The golden ratio between a pair of objects was first defined by Euclid over 2,000 years ago as equal to the ratio of their sum to the bigger of the two quantities. That ratio value is 1.618, or phi. Art lore has it that Leonardo da Vinci used the ratio when painting the Mona Lisa, and that Salvador Dalì applied it to The Sacrament of the Last Supper. Architecture mythology states that Le Corbusier translated the proportions in his work, notably when designing the UN Secretariat Building in New York. And most recently, rumor had it the Apple logo was designed in accordance with the divine proportions. In all cases, the thinking goes: When these proportions are applied to a design’s structure, the outcome is pleasing to the human eye. Some have even contended that the rule applies to human faces. Igor Kochmala, a Moscow-based web designer, illustrates the fallacy of that opinion with his golden retouching of Hollywood icons.
