Design Digest #36: Icons Usability, Home as the New Creative Space & Intercom + AI
This digest was collected by Oleh Idolov, Pavlo Sidash, Mirona Zulgarina, Angelica Yefanova, Nika Kosmina and Awesomic.
Discuss the digest in the comments, and sign up for the updates!
🦄 Product and UI/UX Design
Articles & Case Studies
Maintaining a design system in Figma | Lukas Oppermann
A design reset (part I) | Linear
The Essential Guide to matching icons with typefaces | Icon University
Top 10 Cognitive Biases in Product Design | UX Planet
Zero UI: What it is and its modern use cases | Eric Chung
Unlocking Icon Usability: Insights from Cognitive Psychology | Dr Maria Panagiotidi
How to design AI interfaces to improve user choices | UX Planet
12 Design Recommendations for Calculator and Quiz Tools | NN Group
5 design system examples (and what you can learn from them) | Paula Tienza
A good image tells a good story | iA
Designing the new era of Teams | Microsoft
UX Design Is Rapidly Changing — Can You Keep Up? | Punit Chawla for Muzli
AI UX-Design Tools Are Not Ready for Primetime: Status Update | NN Group
Design systems 102: How to build your design system | Chad Bergman fro Figms
Rethinking personas: Empathy and inclusion in UX design | UX Collective
The Wizard of Oz Method in UX | NN Group
Planning Research with Generative AI | NN Group
Iconography In Design Systems: Easy Troubleshooting And Maintenance | Smashing Magazine
Projects
Intercom – The new age of customer service is AI-first
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Limitless AI – Personalized AI powered by what you’ve seen, said, and heard
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Qudrix – your personal office space that meets all needs. In one place | O0 Design
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RayRaylab is a one-person agency from Republic of Korea | RayRaylab
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TERRA is a companion for mindful wandering
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Flareum – Design System Builder | Glyph
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SCRIB3 is the cutting-edge marketing studio serving crypto and web3 companies | Studio Freight
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100 years of Columbia Pictures | Watson Design Group, Inc. PRO, Exo Ape PRO
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Wright's Ferry Mansion is a historic house museum located in central Pennsylvania | Bom Bom
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Harbour App – UI/UX Design for British neobank | LEAGUE Design Agency
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👀 Visual Communication
Articles and case studies
Dazed and Ikea’s zine explores what home means to young creatives | Creative Review
All you need for good design is a pencil and your brain | The Brand Identity
Elizabeth Goodspeed on how signs remind us of design beyond the screen | It’s Nice That
Salome Frenzel on why entering the industry as a freelancer was the perfect choice | The Brand Identity
Audio Erotica traces the evolution of hi-fi brochures | Creative Review
Does the design have an ego problem? | It’s Nice That
Airbnb gives you the chance to stay in Disney & Pixar's most iconic home, and it floats | Creative Boom
Turning a complex document into a thing of beauty: Codea Studio designs UCLG’s Pact for the Future | The Brand Identity
15 of the Best Book Covers of the Month: April 2024 | Print Mag
Nature is an artist! Inside AKQA’s design for mammoth Spotify and UN project, Sounds Right | It's Nice That
Projects
Venice Biennale stunt reminds people of the daily reality of war | Bickerstaff.734
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The identity for the New York Times’ staff conference balances motion and legibility | CC Studio
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Headspace overhauls visual identity to become mental health all-rounder | In-house
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Jesús López rebrands a boutique Mexican hotel to reflect its local history and landscape | Jesús López
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Floow Tennis Club’s Branding and Visual Identity Redesign | Studio sch_
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Branding and Visual Identity in Ostraka’s Pottery Art | In-house
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Crafting a Modular Identity: BONELESS Branding Deconstructed | Han Gao
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Thick Pickle | Studyhall
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Barnardo’s | The Clearing
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Casa Llimona | Atipus
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Project Restore | Christopher Doyle & Co.
