Keating Logo Explained by Founder Tim Keating
One of the most frequently asked questions about Keating Investments is: "What's the story with the logo?" Here's the answer: My wife Stephanie and I wanted a design that incorporated the following three emotive elements into the logo.
- Meaningful
- Celtic
- Reputable
Meaningful
Ayn Rand, my favorite author, used a distinct formula of "last name + industry" in creating the names of her characters' businesses (e.g., Rearden Steel). Thus, the model for "Keating Investments." By using my last name, we thought it would be easy for people to connect me to the Firm and to distinguish it from generic names like "Global" or "First", etc. We figured we had as much a right as anyone to incorporate the letter "K" in my logo.
Celtic
Since I am of Irish ancestry, we wanted the overall logo design to reflect my Celtic roots. For graphic ideas, we consulted The Book of Kells (Dublin, Trinity College Library), an ornately illustrated manuscript, produced by Celtic monks around AD 800 in the style known as Insular art. It is one of the more lavishly illustrated manuscripts to survive from the Middle Ages and has been described as the zenith of Western calligraphy. Upon careful review, we discovered that no letter "K" existed in Gaelic. So we simply took some artistic liberties and created our own stylized version. The gold lattice is very similar to the calligraphy found throughout The Book of Kells.
Reputable
After working in London for nine years, I had admiration for the great London merchant banking firms that had stood the test of time (e.g., Rothschild). When I was forming Keating Investments in 1997, I wanted to give prospective clients, investors and partners that same feeling of integrity that I associated with these firms. Thus, the need for an overall design that invoked the feeling of reputability. The animal heads at the end of the lattice are "gryphons." The gryphon is a legendary creature with the body of a lion and the head and wings of an eagle. As the lion was traditionally considered the king of the beasts and the eagle the king of the birds, the gryphon was thought to be an especially powerful and majestic creature.