Wayfinding is serious business, and navigating through the tall stacks and concrete pillars of UIC's Daley Library can be challenging. Add in the ongoing transfer of materials from the shuttered Science Library and construction of the new IDEA Commons student study and media library, and Daley was moving stacks and resources multiple times a semester from 2010 to 2012. 
 
The Daley Library map drew its proportions from original architectural drawings and featured custom-drawn icons and layered, grouped assets to allow easy and frequent editing, undergoing eight major revisions over two years. To allow reprinting by staff of varying technical skill, the PDF map was designed to be easily printed on legal-size paper in black-and-white. It ultimately became the base for new digital display kiosks installed in conjunction with the opening of the IDEA Commons. 

Easily-recognizable icons for things like restrooms, elevators, and stairs were easy to come by (and thus not my work, obviously). The challenge was in making sure the icons for computer stations, copiers, and printers were easily distinguishable from each other to make sure students knew where to find the services they needed. Modifications were made to existing icons or built out of recognizable pieces, then approved by library administration. Although the group study room icon was based on existing library imagery, looking back it could use some work to get it to match the style of the other icons more closely.

The map needed an easily-identifiable cover, and the narrow format of the folded map simply didn't lend itself to either a full typographic treatment or a full-size photo, particularly as the Library is a low, wide building and a more symbolic image could not be agreed upon that would cover the scope of services provided by the Library. Luckily, Roberta Dupuis-Devlin of UIC Photo Services helped narrow the search for an appropriate image, which was manipulated in Photoshop to a high-contrast, yet recognizable, black-and-white image.