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Mesura | Carlos Mayo, Sara Pinilla
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Swiss Museum of Games | Hymn Design
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Aruba Conservation Foundation’s rebrand gives nature a voice | How&How
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Whirl | Good Habit Studio
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Unlocking Creative Potential: Inside Dropbox’s ‘Blank Space’ Design Summit | Print Mag
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Build the Tiny Food Village of Your Dreams with Cafe de Papa’s Street Kiosk Packaging | The Dieline
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Apple Juice Has Never Looked Cooler Than It Does in This Stylish Norwegian Design | The Dieline
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🔠 Typography
Exploring Waffle Typeface: Typography Blend of Sans and Serif | Abduzeedo
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Type knitter Rüdiger Schlömer makes fonts for screens and jumpers | It’s Nice That
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Arthur Teboul Zaïane on incorporating data and diagrams into the design process | It’s Nice That
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Proto-typography: how type is dictated by the surface it’s written on | It’s Nice That
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The Art & Science of Typography in 100 Principles | Print Mag
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The Daily Heller: A Big Hand for Arthur Szyk’s Lettering and Calligraphy | Print Mag
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Typeface release: Tegner | Linda Hintz
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Polymath | OH no Type Company
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In The Name Of Typography | Max Shirko
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What does a head of typography do? | Tim Brown, Adobe
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🏇Motion Design
Articles and case studies
Never Sit Still shakes up self-promotion with an animated anti-showreel | Creative Boom
Guide to UI Animations, Micro-Interactions and Modern Tools | Elizabeth Alli
How ChatGPT Can Spark Animation Creativity and Improve the Customer Experience | The Lab @ Apply Digital
Projects
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The Art Department festival shows us the beauty of creative mistakes | Form Play Studio
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Inner State| Kyifornia
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👩🚀 Productivity, Career Growth, and Design Management
How to reframe your frustrations | SCOTT BERKUN
Our journey into complexity via Service Design | IBM Design
One simple way Apple could improve your sleep habits | growth.design
Visionary Leadership — and How Not To Bungle It: The Case of Emperor Maximilian | Jaime Martínez Bowness
Engineering Better Workplaces: Bringing Systems Thinking to the Human Capital Challenge | Carin-Isabel Knoop (on Humans in the Digital Era)
Top 5 Learnings After Mentoring 100 Startups | Daniel Rizea
How to Keep Your Team’s Morale High | Vinita
🚀 Products and Tools
Figma
Meet multi-edit: Editing as it should be | Figma
At Framework, Figma’s design systems event, they launched Code Connect and other new features to empower teams to drive design systems adoption.
100 Figma Design Tips | Figma Blog
Other
Meet Subframe – The best way to build UI, fast
Framer components inspired by Dieter Rams' design principles | Framer
Top 15 Free AI Animation Tools To Bring Your Animations To Life | Emmanuel Crown
Fable Prism – Control of Generative AI
Deblank Colors – Inspirational color palettes
Also
"I'm not talented enough to do art..." | Sam Hardacre
Intranet Feedback Features (video) | NN Group
Just show up. | Joan Westenberg
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🤪 Memes
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This digest was collected by Oleh Idolov, Pavlo Sidash, Mirona Zulgarina, Angelica Yefanova, Nika Kosmina and Awesomic.
Discuss the digest in the comments, and sign up for the updates!
🦄 Product and UI/UX Design
Articles & Case Studies
Maintaining a design system in Figma | Lukas Oppermann
A design reset (part I) | Linear
The Essential Guide to matching icons with typefaces | Icon University
Top 10 Cognitive Biases in Product Design | UX Planet
Zero UI: What it is and its modern use cases | Eric Chung
Unlocking Icon Usability: Insights from Cognitive Psychology | Dr Maria Panagiotidi
How to design AI interfaces to improve user choices | UX Planet
12 Design Recommendations for Calculator and Quiz Tools | NN Group
5 design system examples (and what you can learn from them) | Paula Tienza
A good image tells a good story | iA
Designing the new era of Teams | Microsoft
UX Design Is Rapidly Changing — Can You Keep Up? | Punit Chawla for Muzli
AI UX-Design Tools Are Not Ready for Primetime: Status Update | NN Group
Design systems 102: How to build your design system | Chad Bergman fro Figms
Rethinking personas: Empathy and inclusion in UX design | UX Collective
The Wizard of Oz Method in UX | NN Group
Planning Research with Generative AI | NN Group
Iconography In Design Systems: Easy Troubleshooting And Maintenance | Smashing Magazine
Projects
Intercom – The new age of customer service is AI-first
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Limitless AI – Personalized AI powered by what you’ve seen, said, and heard
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Qudrix – your personal office space that meets all needs. In one place | O0 Design
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RayRaylab is a one-person agency from Republic of Korea | RayRaylab
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TERRA is a companion for mindful wandering
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Flareum – Design System Builder | Glyph
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SCRIB3 is the cutting-edge marketing studio serving crypto and web3 companies | Studio Freight
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100 years of Columbia Pictures | Watson Design Group, Inc. PRO, Exo Ape PRO
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Wright's Ferry Mansion is a historic house museum located in central Pennsylvania | Bom Bom
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Harbour App – UI/UX Design for British neobank | LEAGUE Design Agency
