What’s the first item you think of when someone mentions a design icon? The Eames Lounge Chair? The Chaise Longue LC4 by Le Corbusier and Charlotte Perriand? The Barcelona Chair by Mies Van Der Rohe? Why do we refer to these designs as icons? What do these design icons symbolise? A history, a movement? A symbol? Of what? This dissertation seeks to understand the phenomenon of design icons. Why and how have they achieved this privileged status, what do they produce? This ‘practical guide’ is above all an investigation. Like a journalist, I try to explain the subject and, in conducting my investigation, I’ve explored a whole world. I realised that there has been real study of these icons. They are much more than simple furniture.