More cartoon icons please

 

I took this photo in a plane WC a few years ago. If only all warning signs could emote like this. 

Now you got it

 Thanks to Annetta Cheek for this, from Yellowstone National Park.

Well you did ask

 

Icons as rhetoric

What's the rhetorical function of this sign in Hong Kong? It's not a warning, but an instruction. 

And these deer in a recent New Yorker cartoon also reckon their sign is an instruction.

 

Men in hats, take note

I think this sign, seen in Munich, means "If you've had too much to drink, you'd better take the metro home".

Can't you read?

 

It's an internet meme, I know, but I can't resist. 

That'll tell 'em

I recently saw this bridge in Lisburn, Northern Ireland - you have to ask: how big does this sign have to be? I can imagine each time it's hit, they make a new sign, each one bigger than the last.

The problem is that all communication requires a contribution by the reader. On your day off, driving your car, this sign does not address you. But if you forget that you're driving a double decker bus, it doesn't matter how big the sign is. It's all about relevance.

10.30am

This sign outside a church in Bath shows good design thinking. 

It's on a busy road but drivers might glance across.

We know it's a church. We know they meet on Sundays. The only thing that's worth saying legibly enough to be read at a glance is '10.30am'. And the sheer size of it gives a strong affordance of 'you're invited'.

The meaning of life?

On a church door in Italy. 

I know that's supposed to be a tourist guide in the top icon, but having just emerged from the Uffizi I'd seen a lot of images with a larger central figure with raised hand and a halo...

Incidentally, that's a man's hat in the icon - women are fine with hats, and in fact St Paul insisted on them.

No thunderbolts

 

Bearing in mind this is outside a church, who exactly is the No Thunderbolts sign on the bottom row directed at? Zeus no longer lives here.

Friendly prohibitions

I love a friendly sign, when you're in a friendly place like a garden. 

Things you can't do, drawn nicely

Visiting the Uffizi in Florence, it was refreshing to see graphic prohibitions that don't try to be traffic signs. I don't think I've seen this way of showing a negative on a public sign before (rather than a smartphone app).

On not jumping to conclusions

We thought it pretty odd to find a You Are Here map just outside the gents at Pisa airport. But then we noticed the tactile path leading to it. It's a 3D map for people with sight impairment. So pretty good.

Icon grammar

 

Double negatives are controversial. Pedants may think that 'I didn't do nothing' means 'I did it', but we all know the second negative is an intensifier.

So hopefully this doesn't come across as 'Don't use the litter bin'. But risky.

Covid19 notices and their tone

Equal opportunity icons at River Island.

You can't tell if people are smiling under a mask. In this case I suspect not.

Do you ever need the word Notice? It started as a verb (as in 'take notice' or 'look!') but now it's a noun. And it's a waste of a headline. 

 

Too Much Information Did Not Read

Way Too Much Information Did Not Read

Linking safety to the reason you're here. Some churches are using 'Stay safe. Love one another'. Also nice.

Fair comment

Public signs should include a comments section, or in this case some FAQs to explain why this road is closed but no work is happening (Margate again). 

 

Maybe

Don't you just love a decisive notice? Seen on a recent trip to Margate.

 

Things you can't do in Madeira

Following the popular series of posts 'Things you can't do...' (2013), here's what we weren't allowed to do in Madeira last year.

I particularly like 'no walking on stilts near ladies', and 'don't do a poo while walking on water', although it meant the holiday wasn't much fun.

This is a sign

Looking back at those huge but ineffectual anti-Brexit marches, at least the signs were great. I particularly liked this one which wasn't picked up in the press coverage (yes, I was there so now you know what I think of Brexit).

The opposite of No Entry

I saw this sign more than once on a recent visit to Denmark - this is in the art museum in Aarhus. A nice idea, possibly a bit like an 'on' switch, and in colour and orientation the opposite of 'no entry'... but is it actually an improvement on an arrow?