It is important to remember that when designing signs and symbols to assist or improve way finding throughout a building, that the user reading the signs may not speak the same language, and may have never seen a sign before. It is important to remember that the sign must be informative regardless of age, language, nationality, race or religion and something that anyone can read.
But my question is this? What happens when we take the signs and symbols away?
Can we ‘read’ a building just from the shape, colour, form or texture of a hallway or door, and how can we simply and quickly learn these tangible surface signs? I need to think of a way to start my indexing of ‘things’ to understand what and how people associate colour and shape.
Design Wayfinding 