Choosing a unified style

[andru]

I've started producing a style guide but as a prerequisite to that we need come to a consensus on exactly what our stylistic direction is for this set.

I'm designing with Hortomatic in mind and that's pulling my stylistic choices in a direction which it might be better for me to do as a fork, since it doesn't seem to be lining up with the work everyone else is contributing and I'm thinking it might not be generic enough for everyone's use cases. In my case the icons are used in large format and so extra detail really works out.

Here's an image by way of explanation of a random sampling of icons designed by me and others. The right side is a rendering of the icons in the style I'm using for Hortomatic, the left is a flatter, less detailed rendering with more use of line weights instead of fills suggesting shade.

My current thought is to make this repo favour the style on the left, since it's a simpler style to design which makes it easier to receive contributions, and it's probably more flexible for use in various projects.

@simonv3 @roryaronson @warpling @neynah @jneubrand @jsimplicio @mstenta .... Would love to hear your opinions (also, please ping anyone else you think might want a voice in this)

[roryaronson]

At least in the side-by-sides above, I like the more detailed icons on the right side more, and they seem equally as usable/flexible as the ones on the left. As I mentioned in #8 I think larger, more detailed icons would be awesome to create too for applications which plan to use them in that way. While Hortomatic is the only app with that use case now, I'm sure there will be more in the future.

At the same time I see your point about lowering the barrier to contributions. Whether we go with the left or the right style, I think we should make clear to prospective contributors that if they want to make just one size icon, they can. ie: maybe someone is good at and enjoys only working with the really small size ones. Others might think that's boring and want to add details, so they could fill in where the other designer left off with the larger sizes.

[jsimplicio]

While the detailed looks definitely better looking, I think the ones on the left are just as great and easier for people to contribute to. They still act well as an icon, I don't see how choosing the better aesthetically looking ones improve any case unless we're trying to use them in bigger sizes too?