Smashing Community Icon Set: Comment and Win!
Ready for this? Here’s how it works: you tell us what icons you need, and then we design them together with SoftFacade (which recently created the beautiful Smashing Retro Icon Set) and release them for free. And to make it a bit more interesting, we’ll smash six commenters and forum participants with original nerdy gifts.
To participate, just suggest an idea for a great useful icon set in the comments to this post or in this forum thread. Details are below.
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How do I participate?
Participating is very easy: just let us know what icon set you would like us to design (and, if possible, what specific icons the set should contain) in the comments to this post or in this forum thread. The set may contain at most eight icons.
On the 20th of March, we’ll select the most popular ideas and requests and publish a poll in our magazine, inviting our readers to vote on their favorite theme. Once it’s done, the creative minds behind SoftFacade will carefully design the set and submit drafts of its work in progress to the forum, documenting the design process. Hence, you can observe how the set is created and, if there is something you would like to change, communicate with the designers directly. You can keep track of updates on Twitter @smashingmag and @softfacade.
Awards
A total of six commenters and active participants in the forum will be awarded Mac Dock Icon Throw Pillows (see images below). The winners will be picked randomly and announced in the forum and on Twitter after the theme of the icon set has been chosen.
Finally, we’ll release the set as a free download, which you can freely use for personal and commercial use.
Smashing Magazine Is All About Our Readers
At Smashing Magazine, our readers have always been our highest priority. We respect our readers; we listen to them; we are always open to their suggestions; and we always appreciate constructive criticism. This is why we created a number of ways to interact with our readers:
- We created a friendly Smashing Forum to make it possible for our community to exchange ideas and help each other in problem solving.
- We are using Twitter to share useful resources and knowledge with, and get feedback from, our readers (e.g. deciding which article should appear next), and we now have almost 20,000 followers.
- We are preparing the Smashing Book, in which our readers can decide what topics will be included.
And now we would like you to decide what icon set we should design and release next, especially for you. We hope to get great feedback from you, and we would like to thank SoftFacade for its cooperation in this event! Please spread the word, too; we would like the design community to decide what would be most useful and interesting for designers out there!
So, what icon set is it going to be, folks?
(al)




Scott Brown
March 19th, 2009 3:05 amSome nice smooth e-commerce icons would be good. A bit of uniformity between e-commerce sites can only be a good thing. Aids usability, breeds confidence and recognition in the user etc.
I notice a few requests for portfolio icons. Surely if you’re doing a portfolio you should make your own! There are enough blog and social network ones these days as well, grunge, 3D, web 2.0 styles etc, they’re all out there.
Nathan
March 19th, 2009 3:11 amPins. A nice and simple set of pins for customising Google maps. Those default ones are horrid.
Laurel Natale
March 19th, 2009 3:18 amI think a set of Marketing icons would be nice. Internet Marketing, Print Marketing, Viral Marketing, Guerilla Marketing, Buzz Marketing, and so forth. These could be used by web design companies, freelancers, portfolios to show type of marketing used in examples or case studies, in marketing and design blogs, or to give the readers a little hint about the type of article they will be reading about. I haven’t seen any yet on the web, and I think a collection would be nice.
Michael
March 19th, 2009 3:19 amIcons for PHP, JS, Grafic, HTML, CSS files
Martin S.
March 19th, 2009 3:24 amLooking at the financial crisis and it´s lasting effects, an icon set dealing with stocks, business and charts would be cool. Pretty hard to create some coherent icons for this rather complex subject.
Laurel Natale
March 19th, 2009 3:35 amA set of Marketing icons would be nice such as:
Internet Marketing
Print Marketing
Word-of-Mouth Marketing
Guerilla Marketing
Buzz Marketing
Viral Marketing
Traditional Marketing
And so forth…
I haven’t seen anything like these yet, and I think web design companies could use them as well as freelancers, bloggers, etc.. They could be used as service icons, or in portfolios and case studies to demonstrate type of marketing used. Marketing bloggers can use them to give hint as to which type of marketing the article is talking about. I think a lot can be done with these.
R Correia
March 19th, 2009 3:41 amGreat initiative, I would like to see a icon set of programming languages, it would be very useful and I would like to see how it turns out, in the end being a strict theme…
Cristiano
March 19th, 2009 3:45 amGreat!
I need a set of icons for a website deailng with soccer game!
The site has a funny tone, so informal icons are very well appreciated!
;)
Andrei
March 19th, 2009 3:48 amEdited
Andrei
March 19th, 2009 3:50 amI would like a set of icons related to flying like airplanes, airports, tickets, icons of popular destinations: Paris, New York, Moscow, Sao Paolo, Budapest, Vienna, Madrid, etc.
