For the love of icons
Icons play an important role in a variety of graphic design disciplines from way-finding to UI design. They distill a concept down to a single, straight-forward, easy to understand graphic illustration. Icons breakdown language barriers, and guide everyone everywhere. Need to find the restroom? Or the stairs? Elevator? There’s an icon for that. Need to fill up the tank of the rental car before returning it to Hertz? There’s an icon for that. Need to view the items in your Amazon cart? Boom. Shopping cart icon.
And even though the use of icons can be traced back to the ancient Egyptians’ hieroglyphic language, it’s this last example, personal computing, websites, e-commerce, etc. and the amount of time we spend on screens, that we encounter icons every day, every hour, with every email or text message we send. Icons are at the forefront of our collective cultural conscience more than ever.
As such, they have become an important part of a brand’s visual language and identity. Here are some icons from brands you know. These icons are such an inherent part of the brands’ visual identities that you’ll be able to identity the brand by the icons alone.
Google uses icons to differentiate it’s suite of products within its graphical user interface.
Dunkin’ uses icons throughout their packaging and advertising. It is as much part of their visual identity at this point as the logo itself.
“Icons are at the forefront of our collective cultural conscience more than ever.”
At Studio Eighty Seven, we often design and build icons for our clients. Here are some of our favorite examples.
WILSON WOLFE REAL ESTATE
Wilson wolfe real estate icons for their “You’re Golden” guidebook, a guide for their clients to find trusted vendors.
Icons were created as part of the trupros website design to add variety to the design.
ICONS WERE also used with a sense of humor on the back of vehicles to distinguish the service provided.
These icons for child behavior choices are more illustrative. Again, they were created to add variety to the website design. The icon on the left represents connection and bonding, the center is learning, and the right confidence.
Studio Eighty Seven creates new icon concepts, and helps create new icons that are part of an already established system. Reach out to us today if you need help with icon design.
