Sasha DiGiulian Helps Make Person Climbing Emoji

Top American climber Sasha DiGiulian has spent time over the past year helping the people who develop emojis to design a climber. The new illustration is called “person climbing” and will be released later this year.

This is something that I've been working on for the last couple years. I'm thrilled to announce it's coming to fruition. I wrote an article for @outsidemagazine on the process I went through to make this happen. Huge thanks to the "Chief Emoji Operator," Jeremy Burge, for working with me! To now have a #climberemoji a part of the vernacular that anyone can use on their phones is emblematic to the surging popularity of the sport. ? stay tuned for the keyboard update!! #climbing #climbergirls

A post shared by Sasha DiGiulian (@sashadigiulian) on Mar 27, 2017 at 11:44am PDT

In a story for OutsideOnline.com, DiGiulian wrote: “For a large part of my life I have needed to vigorously explain what climbing is to people outside of the insular community. To now have a climber emoji as part of the phone vernacular is emblematic of the surging popularity of the sport. ‘Having an emoji could be seen as a sign of legitimacy for many sports, as the burden of proof for adding a new emoji is quite high,’ Jeremy [Burge, the chief emoji officer of EmojiPedia] says.

“‘When a new emoji is approved by Unicode, that means that the case has been made for it being sufficiently popular—and also visually distinct. In the case of the climber emoji, there wasn’t any emoji that could be used as a reasonable substitute, which also helps the case.’

“Now I have an accurate emoji to use when I describe what I am doing. I hope that other climbers will find this emoji appealing to use. There will be 12 variations on the way, including skin tones and genders, so there will be a climber emoji for everyone.”