Great contest idea.
Diogo Duarte
March 19th, 2009 3:55 amWell…well .. First I would like to congratulate SM for the iniciative.
The icon set I’d like to have is about the Graphic Design and Web Design themselves… I think I’ve never seen any of this kind of set…
And would be great have them so as we could use on our sites or computers. If I’m not asking too much some “TECH GEEK” icons would be inserted in the set too… I’d love have this ICON SET!
(sorry for english)
Kamil
March 19th, 2009 3:59 amfood & nutrition set please, I need it for yesterday ;-) You can also make some fat people avatars for me :)
Marcio Rocon
March 19th, 2009 4:19 amThose mac pillows look good for me, they look soft te he he
Frits
March 19th, 2009 4:25 amA set of icons for general website navigation would be nice. Most icon sets contain some usefull icons, but also lack a few. Icons that I would like are:
Home
E-mail
Search
Login
Forward
Back
Photo’s
Calendar
Alaibn
March 19th, 2009 4:26 amSubject: Film animation technique
Icons to identify:
01. Workshops
02. Videos
03. PDF to download
04. Podcast to download
05. Forum
06. Tutorials
07. Software review
08. Teachers lounge
09. Students work
10. Links
11. Theater (to view films done by students)
12. Gallery (production stills)
Francois Botha
March 19th, 2009 4:28 amI’d actually like a set of icons that relates to the services an ISP would offer, e.g.
* E-mail
* WWW hosting
* VoIP
* Hardware setup
* Web login
* The above for both business and personal packages.
* Contact us, FAQ, etc
* Anything else you can think of
I imagine that these icons could be based on web.png of the Flavours icon set.
John McMullen
March 19th, 2009 4:29 amHmm… I think I saw a posting or two on this, but I’ve got a little twist. How about a food based icon set… ie: an orange with skin cut to reveal a RSS feed icon.
Mel
March 19th, 2009 4:30 amI think account icons suggested by JessicaB or sea based icons suggested by parsifal would be great. I have a marine life website [portuguese only, for now!] and a think sea icons would awesome! :)
Anyway, thanks again, Smashing Magazine, for this amazing oportunity!
Alex
March 19th, 2009 4:32 amDifferent Adium Icons!!! :)
MicheleB
March 19th, 2009 4:38 amHow about something a little outside of the tech and design realm…
Paint Theme
Airbrush
Paint Brush
Paint Can
Spilled Paint
etc
Or mechanical/motorhead theme:
Engine block
Tires
Wrenches
etc
I also think Bryant’s idea is great…
Bryant (March 18th, 2009, 11:57 am)
A nice set of modern or grunge motorcycle or streetbike icons would be nice. There doesn’t seem to be any created as of yet that I have been able to locate.
jens
March 19th, 2009 4:38 am>> Do me a slick web 2.0 icon set with huge icons for use on portfolios, please. <<
Me too, plz. :-D
Ethan Ellis
March 19th, 2009 4:53 amHow bout a rocket with the rss feed thing on it which will represent how using the feed is like going to a new world type thing.
radeksonic
March 19th, 2009 4:55 amHi!
This is my idea:
A microwave icon set…
Just some icons cooked in a microwave. Some icons could be:
-Smashing Magazine logo (in many colors??)
-Social bookmarks
-Smilies
-Cup of tea and coffee
-Comment and icons (post new, read comment, etc…)
-Download and upload icons
-Animals (mmm, I won’t put animals in a microwave :p )
-Alfabet
-A ‘read more…’ icon
-File type icons
-Email and RSS icons
-A microwave in a microwave?
-Etc…
Fredrik
March 19th, 2009 4:56 amHey, great idea!
How about music icons:
LP’s
Singles
Album covers
different instrument for different kind of music:
rock: fender and gibson like icon
classic: violin:
country western: Acoustic
folk: banjo
… and so on
looking forward to se them in a post tomorrow! ;)
Andrea
March 19th, 2009 4:57 amSome MAD icons would be great! Icons are always pretty and happy! Every time my users send my forms with useless trash, so i had to do a super thight validation… so then, if they still continue doing errors even now, i wish i had some MAD icons to show them together with the errors :D
I love the pillows!
radeksonic
March 19th, 2009 5:12 amI’ve also got an other idea.
A pillow icon set ;-)
Marty
March 19th, 2009 5:13 amA set of user experience icons for user flows would be fantastic:
– a few user icons (different races, genders, ages, etc.)
– decision tree icons (decision, concurrent event, system decision, etc.)
– database icons (similar to Visio’s for email dB, web dB, etc.)
