My Thoughts on the Blues, and Three Guest Concepts

As you all must know by now, the St. Louis Blues unveiled new home and road jerseys on Monday.  Those new jerseys were based off of the Blues' 1998-2007 jerseys, but had a few important changes.  I personally love the new jerseys, I also liked the jerseys they were based off but I think the few changes make it even better.  Using bolder stripes, straight arm stripes, and adding a small gap in the striping pattern give the jerseys a more traditional look (compared to their 1998-2007 jerseys) that suit the Blues perfectly.

Photos from blues.nhl.com

While I think the new jerseys are basically perfect, there is one part of the uniforms I don't like and that is the socks.  I don't like the fact that the road socks have no navy blue, and the home socks don't really match the home jerseys.  Personally I'd match the socks stripes to the shoulder yoke, as you can see below.

Overall I'd give the uniforms a high A grade.  And while we're on the subject of Blues jerseys, I just want to say that I never thought the Blues' 2007-14 jerseys were that bad.  I've seen a lot of people saying they were the worst or one of the worst jerseys in the league, but I thought they okay (I'd give them a low B grade) Now moving on to some concepts...

St. Louis Blues, by Ricky:

Sticking with the Blues, Ricky made this Blues concept which features a yellow home jersey and the return of red.  He also uses their roundel logo on the front, and the swooshing striping pattern from the Ducks previous jerseys.  Honestly I'm not a fan of any of those decisions.  A yellow home jersey doesn't say Blues to me, I never liked red in their colour scheme, I don't think the roundel is a good primary logo (and the blue-note is such an iconic logo), and this striping pattern should stay with the Ducks in my opinion.

Calgary Flames, by Ricky:

Ricky also made this concept for the Flames, which I'm glad to say I like better than the previous concept.  The striping pattern on the home and road looks good, I like that the cowboy-shirt yoke from their current third jersey is used, but I think a few minor changes could really help.  First I'd make the hem stripe the same thickness as the arm stripes, I'd also remove the piping on the home jersey, and on the road jersey I'd replace the black with red as I think there is too much black right now.  Speaking of too much black, I think the numbers on the home jersey need to be another colour (or re-work the outlines) because they blend into the jersey too much right now.  I'm also not sure about using the roundel as the primary logo, I think it's a good secondary logo but it doesn't work as a primary in my opinion.  The third jersey is really cool, the striping pattern is unique and matches the logo perfectly.

Czech Republic, by Jared:

We end today's post with a Czech Republic concept by Jared that looks more like a Washington Capitals concept.  I'm sorry but I just can't get past the fact that a Capitals logo was used as the main logo for a Czech Republic concept, it ruins the whole concept in my opinion.  The socks also look bad how the panels are just filled in with colour, instead of using an actual striping pattern.

Enjoy the rest of your day!

New Blues

St. Louis Blues:

There are rumours that the Blues could be getting new jerseys next year, and possibly a new logo, which is why I made this concept.  As you can see the jerseys are similar to their pre-Edge jerseys, but with some differences.  I also slightly altered the logo, which you can see below.

Logo:

I changed the top of the logo from straight to curved, and I also eliminated one of the outlines.

Have a good day!

Central Division De-Edge Vintage Jerseys

I'm back with part two of the vintage jersey program for my De-Edge series, this time for the Central Division.  Also, as you can see, the vintage header at the top of the page is now onto my shield logo.

Chicago Blackhawks Vintage Set:

The Blackhawks wore these jerseys won they won the Stanley Cup in 1961.

Colorado Avalanche Vintage Set:

These are the classic Avalanche jerseys, but specifically from 1999-2007 (darker shade of burgundy).  They won the Cup in 2001 wearing this set.

Dallas Stars Vintage Set:

The Stars wore these jerseys 1995-99.  The Stars won the Stanley Cup in 1999 when these were their home and road jerseys (although they did wear their third when they won the Cup).

Minnesota Wild Vintage Set:

These are the Wild's original jerseys.

Nashville Predators Vintage Set:

I also went with the Predator's original jerseys.

St. Louis Blues Vintage Set:

The Blues wore these jerseys from 1968-73.  The went to the Stanley Cup final three times during that time.

Winnipeg Jets Vintage Set:

This may surprise some people, but I went with the Jets current jerseys.  I wasn't going to throwback to the original Jets since they are a different franchise, so my only other option was Atlanta Thrashers jerseys.

