🔴 “Excuse me … I believe you have my stapler?”
One line. Infinite memes. A red-hot icon.
In this episode of The Story Behind the Icon, we dive deep into the surprisingly rich lore behind the humble office stapler — and how a cult classic film, a soft-spoken cubicle dweller, and a spray-painted prop turned it into a cultural artifact.
🎧 Whether you’ve got 37 pieces of flair or just enough sarcasm to survive corporate life, this one’s for the design nerds, Office Space devotees, and UI jokesters looking for the perfect button metaphor.
🔍 What We Cover in This Episode
🔴 The origin story of Milton’s beloved red stapler
🎞️ Mike Judge’s animated roots and early Office Space shorts
💻 Remote work, legacy office gear, and the evolution of workplace design
🧑💼 Font Awesome’s very own “Milton” and the logic behind the madness
🎨 How to recreate Milton’s soul in HTML with our duotone icon
🎬 The real reason Swingline started making red staplers
⏰ Timestamps
00:00 – Welcome to Podcast Awesome
01:25 – A new take on the old office
02:40 – Meet Milton: The patron saint of passive resistance
04:20 – Mike Judge: From Beavis and Butthead to box office satire
05:55 – The stapler becomes an icon
06:35 – Meet FA’s own Milton (Hi, Steve 👋)
07:20 – Grumpiness as UI insight
08:05 – Milton’s stapler wasn’t red... until it was
09:00 – Design challenge: Where will you use the stapler icon?
09:50 – Commission your own icon or vote one into existence
10:30 – Credits and a final plea: Return. The. Stapler.
🔗 Links & Resources
🖇️ Stapler Icon on Font Awesome
📽️ Office Space (1999)
🎨 Vote for an icon on the leaderboard
📝 FA Blog: The Story Behind the Icon Series
🎥 Podcast Awesome on YouTube – Full uncut convo with extra music nerdiness
🎶 The Font Awesome Theme Song – Composed by Ronnie Martin
🎸 Music Interstitials by Zach Malm
🎬 Produced and edited by Matt Johnson
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