– user actions (click, print, download, register, email, log in, etc.)
– web page type (HTML, form, PDF, Flash, JavaScript/AJAX, search results, data, etc.)
– window state (layer, new window, video layer, etc.)
– status icons (error, help, information, etc.)
Kiker
March 19th, 2009 5:20 amit would be nice funny icons about abstract descriptions like profesional, accurate, confidentiality, security,
Myles
March 19th, 2009 5:25 amI’m always on the hunt for phone, and fax icons.
always seem to find everything else. but whatever happened to the neccessities?
Home, about, contact, phone, fax?
ya know, all in the same STYLE.
Chris Trygstad
March 19th, 2009 5:33 amWhat about some information technology hardware icons? Like servers, storage, RAID arrays, racks, tape libraries, icons that can be used to communicate the massive datacenters that will be fueling the cloud computing everyone is talking about out there.
Lukas Prudek
March 19th, 2009 5:37 amHi, I’d need these:
- Paint icon
- Web icon
- Photo icon
- Print icon
Dejan
March 19th, 2009 5:46 amI’d like to see some icons for a “social website” that i’m working on
icons like
- person (male/female)
- institution
as well as combination of the above two for searching and/or lists
Big dish
March 19th, 2009 5:49 amI REALLY need some update, cool looking construction related icons. Things like cranes, bulldozers, orange cones, builders, etc.
Fabio Marchi
March 19th, 2009 6:00 amSimply amazing , fantastic !!!!!!
I wanna icons to build a cms, like text editor, logins, etc…
Ezequiel
March 19th, 2009 6:01 amI’d love some funny stick figure icons which can be used on any website’s tour and help section.
Love you guys, keep on doing awesome stuff.
Matt Litherland
March 19th, 2009 6:02 amCan we have a FULL set of web icons, totally new revamped!
Magnus Fleig
March 19th, 2009 6:02 amI would like to see some hq file type icons (pdf, doc, wmv, etc.).
Fledder
March 19th, 2009 6:04 amI’d like an icon set of animals, particularly jungle-themed.
Greig
March 19th, 2009 6:07 amSocial networking pillows…
Facebook, Twitter, Blog, RSS, Digg, Flickr, Delicious, Stumbleupon
Greig
March 19th, 2009 6:12 amBrowser pillows…
Internet Explorer, Safari, Firefox, Opera, Netscape, Camino, Chrome, Maxthon
Greig
March 19th, 2009 6:16 amAdobe creative suite…
Photoshop, Illustrator, Flash, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, After Effects, Premier, InDesign
Victor
March 19th, 2009 6:19 amHi guys,
i think that some special icons for different sectors of design would be very nice for websites specialiced in our issue. I mean:
Graphic, web, typography, interior design…
Those pillows look great!!!
RichardvdBoom
March 19th, 2009 6:20 amSome Photography icons.
- Camera
- Photoprinter
- lenses
- etc.
Its for the use on specified photographers portfolio’s etc. Should be a bit cartoony but seriously orentiated.
Aditya
March 19th, 2009 6:22 amPopular filetype icons.. such as those for downloadable documents such as RAR, ZIP, XLS/XLSX, DOC/DOCX, PDF and the likes would be very desirable!
mamcx
March 19th, 2009 6:22 amSome icons that convey ideas like:
- Happy customer
- Easy sale
- Friendly support
- Pay easy
- Connected!
diegotoast
March 19th, 2009 6:25 amvideo, image and audio icons.
Ira Rusydi
March 19th, 2009 6:37 amI think enterprise icon set , which consist of enterprise icon, business process icon, information system icon, and organizational department icon, etc, will be valuable.
holder10
March 19th, 2009 6:52 amA portfolio icon set, with icons for a gallery/portfolio, contact, service, hire me, about me, home, coding, design, etc.
Claudiu
March 19th, 2009 7:03 amI need an icon with a street sign that says EAST13TH :)
Amanda
March 19th, 2009 7:06 amI would love for someone much more artistic than I to create icons for the non-profit with which I volunteer. RSS, social networking – but with a pb&j sandwich, lunch bag, cookies, chips, bagel, coffee, etc. – that ties into the way we serve the homeless. We’re called Food For Thought (I know, not terribly original), and we’re based in Toledo, OH.
JeankGeek
March 19th, 2009 7:17 amA group of people with big heads, from all parts of the world, such as chinese, African, Latin, etc.
Thomas K.
March 19th, 2009 7:24 amA set of icons for driving schools would be nice :-)
Marty
March 19th, 2009 7:27 amsome hand drawn flourish type ones please.
degentd
March 19th, 2009 7:38 am…holy smoke, i (want) LOVE that mac pillow…
I always wanted to do some game (panzer general2) related icons.