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👀 Visual Communication
Articles and case studies
Dazed and Ikea’s zine explores what home means to young creatives | Creative Review
All you need for good design is a pencil and your brain | The Brand Identity
Elizabeth Goodspeed on how signs remind us of design beyond the screen | It’s Nice That
Salome Frenzel on why entering the industry as a freelancer was the perfect choice | The Brand Identity
Audio Erotica traces the evolution of hi-fi brochures | Creative Review
Does the design have an ego problem? | It’s Nice That
Airbnb gives you the chance to stay in Disney & Pixar's most iconic home, and it floats | Creative Boom
Turning a complex document into a thing of beauty: Codea Studio designs UCLG’s Pact for the Future | The Brand Identity
15 of the Best Book Covers of the Month: April 2024 | Print Mag
Nature is an artist! Inside AKQA’s design for mammoth Spotify and UN project, Sounds Right | It's Nice That
Projects
Venice Biennale stunt reminds people of the daily reality of war | Bickerstaff.734
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The identity for the New York Times’ staff conference balances motion and legibility | CC Studio
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Headspace overhauls visual identity to become mental health all-rounder | In-house
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Jesús López rebrands a boutique Mexican hotel to reflect its local history and landscape | Jesús López
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Floow Tennis Club’s Branding and Visual Identity Redesign | Studio sch_
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Branding and Visual Identity in Ostraka’s Pottery Art | In-house
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Crafting a Modular Identity: BONELESS Branding Deconstructed | Han Gao
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Thick Pickle | Studyhall
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Barnardo’s | The Clearing
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Casa Llimona | Atipus
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Project Restore | Christopher Doyle & Co.
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Mesura | Carlos Mayo, Sara Pinilla
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Swiss Museum of Games | Hymn Design
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Aruba Conservation Foundation’s rebrand gives nature a voice | How&How
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Whirl | Good Habit Studio
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Unlocking Creative Potential: Inside Dropbox’s ‘Blank Space’ Design Summit | Print Mag
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Build the Tiny Food Village of Your Dreams with Cafe de Papa’s Street Kiosk Packaging | The Dieline
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Apple Juice Has Never Looked Cooler Than It Does in This Stylish Norwegian Design | The Dieline
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🔠 Typography
Exploring Waffle Typeface: Typography Blend of Sans and Serif | Abduzeedo
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Type knitter Rüdiger Schlömer makes fonts for screens and jumpers | It’s Nice That
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Arthur Teboul Zaïane on incorporating data and diagrams into the design process | It’s Nice That
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Proto-typography: how type is dictated by the surface it’s written on | It’s Nice That
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The Art & Science of Typography in 100 Principles | Print Mag
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The Daily Heller: A Big Hand for Arthur Szyk’s Lettering and Calligraphy | Print Mag
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Typeface release: Tegner | Linda Hintz
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Polymath | OH no Type Company
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In The Name Of Typography | Max Shirko
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What does a head of typography do? | Tim Brown, Adobe
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🏇Motion Design
Articles and case studies
Never Sit Still shakes up self-promotion with an animated anti-showreel | Creative Boom
Guide to UI Animations, Micro-Interactions and Modern Tools | Elizabeth Alli
How ChatGPT Can Spark Animation Creativity and Improve the Customer Experience | The Lab @ Apply Digital
Projects
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The Art Department festival shows us the beauty of creative mistakes | Form Play Studio
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Inner State| Kyifornia
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👩🚀 Productivity, Career Growth, and Design Management
How to reframe your frustrations | SCOTT BERKUN
Our journey into complexity via Service Design | IBM Design
One simple way Apple could improve your sleep habits | growth.design
Visionary Leadership — and How Not To Bungle It: The Case of Emperor Maximilian | Jaime Martínez Bowness
Engineering Better Workplaces: Bringing Systems Thinking to the Human Capital Challenge | Carin-Isabel Knoop (on Humans in the Digital Era)
Top 5 Learnings After Mentoring 100 Startups | Daniel Rizea
How to Keep Your Team’s Morale High | Vinita
🚀 Products and Tools
Figma
Meet multi-edit: Editing as it should be | Figma
At Framework, Figma’s design systems event, they launched Code Connect and other new features to empower teams to drive design systems adoption.
100 Figma Design Tips | Figma Blog
Other
Meet Subframe – The best way to build UI, fast
Framer components inspired by Dieter Rams' design principles | Framer
Top 15 Free AI Animation Tools To Bring Your Animations To Life | Emmanuel Crown
Fable Prism – Control of Generative AI
Deblank Colors – Inspirational color palettes
Also
"I'm not talented enough to do art..." | Sam Hardacre
Intranet Feedback Features (video) | NN Group
Just show up. | Joan Westenberg
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🤪 Memes
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Awesomic is an open-minded team of people who are changing the way of getting design done. It’s the right place for professional design growth and a great spot for motivated individuals. And for humor, of course!
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