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05th May 2015

Female icon on bathroom sign transformed into superhero

Turns out, it was never a dress

Sive O'Brien

If you thought the female icon on the public bathroom signs was wearing a dress, you’ve been looking at her all wrong.

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Turns out that the triangle dress you thought you saw, is in fact a superhero cape, and we’ve just been looking at the stick figure’s back this whole time.

That’s according to Tania Katan, a programmer and an activist who has changed the sign by colouring in what most people see as the skirt, to reveal the edges of a superhero cape. The new graphic was created as a feminist symbol for the women of tech and leads the way for Axosoft’s #ItWasNeverADress campaign, which launched last week at the Girls In Tech conference in Phoenix, Arizona.

A statement on the campaign’s website, reads, “It Was Never a Dress is an invitation to shift perceptions and assumptions about women and the audacious, sensitive, and powerful gestures they make every single day. In science, technology, arts, mathematics, politics, houses of worship, on the streets, and in our homes, insightful women are often uninvited, overlooked, or just plain dismissed.

“It Was Never a Dress will foster necessary conversations, vital voices, and images from around the world that honour ALL women.”

We think this is a great icon and message for all the powerful little women in our lives.