The Next Web has given us a peek behind the scenes at the development of the new and controversial user interface in iOS 7.
One of the more revealing points in the piece is that Jony Ive, recently put in charge of software as well as hardware design, tapped Apple's marketing and communications team -- MarCom -- to design the look and feel of the icons. Then, with those as a guide, the iOS design teams went to work.
First of all, many of the new icons were primarily designed by members of Apple’s marketing and communications department, not the app design teams. From what we’ve heard, SVP of Design Jony Ive (also now Apple’s head of Human Interaction) brought the print and web marketing design team in to set the look and color palette of the stock app icons. They then handed those off to the app design teams who did their own work on the ‘interiors’, with those palettes as a guide.
The site goes on to note that the design is "firmly a 'work in progress'", and that the look and feel of the icons and other new UI bits are likely to change significantly as the iOS 7 beta proceeds.
Top Rated Comments
It sure as heck needs to.
Putting Marketing people in charge of ANYTHING critical is a bad idea. They aren't engineers, they aren't interface people, heck, they aren't even graphics and design people. Marketing is full of glorified sales people. As others have said this explains a lot.
That's good. I think they've made a good start but the icons in particular do need some refinement.