Or today. Image credit: Ruud Onos / Flickr Creative Commons
• 1968 Elna Lotus sewing machine This may not be the best known work in Loewy's extensive portfolio, but the Lotus won a loyal following of admiring fans — selling over a million units around the world — and is now part of the New York Museum of Modern Art collection. Image credit: Wikimedia Commons