Once again you can let me know if you think my choices are good or bad.  Thanks for visiting!

St. Louis Blues De-Edge

St. Louis Blues:

I wanted to try a super-sized shoulder yoke in this series, and since all of my favourite Blues jerseys have had shoulder yokes (and I didn't have any other ideas for them) I decided to try it on a Blues jersey.  At first I tried it styled after their 1968-84 white jersey, but I didn't like the way the blue jersey looked, so it ended up being styled after their 1998-2007 jerseys.  I also slightly changed the logo, getting rid of one of the outlines.

Thanks for visiting.

Two Concepts

Remember back in June when I posted about what the Quebec Nordiques might look like if they never moved.  I said back then that I might do the same for the original Winnipeg Jets, and I have now started working on that.  Expect that post sometime this week.

A few weeks ago Ryan posted a Florida Panthers concept on HJC.  I really liked the look of the logo, and used it as inspiration for a few concepts.  These were already posted on HJC, but I'll post them here anyways.

Chicago Blackhawks:  I was going for a retro look for this jersey, with lots of stripes.  I took inspiration from their current road jersey, their 1957-58 white jersey (logo on the sleeve stripes), their 1926-27 jersey, and the Chicago Cougars jerseys.  I also used red pants and their retro logo (with some modifications).

St. Louis Blues:  I wasn't going for a retro look for this jersey, but I did use their old trumpet logo (again with some modifications though).  I used their double blue colour scheme, but without any yellow.  The striping pattern is modelled after their 1998-2007 jerseys.  (I got some suggestions when this was posted on HJC saying I should add yellow.  I agree it would be more realistic, but when I tried I couldn't get it to look right).

Blues, Bolts, and Leafs

As promised, here is the next NHL Redesign post.

St. Louis Blues:  The home and road are a inspired by their early jerseys, but with their current colours.  The third jersey is the lighter blue, and it features sublimated music-staff striping.

Tampa Bay Lightning:  The primary jerseys are updated versions of their original jerseys.  I used their original "Hawaiian blue", and their current logos.  The third is completely black and white (which would be the first black and white jersey in the NHL since 1934).

Toronto Maple Leafs:  The home and road have no changes.  The third jersey is a faux-back jersey, which features the old "T" logo inside of their vintage leaf.

I don't know if anyone here is also following this series on CCSLC, but there have been some updates based on their comments.  I will post all the updates here after this series is complete.  The final three teams are next.

My Concept History

A special post today about the history of my concepts.  The execution is pretty bad on some of these, but please don't laugh.

I first starting making concepts near the end of 2009, when my local minor hockey association got new jerseys.  These "concepts" were basically me recolouring jersey from The Hockey Uniform Database, like this Team USA concept from January 2010.

A few months later I found the website Icethetics, and I took someone's concept to make a better template.  Here is a St. Louis Blues concept I made in May 2010, using that template.

Later that year I found a cleaner template, and decided to attempt an NHL series.  That series was very incomplete, I only made concepts for about half the teams, and many of the concepts were incomplete.  This Canucks concept from July 2010, and this Ducks concept from November 2010, are from that NHL series.

By the beginning of 2011 I had started using a brand new template.  This new template was a lot harder to use, but I thought it looked better.  I also didn't put numbers on my jerseys, because the numbers for the other template were to small.  This Predators jersey from February 2011, was my prediction of what their new jerseys for 2011-12 would look like.

I was still using the older template as well, and in March, when it looked like the Coyotes might move to Winnipeg, I sent Icethetics this concept.  This was my first concept posted on the Internet.

Image from Icethetics

Then two months later, when we knew the Thrashers were moving to Winnipeg, I sent in this concept to Hockey Jersey Concepts.  This was my first concept on HJC.

By summer 2011 I almost quit making concepts.  It just took too much time to create a concept on the template I was using.  Finally, by the end of August, I decided to switch back to my old template, and use my name and number on the back to save time.  I also made an attempt at an NHL series.  This Sabres concept from September 2011 was from that series (which I didn't complete).

For Christmas 2011 I got a new Laptop, and downloaded Paint.net (previously I was using MS Paint).  I also added a double outline to my concepts, and started posting concepts to CCSLC.  This Stars concept was from January 2012.

Most recently I started another NHL series, which I will complete, and I started this blog.  I hope you enjoyed reading about the history of my concepts.  The next NHL Redesign will be posted in a few days.