Who designed the modern golden-arches symbol used in McDonald’s 1960s branding?

Jim Schindler designed the modern golden-arches symbol used in McDonald’s 1960s branding.

Schindler worked for McDonald’s and combined the two separate architectural arches from the company’s restaurant buildings into a single stylized “M.” This created a compact corporate symbol that could work on signs, packaging, advertisements, and other branded materials.

The Golden Arches are often credited entirely to Ray Kroc, but Kroc was the business leader who expanded the McDonald’s system; he was not the designer of the symbol. Architect Stanley Meston designed the original restaurant arches, while Schindler developed the later combined graphic form.

The symbol became one of the world’s most recognizable corporate logos. Its visual simplicity allowed McDonald’s to identify restaurants even when little or no written text was visible.