1. Miracle Whip? While the M/W is an obvious ambigram, I never thought I would see this on a container of mayonnaise from Kraft! My girlfriend picked this out of a crowded store shelf in a blink of an eye, and I cannot believe I didn’t see it first!

2. The Sun microsystems logo has been around for 28 years before it was acquired by Oracle in 2010. While the company itself doesn’t technically exist anymore, the ambigram logo survives!

3. Say what you while about Hyundai quality, but at least part of their logo is an ambigram!

4. Xpedx is a simple yet effective ambigram, and in my mind embodies what a corporate ambigram should be: readable, legible, and aesthetically suited for the business.

If any of our readers see ambigrams in the real world, take a photo and send me an email, telling me where you saw the ambigram & what you think of it. We might just feature it in the next “Real World Ambigrams.”

In fact, its the first ambigram date in almost 10 years (the last one was October 02, 2001).

What exactly is an ambigram date?  It’s a date that appears the same when rotated 180 degrees (not counting any date separators).

For example, today is January 02, 2010, which can be written as:

Ambigram Date - Jan. 2nd, 2010

It appears identical when rotated 180 degrees – an event so rare that it only happens about twice a decade.

It’s even more rare for an ambigram date to occur so close to the beginning of the decade (and it hasn’t happened this early into a decade in over 1000 years!  [Jan 1st, 1010])

An interesting property of ambigram dates is that it doesn’t matter if they are written in MMDDYYYY format (common here in the US) or in universal date format: YYYYMMDD.

YYYY-MMDD Universal Date Format

While it has been many years since the last ambigram date, the next one will occur in less than 2 years: Nov. 02, 2011.

Nov 02, 2011 - The Next Ambigram Date

However, after next year, we’re in for another long wait as the one to follow won’t occur until the year 2020.

Feb 02, 2020 - On Deck

That will be a pretty cool one, though, consisting of only 2 numbers.  Of course, that assumes that the world continues past the year 2012.

So, enjoy this ambigram date while you can.  They don’t come around very often!

(*Note that is is possible to find other ambigram dates using other formats besides the fully formed MMDDYYYY or YYYYMMDD formats)

We wanted to add a whole new level of challenge to creating an ambigram (in fact, if there is any interest, we can officially make this an ACAC challenge in the future).

Here is the challenge: Try to create an ambigram that is also a palindrome (or a palindrome that you can turn into an ambigram).  If the ambigram says something different upside-down, of course, that ALSO must be a palindrome.

You get the idea… Nothing but ambigrams and palindromes.

We worked on it, and set the bar pretty high right out of the gate.  Here is the longest double ambigram palindrome that we were able to create (although we certainly don’t claim that it is the longest one possible).  Both the upright and inverse phrases are palindromes that can be read forward and backward, and the entire ambigram rotates to become the opposite phrase.

So, what WAS the longest double ambigram palindrome we could come up with?

Upright: “Live Not On Evil”
Inverse: “Dogma I Am God”

Live Not On Evil / Dogma I Am God palindrome ambigram

Care to give it a shot? We’d love to see what you come up with!

We’ve just been informed of the first web domain that was specifically selected to be a natural ambigram:

ap.xozzox.de

Not only that, but the owner realized that the claim that his site’s domain was a natural ambigram wouldn’t be complete if a site visitor used the fully-formed version of his URL, so he even created a page so the fully formed URL forms a natural ambigram as well:

http://ap.xozzox.de//:dtty

Although others have taken the URL to a page and intentionally turned it into a natural ambigram, this is the first case that we are aware of where the bare domain forms a natural ambigram with nothing else appended to it.

Do you know of any other ambigrammatic domains, or anything else similar?  Tell us about it below.

To make our list of the Most Famous Ambigrams, an ambigram had to 1) be part of a mainstream product, 2) be exposed to a large number of people and 3) be a rotationally symmetric ambigram.

Here is the list of the “Top 10 Most Famous Ambigrams” from Ambigram.com:

• 

  Paul McCartney - Chaos and Creation in the Backyard

  Paul McCartney’s album “Chaos and Creation in the Backyard” featured an ambigram of the words “Paul McCartney” on the album cover.  Although the album was not a huge commercial success, the album was the biggest to feature an ambigram on the cover.
  

• 

  Princess Bride 20th Anniversary Edition

  The 20th Anniversary Edition of the movie “the Princess Bride” featured an ambigram on the cover of the DVD and Blu-Ray releases created by Menagerie Creative.  The Princess Bride ambigram was accompanied by a photo that appears at first as a reflection, but upon closer inspection has some subtle insights into the story’s plotline.

  As a side note: there is a second ambigram inside the DVD booklet of the words “True / Love”, but that particular design isn’t famous enough to make our “Top 10″ list.
  

• 

  Glam Rock Band "Angel"

  Glam rock band “Angel”, whose members always dressed in white, adopted a Robert Petrick ambigram logo of the band’s name in 1976 and continued to use it until 1992.
  

• 

  "New Man" Clothing Company's ambigram logo

  French clothing company “New Man” began using thisRaymond Loewy designed ambigram in 1969…and they are still using it today.
  

• 

  NASA's Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) logo

  Scott Kim created the logo for NASA’s Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES), and since there is no “up” in space, the satellite’s logo is a rotational ambigram.
  

• 

  Angels and Demons Illuminati ambigram

  The first ambigram encountered in Dan Brown’s book “Angels and Demons” is the Illuminati ambigram, which launches the lead character Robert Langdon (played by Tom Hanks in the movie adaptation) on his quest.  The ambigram was drawn by artist John Langdon, who lends his surname to the lead character in the story.
  

• 

  "Angels and Demons" Earth Ambigram

  Since the “Angels and Demons” book was such a big success (reportedly the second most popular book in America among people 32-43 years old), the rest of this Top 10 list is monopolized by the designs in the book.  Here is the Earth ambigram, drawn by John Langdon.
  

• 

  "Angels and Demons" Air Ambigram

  The “Air” custom ambigram from “Angels and Demons”, by John Langdon.
  

• 

  "Angels and Demons" Fire Ambigram

  The “Fire” ambigram from “Angels and Demons”, which is at the center of one of the most gruesome parts of the story.
  

• 

  "Angels and Demons" Water Ambigram

  Finally, to round out the Top 10, here is the Angels and Demons ambigram of “Water”, also drawn by John Langdon.
  

There you have it. The “Top 10 Most Famous Ambigrams” from Ambigram.com, with fully HALF of the list from author Dan Brown and artist John Langdon!

In fact, if we were to extend the list further to the “Top 12 Most Famous Ambigrams“, the “Illuminati Diamond” final ambigram in “Angels and Demons” and the books ambigram title (in certain regions) would populate the remaining spots!

So, to say that “Angels and Demons” has had an impact on the ambigram space would be a huge understatement.

Click a thumbnail on the left-hand side to choose a picture. Then, move your mouse over the large picture that appears to see it rotate.

Anonymous
Italy 1870

Although these aren't technically ambigrams, we knew that you'd appreciate them anyway.