MSimpkins
March 19th, 2009 7:41 amrobots
plants/trees/nature/flowers
manufacturing components – gears/cnc machines/tools
pantone chips
furniture
shoes
retro patterns
Brandon
March 19th, 2009 7:52 amSome sports related web icons would be great. Things for areas like equipment, sports, statistics, bio, and others. There are lots of icons, but not very many sport related.
Chris
March 19th, 2009 7:58 amI think it would be neat to see some e-ccommerce icons with an automotive theme.
Jake Knight
March 19th, 2009 8:00 amI’ve been trying to find an Icon set that has old school contact items
phone, fax, email, snail mail, address
Preferably in small, medium and large sizes.
This seems like a great contest can’t wait to see the results.
Jelle
March 19th, 2009 8:02 amI’ve been looking for a slick consequent icon set I can use on my personal site which has a dark background. I write articles and have a lifestream going on, so my menu bar includes sections as home, articles, lifestream, contact, about. Maybe an additional matching RSS icon would be nice. And since lots of people have portfolios, a photos and a services page, that would suit perfectly as well.
Also, because I’m a coffee addict, anything coffee related I would go crazy for!
Jessica
March 19th, 2009 8:03 amI LOVE those pillows
I would love to see some icons related to a software interface design:
• scan • repair • fix • delete • purchase • optimize • clean
OR
Some environmental icon sets, green-design is really popular right now.
Jessica W
March 19th, 2009 8:05 amOMG I would love to see some navy / sailor / pinup / tattoo icons!!!
tobi
March 19th, 2009 8:06 ama professional buisness icon se would be very usefull..
i haven’t found a good looking icon for
- fax
- telephone (which is not a mobile or some call center thingy.. so maybe just a nice standard phone)
- an according mail icon ( to suit the set)
- some “download” icon which is not looking like “file sharing”
- so make them clean..no shiny web2.0 look
- maybe just highres grascale so everyone can change the colors to fit the needs in PS
that would be nice.. and some pdf,doc,xls… icons to put behind the links via css
Craig
March 19th, 2009 8:12 amA flower based icon set
Nqy_Nik
March 19th, 2009 8:18 amAdobe Creative Suit Icon Set, cs3 cs4.
Heidi
March 19th, 2009 8:23 amHow about a set of icons based around copywriting / editing / proofreading? A couple things that could be included would be:
1. A red pen.
2. A computer keyboard.
3. Some various proofreading and editing marks, arrows and parenthesis in red, etc.
4. A submissions box – like a black desk tray, with pages in it.
5. A pair of reading glasses.
6. A dictionary and / or thesaurus.
Alternatively, what about an icon set of punctuation marks?
1. ?
2. !
3. ;
4. ;
5. @.
6. &.
7. +
8. #
9. =
et cetera …
Anyway, I’d be really interested in seeing what you guys could come up with. I’m a freelance copywriter, and I would love to use some of those icons on my blog / website.
Tom Webber
March 19th, 2009 8:26 amI’d like:
A Radio Ico – A simple little radio icon, I’d use it for a station website I’m working on
Remiss63
March 19th, 2009 8:39 amI need icons to use in the Mac OS X dock for folders such as Applications, Documents, Downloads, etc. Typically I get generic low contrast folder symbols with light icons indicating their function. Alternatively, I’ll get the image of a stack of icons with the top most Application visible over the others which is particularly confusing.
Viewing these items in the dock in a screenshot is positively confounding. Who can help?
Samantha
March 19th, 2009 8:47 amWould love a set of cinema/filmmaking icons. Could use the camera, the tripod, the clap, the movie reel, the director chair…
myDevWares
March 19th, 2009 8:47 amA nice usability icon set for use in web applications!
Loading icons, action icons, commands, abstract states, etc..
Haddy
March 19th, 2009 8:48 am-Home
-Portfolio
-Clients
-How-to’s
-Services
-Contact Us
Thank you!
Predrag Drljaca
March 19th, 2009 8:49 amMaybe some sort of Portfolio Icon Set. Home, About, Services, Work, Contact… a few more on sub-pages like Services > Slicing, Design, Print, etc.
Have a nice day :)
Pedja
EDIT:
hehe… Haddy typed it faster :)
Patricia
March 19th, 2009 8:58 amI would like to see grocery shopping or money saving type icons.
Nathan S
March 19th, 2009 8:59 amI would like to see an icon set related to the sport of Diving.
i.e. divers, dive boats, fins, oxygen tank, mask, manta rays, fish, etc
Trevor G
March 19th, 2009 9:10 amI would like to see a spray paint social network icon set.
