Icon Design & Visual Literacy

You may not know Jon Hicks but you’ve likely seen his work as the graphic designer of Firefox, MailChimp and Shopify logos.

In 2012, he published a book entitled ‘The Icon Handbook’ - it’s a great primer and culimination of two years of work and guides you through the process of designing icons - from identifying an appropriate metaphor to drawing symbols through to the practicalities of implementation. Best of all, he is providing it free of charge on the basis that quite a lot of the content has aged although that does not apply to many of the foundational principles.

Even if you’re not interested in creating your own icons, the chapters on history, metaphor and use are valuable and accessible to a non-design audience.

Warning systems rely on icons to overcome language barriers and issues with translation so understanding the design process can only inform better briefs and more effective design.