From polo shirts to pens, we offer guidance to brand your materials appropriately.
Consistent and strong Illinois branding on apparel and merchandise can be one of the best tools to showcase our university. We offer guidance for how to implement our brand on merchandise.
When creating apparel and merchandise, you must use a licensed vendor. Licensed vendors have been vetted and can help you. Many are trained in making sure your designs are on brand.
Unit Names and Wordmarks
If you have a unit wordmark, you may use any version on apparel and merchandise. If you do not, check with your CCO about how your parent unit would like sub-units to brand up. You may brand up to a unit wordmark or to Illinois, depending on their guidance. Find more information on wordmarks.
If you do not have a wordmark, do not pair the Block I or Illinois wordmark with the text of a unit name to form what visually looks like a wordmark. There may be instances where units without wordmarks need to combine both the Illinois wordmark and the unit name in small or singular imprint areas. For those cases, we have developed templates that combine these elements in ways that follow the brand guidelines.

When creating printed materials for units without wordmarks, especially for apparel and swag such as embroidered polo shirts, make sure the unit name is large enough to be legible. If it isn’t, we recommend branding up to the Block I, primary university wordmark or parent unit wordmark and including the sub-unit name elsewhere, like on another imprint area of the item or on other swag. For embroidery, use an .eps file.

Apparel Colors
For base apparel colors, use orange, navy blue, white, black and gray shirt colors. There may be extremely limited exceptions for this based on retail or co-branded, recognized partnership needs.

- Do use orange, navy blue, white, black and gray merchandise colors
Improper Use

- Do not use apparel colors other than orange, navy blue, white, black or gray.
- Do not distort, put text over or change the color of the Block I.
Proper Use
Need some design inspiration? Here are some examples of properly branded apparel and merchandise.
