Idea Summary
Normally you have to set an icon for a navigation menu entry. In older APEX version, if not filled in, there would be no icon, but now in newer APEX versions there will always be a top level “fa-file-o” icon.

The default navigation menu setting in User Interface for Collapse Mode is Hidden. Icons are only needed when this setting is set to Icon.

The idea is to remove the ugly “file” icons when Collapse Mode is set to Hidden.
Use Case
My client does not want any icons in the menu, which is currently not possible.