From AT-ATs to iPhones: Early Sketches of 10 Iconic Objects

Our most iconic products don't spring fully formed from their designers' minds. Even Jony Ive had to attack the iPhone more than once. (A lot more than once.) But the earliest drawings of some now-classic designs help show the process their creators went through to make something recognizable and definitive.
  • Coca Cola
  • iPhone Concepts
  • Burj Khalifa
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coca-cola
Our most iconic products don't spring fully formed from their designers' minds. Even Jony Ive had to attack the iPhone more than once (a lot more than once). But the earliest drawings of some now-classic designs help show the process their creators went through to make something recognizable and definitive.

coca-cola bottle, pencil drawing, 1915

Earl R. Dean

When other people started bottling pop made with the syrup Coca-Cola sold, the company realized it needed a standardized look. Earl Dean, of the Root Glass Company, based his (slightly too wide, it turned out) pitch, seen here, on a curving cocoa pod. (He couldn't find a picture of a coca leaf or kola nut.) That swoop became the fundamental unit of Coca-Cola iconography. —Bo Moore

2010 bug- Design Wants to Be Free