Los Angeles FC

Los Angeles Football Club (LAFC) might be one of the newer faces in Major League Soccer – founded in 2014 and playing its first season in 2018 – but it has rapidly become an iconic USA team. In this #GetTheBadgeIn fan feature, we’ll dive into what makes LAFC special: from its passionate fan culture, to the distinctive winged crest logo, and the deep connections with the City of Angels that fuel the club’s identity.

LAFC was awarded an MLS expansion franchise in late 2014, giving Los Angeles a fresh start in pro soccer after the demise of the former Chivas USA. The club spent the next few years building from scratch – literally constructing its own 22,000-seat stadium in the heart of the city and signing Mexican star forward Carlos Vela as its first marquee player. This was all very clever. LA had an MLS team in LA Galaxy (of David Beckham fame), but they played some distance outside the city centre – by positioning themselves right in the centre of the city (their stadium is next door to the famous LA Memorial Stadium, built in 1921 and used in the 1932 and 1984 (and scheduled for 2028) Olympics). By signing Vela, they immediately won over a huge chunk of the Latino community in LA. Overnight, they became the city’s main team.

The new crosstown rivalry against the older LA Galaxy is nicknamed El Tráfico – which is superb. In fact, their derby clashes have drawn massive crowds – including 82,110 fans at the Rose Bowl on July 4, 2023, a new MLS single-game attendance record.

A few years later, the club reached the pinnacle of US soccer by winning its first MLS Cup championship in 2022, which led to a Supporters’ Shield/MLS Cup “double” that year.

Equally important in LAFC’s story is the fan culture that sprang up around the club from day one. The club’s independent supporters’ union, known collectively as “The 3252,” formed even before the first match and has become the beating heart of LAFC’s game-day experience. (The name “3252” comes from the safe-standing supporter section’s capacity of 3,252; interestingly, if you add 3+2+5+2 it equals 12 – a nod to the “12th man” and homage to the supporters themselves.) Week after week, in the North End of BMO Stadium, the 3252 create a raucous wall of noise and colour – even for sceptical European fans – it is quite an impressive sight. You’ll hear songs in English, Spanish, and even Korean, reflecting the diverse Los Angeles community.

So what about that badge then? It is a good-looking one.

The crest is a sleek black shield outlined in gold, with the bold letters “LA” stylised in an Art Deco-inspired font. Notably, the “A” is adorned with a wing sweeping back from its top. The wing is a deliberate homage to Los Angeles’ nickname, the “City of Angels”. The wing design also carries a historical nod: it harkens back to the winged eagle crest of the Los Angeles Aztecs, a 1970s NASL team, connecting LAFC to the city’s soccer heritage.

“City of Angels” is obviously derived from the city’s name – which in turn comes from the original Spanish name for the settlement, which was quite a mouthful – known as El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles de Porciúncula (The Town of Our Lady the Queen of the Angels on the Porciúncula River). The ‘Lady the Queen of the Angels’ is a long way of saying ‘The Virgin Mary’.

Why a Spanish name in the first place? Well before the USA expanded, this area became known as ‘New Spain’. In 1769, Spanish explorers and missionaries began travelling north from Mexico to claim land, build missions, and spread Christianity. One of their goals was to create Catholic missions, military forts (called presidios), and settlements (pueblos) to keep control over the territory and convert the Indigenous peoples to Christianity. In 1781, a group of settlers — including people of Spanish, Indigenous, and African backgrounds — founded the city of LA.

Beyond the wing, every element of the crest ties back to Los Angeles. The shield shape itself is derived from the official Seal of the City of Los Angeles, giving the logo civic pride and authority. Even the typography has an LA flair: the club chose a typeface inspired by Art Deco architecture (specifically, the work of L.A. architect Richard Neutra), a nod to the city’s rich collection of 1920s Art Deco buildings downtown (which is similar to Inter Miami).

LAFC’s colours further reflect the club’s identity and its hometown. The gold adds a touch of Hollywood glitz (which is also included in its ownership group – which includes the likes of Will Ferrell and Magic Johnson). In just a few years, that winged LA logo has become a badge of honour around the city, as recognisable to locals as any Hollywood logo.

LA is the second-largest city in the USA (after New York). Its location made it perfect for tourism and then, in the early 1900s, it became the centre of the emerging film industry – bringing in more people and investment. The Port of Los Angeles was developed and is now one of the biggest ports in the world, and is the USA’s main gateway to the Pacific and Asia. During the Second World War, LA benefited from large investments in aerospace, which in turn then fed into the Cold War’s Space Race, and LA became one of the major centres for NASA and rocket development.

Such a diverse and successful city needs a diverse and successful football team.

In LAFC, they may have just got one.