Anyone who has watched an Olympics whose vision is sharp will notice that the logo for Sochi 2014—which appears in every stadium, on every ticket, and on tens of millions of dollars’ worth of Olympic merchandise—is remarkably different from those of previous Olympics. It contains no drawing and features only unassuming lowercase lettering, the five Olympic rings, and a Web address.

Guo Chunning, who designed the “Dancing Beijing” logo for the Beijing 2008 Games, has researched the history of Olympic logos going back to the beginning of the modern Games, in 1896. He believes that, with the exception of Mexico City 1968 and London 2012, this is the first time a logo has lacked drawn elements. (Mexico City and London, however, used lettering that resembled artwork.)

Christoph Marti, a Swiss member of the design team at Interbrand Agency, whose proposal for the logo prevailed over five other finalists, shared with me a few pages from his notebook that show the complex evolution of the lettering. The design team, which included eight members from around the world, originally had a much more sophisticated idea in mind. The team vacillated between a floral, traditional design (on the left), which drew inspiration from Russian Khokhloma art, and a more modern interpretation (on the right), which melded images of human activity such as partying and sailing with icons of native animal life and the Russian landscape. After more than ten revisions, according to Marti, a “more future-oriented” logo, favored by the Organizing Committee, emerged, far from the original concept.

Multiple iterations are normal for Olympic brands. The original concept goes through layers of revisions suggested by multiple parties: the Organizing Committee (which typically owns the brand, with no residuals to the creator), the host country’s political echelon, and the International Olympic Committee. It can be difficult to identify the inspiration behind the design. Often, a rationale for the logo is imposed after the logo has been approved.

The Organizing Committee—which executes the Games and coördinates closely with the I.O.C.—portrayed the final Sochi logo, unveiled in December, 2009, as a grand collaboration fashioned by an “expert council” made up of “high profile marketing specialists, famous athletes, and representatives of large multi-national companies, working both in Russia and abroad.”

Some will interpret the type for “Sochi” and “2014” as mirroring each other, portraying Russia as a country of contrasts—seashore and mountain slope, snow and sand. Others might see the mirroring as symbolic of Sochi’s location on the Black Sea.