Kirill
March 19th, 2009 9:12 amBank theme icon set, business (not e-commerce), anti-crisis and economy set.
:)
you’re grear!
Jack Clarke
March 19th, 2009 9:13 ami would love a candy mountain logo for my website i am making
lesiwa
March 19th, 2009 9:13 amHello,
Great idea !
it’s could be interested to design a e-catalogue set icon.
- Thumbnail view
- Send to a friend
- Print page
- Download catalogue
- Summary of the catalogue
- Search by kewwords
- go to page
- fullscreen
Thx
Gé
March 19th, 2009 9:17 amHi,
I suggest apersonal portfolio set icon.
objective, profile, education, work experience, portfolio, intrests, competences
Thanks a lot,
Otafu
March 19th, 2009 9:26 amHi, I suggest an Icon set for all types of Arts out there.
* visual arts (such as painting and print-making, sculpture and so on)
* crafts (pottery, ceramics, jewellery-making etc)
* performing arts (dance, drama, music, opera, new circus)
* literature (creative writing, poetry, storytelling)
* media (film, video, photography, computer design)
I know you can made a cool set!
Cheers!
Mike H
March 19th, 2009 9:27 amI’d like to see a user set of different professions (perhaps departments)
Sisi
March 19th, 2009 9:29 amI would like to see a set of chess icons. =D
phiyo
March 19th, 2009 10:23 am+1 vote for portfolio icons like different types of project, features, about me, education, resume, etc.
Manon
March 19th, 2009 10:31 amWould love icon sets for small businesses as I think in this economic climate, small businesses great design more than ever. For example, an icon set for restaurants, an icon set for a gallery, icon set for a boutique, etc.
Nev
March 19th, 2009 10:39 amSome gothicy horror icons. Or classic horror icons. And they should be for everything like flickr, tweeter, rss, search, email, facebook etc
Riccardo Messina
March 19th, 2009 10:46 amIl mio set ideale di icone è questo:
- Musica
- Video
- Giochi
- Testi
- Radio
- Tv
————————— TRADOTTO ——————————————–
My ideal icon set is this:
- Music
- Video
- Games
- Texts
- Radio
- Tv
Jesse Watkins
March 19th, 2009 10:56 amPeople’s ideas look good! I hope to win those awesome pillows.
For Web icons, you could create a traditional set of 3D icons that are animated .GIFs, bringing Web 2.0 back to 1999. I would probably not use such icons, but it’s a thought.
Etienne Lemay
March 19th, 2009 11:12 amFew ideas:
Car logos set
Xtrem sports set
New Adobe set
New Hard drive set and one for finder
Alexander Baldwin
March 19th, 2009 11:13 amAn icon for all the major technologies…
XML, Javascript, PHP, XHTML, CSS, ASP(.NET), Ruby, Python, etc…
Sometimes I even amaze myself :)
Andrew Philpott
March 19th, 2009 11:42 amA multimedia icon set would be great.
ie:
speaker
camera
video camera
things like that. i had a hard time finding good ones for a project i was just working on.
Melissa
March 19th, 2009 12:02 pmFor buttons linking to forms:
- Contact Us
- Book Service Appointment
- Parts Inquiry
- Request Test Drive
- Apply Online
Website pages, preferably car dealership:
- Home
- About Us
- New Vehicles
- Pew-Owned Vehicles
- Parts
- Service
- Financing
- Careers
- Location / Hours of Operation
- Contact Us
- Online Coupons
Florian Stelter
March 19th, 2009 12:05 pme-Commerce Icons ;-)
Peter
March 19th, 2009 12:07 pmCool
destoo
March 19th, 2009 12:10 pmZombie icon set.
bwaaaaaaains…
Sahar
March 19th, 2009 12:33 pmLike to see some icons with twitter feed update
Jimi
March 19th, 2009 12:36 pmFunky retro mini cooper icons
Rey
March 19th, 2009 12:37 pmawesome! Pretty cool throw pillows
Nolan
March 19th, 2009 12:43 pmcooking icon set, or one for restaurants.
Max
March 19th, 2009 12:44 pmI’d really like to have some nice icons for web2.0 development like,
- Standards
- SEO
- SMO
- SEF
- XHTML
- CSS
- Web 2.0
- AJAX
- and maybe MKTG icons too
thanks!
Pål
March 19th, 2009 1:23 pmI need icons showing different aspects of golf – player, trophy, green, ball, club, peg, …
Thanks!
Spaksu
March 19th, 2009 1:39 pmI Think;some great icons for web 2.0 .. Social Bookmarks set maybe..