Marc Jacobs and Nirvana Settle Lawsuit Over Smiley Face Logo

After six years of litigation, Nirvana has settled its lawsuit against Marc Jacobs over its use of an illustration strikingly similar to its signature “X”-eyed smiley face logo. In a notice filed in Los Angeles federal court on Tuesday, attorneys for both entities stated that they had accepted a proposal to end the longstanding case, though the terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The rock band first filed the lawsuit against Marc Jacobs in 2018, when the brand released its “Bootleg Redux Grunge” T-shirts and sweatshirts, which featured happy face graphics that Nirvana claimed violated its trademark.

At the time, the group’s initial complaint stated that Marc Jacobs’ “use of Nirvana’s copyrighted image on and to promote its products is intentional and is part and parcel of a wider campaign to associate the entire ‘Bootleg Redux Grunge’ collection with Nirvana, one of the founders of the ‘Grunge’ musical genre, so as to make the ‘Grunge’ association with the collection more authentic.”

Shortly after the complaint was filed, artist Robert Fisher came forward and stated he was the creator and owner of the design, a claim which Nirvana’s attorneys called “factually and legally baseless.” Marc Jacobs then countersued the band in 2019, claiming that the copyright claim was not valid because Nirvana could not verify the logo’s creator.

The band’s lawyers remained firm on their original claim, which stated that the late Kurt Cobain created the iconography. In the case that Fisher did create the logo, Nirvana’s legal team believed that it would have occurred while he was employed as an art director at Geffen, making it the label’s property.

Judge Kronstadt sided with Nirvana on those claims in December and later denied Fisher’s request to appeal the ruling.