Design
Making Better Digital Maps in an Era of Standardization
Using pre-digital techniques as inspiration, three cartographers lead the charge against cookie-cutter digital maps.
What’s in a map? Or better yet, what should be? The question of how to best visualize information about a place has always been the heartbeat of cartography. Today, with what many call the “democratization” of the field, it's pulsing faster than ever.
For while the open door of online mapmaking has produced a lot of maps, it's also brought about a standardization of aesthetics. “To make it easy for people to make a map,” says Daniel Huffman, a cartographer at the University of Wisconsin, “you need to simplify the process down and make things very uniform.” Riffs on Google Maps look for the most part like Google Maps, with its top-down view, muted color scheme, choice of line weights, and approach to terrain.