Why Merion's Wicker Basket Logo Captivates Every Golfer Who Sees It
Walk into Merion Golf Club's pro shop during the 126th U.S. Amateur, and you'll find yourself surrounded by something far more compelling than typical tournament merchandise. Every polo, every pullover, every ball marker bears the same distinctive mark: a red-and-white striped stick topped with a wicker basket, set against a spray of scotch broom. It's a logo that stops you mid-stride, demands a second look, and somehow makes you reach for your wallet.
The Rare Magic of an Unforgettable Emblem
Most golf club logos exist somewhere between forgettable and serviceable. They're corporate exercises in shield-making, predictable compositions of crossed clubs and founding dates that blur together after you've seen a few hundred of them. But then there are the rare ones—the marks that transcend their function as branding and become something closer to art.
Augusta National's outline needs no introduction. Sleepy Hollow's headless horseman tells a story before you've hit a shot. Maidstone's spouting whale captures the Long Island coast in a single image. Merion's wicker basket belongs in this exclusive company, and this week in Ardmore, Pennsylvania, its power is on full display.
Jack Davis, Merion's director of golf, owns approximately 70 shirts bearing the logo and another 30 pieces of outerwear. His hat collection has grown beyond any reasonable count. And yet, as he told me, even the staff here never grows tired of it. "Even for us, we're not desensitized to it," Davis said. That's the test of truly great design—it rewards attention rather than punishing it.
A Logo Born from a Window View
The emblem's origin story is wonderfully simple. Around 1970, longtime golf professional Bill Kittleman was gazing out the pro shop window when a particular scene caught his eye: a wicker-basket flagstick rising against a burst of yellow-green scotch broom. It was a view as essentially Merion as anything could be—the club has used wicker baskets instead of traditional flags since 1915—and Kittleman recognized that it deserved to be captured.
The resulting design is masterfully clean. The red-and-white striped stick grounds the composition. The red basket provides a focal point. The scotch broom adds organic texture and, in spring, a pop of yellow that Davis says brings the logo to life in three dimensions on the actual course. "In May, I actually see that picture," he explained. "It pops and it's yellow and it's amazing."
What Makes It Work
Great logos communicate something essential about a place without requiring explanation. Merion's emblem achieves this perfectly. Those wicker baskets are genuinely unusual—how many courses can claim such a distinctive flagstick?—and the scotch broom speaks to the club's botanical character, its connection to the Scottish origins of the game, its sense of place.
The design also scales beautifully. It works on a massive banner hanging over the first tee and on a tiny ball marker in your pocket. It looks equally at home carved into a wooden door or printed on a napkin.
Wicker Everywhere at the Amateur
This week, the logo has colonized every corner of the grounds. It appears on course signage, dining room napkins, bathroom hand towels, and the step-and-repeat in the media center. At the Wicker Bar near the first tee—where three actual wicker flagsticks are mounted on the wall—bartenders pour cold beer into logo-branded mugs from wicker-themed taps.
In the pro shop, the merchandise runs from expected to inspired: polos, pullovers, visors, bottle openers, leather footballs, even replica ceramic mugs from the Wicker Bar for $45. When Davis interviewed for his position, he asked what the club's signature drink was. "There really wasn't an answer," he recalled. "It was like, 'Whatever's served in this mug.'" The vessel itself had become the experience.
The Takeaway
Merion's logo endures because it tells the truth about a place unlike any other. It captures something you can only experience by walking the grounds—the strange delight of spotting those wicker baskets against the sky, the yellow scotch broom blazing in late spring, the sense that this corner of Philadelphia has been doing things its own way for more than a century.
For the young amateurs competing this week, many of whom are experiencing Merion for the first time, that logo will become a souvenir not just of a tournament but of a feeling. And they'll want to take it home. Everyone does.