Typography I: Typographer of Week 9 – Tobias Frere-Jones

TYPOGRAPHER: TOBIAS FRERE-JONES

Frere-Jones is an American type designer who had designed over 500 type faces – crazy! From the readings on him, it seems like he really picked type and stuck by it.

Some of the typefaces he designed includes Gotham and Interstate.

Gotham was popularized throughout New York City in signages, Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign and other campaigns. Interstate was designed as homage to Highway Gothic, the official typeface of the American Federal Highway Administration.

Typefaces are Solutions

Frere-Jones talks in specific about typefaces for the different mediums and display (for print and for web) in this particular video. The video really highlights the problems that surfaces when a typeface is directly plucked from print and placed for web-reading, down to pixels!

The most interesting thing about this video for me is that the video provides the different methods to solve and clarify the typefaces for web, and the specific problems in specific letters down to pixels. It’s a really in-depth review of his experiences, experimentation and solutions for type problems.

I think this is really importance as a designer today where the computer screen is (almost) king.

Typography I: Typographer of Week 4 – Neville Brody

TYPOGRAPHER: NEVILLE BRODY

I find it interesting that we’re progressing into younger typographers for typographer of the week so far.

Neville Brody is a typographer, graphic designer as well as an art director from London. His works consists of record covers, magazine art and typography.

Fonts by Neville Brody

Some of the fonts he designed includes:

Arcadia
Industria
Insignia
FF Pop

I personally found Arcadia quite interesting and went to do a little bit more research on it. It turns out that the font borrows some elements from the Art Deco style and elegance. It also features high contrast lines – such as the A’s hair-thin crossbar on its much thicker body. On FontShop where Brody was one of the founders, the font is described to be well-suited for advertisements and invitations.

Looking up fonts by Brody seemed like a good start to understanding more about him. Soon I found Fuse, a “fontzine” by Neville Brody and Jon Wozencroft that launched in 1991. Fuse was to “challenge conventional thinking about the form and function of typography” and consisted of four experimental fonts designed to a theme and showcased through A2 posters.

At this point, I’ve gone through a couple of articles and each one described Brody, and his works, as experimental. This was certainly very refreshing compared to the two other typographers I’ve looked at previously (Tschihold and Vignelli).

Brody’s Works

Brody’s first record cover

In OFFSET 2014, Brody also mentions the idea of the ‘third mind’ where one needs to “find a device to put together incongruous elements and something new comes out of that”. The idea is to deliver something unexpected and taking the plunge to be pushing the boundaries of understanding. Between this and the ideology behind Fuse, Brody explores a very different face of design as compared to designers from the previous weeks.

While all of them understand to communicate with design, Brody seems to have a less traditional approach to it. He designs to challenge and not just to communicate. This can also be chalked up to the fact that Brody works with designing very different items and assets as compared to Tschihold and Massimo, and therefore his designs seek a very different purpose as well.

I feel that Brody, for his time, had been very forward-looking and an innovator. While he was criticized many times for his differences in approach and his products, alot of designers have now adopted a similar attitude in the treatment of everything as a design problem, regardless of disciplines (visuals, sound, installations, etc), as well as taking risks. There’s alot to be learnt from not just from his designs but from the “third mind” as well.

Typography I: Typographer of Week 3 – Massimo Vignelli

TYPOGRAPHER: MASSIMO VIGNELLI

Massimo Vignelli was an Italian designer – modernist designer and founder of Vignelli Associates. He was born and raised in Milan, started off in architecture and design, and later fell in love with graphic design.

He had an opinion – that a designer only needs about 6 typefaces. For him, the 6 are:

Some things that Vignelli did:

Popularized Helvetica
Under his direction, a redesign of 1972 New York City subway map
1968’s format for The Herald

Redesign of 1972 New York City subway map

2018 NYC Subway Map, as of February 2018

Vignelli’s NYC subway map

In 1972, the subway map was changed to Vignelli’s design. It was one that was modeled after Harry Beck’s simplified London Underground map, but was rejected by commuters who felt that Vignelli’s design and approach had been too abstract.

Where Vignelli’s map had emphasized readability and clarity, the commuters felt that it was geographically inaccurate and did not accurately represent the cities and subway routes.

THE HERALD

Vignelli’s 1968 format for The Herald revolutionized newspaper formats.

The Herald in 1968

His redesign had a strong impact – it had a modular layout, using limited color palettes and typefaces, creating a clean look for the paper. It looked modern and made The Herald stand out from the other papers.

Personally, what he had done for the paper was an extremely important step. Newspapers were to be read daily for the latest news and usually featured a congested page. By introducing a better spaced layout and minimizing the amount of elements, while still retaining the core of the purpose it should serve, his redesign showed ways to make newspapers even more effective. This especially applied with what he had planned for advertisements, even though The Herald did not accept advertisements. Advertisements were necessary for many papers, but usually are obstructive.

The work he has done in redesigning the papers would finally be acknowledged later on when other papers start adopting similar modular designs.

Other Looks

In one of the articles provided as a reference for Vignelli (as a fearless critic of junk), it is mentioned that the people who criticized Vignelli’s works commented that his designs were always the same:

“-the heavy black rules, the red, black and yellow, the large Garamond Italic or Bodoni type going over the gutter-“

I find it interesting that Vignelli’s explanation for that is that he’s interested in achieving a certain effect. I feel that he most certainly achieved it. In most projects he has done, it usually gives the design and content a lookover that focuses on clarity.

Comparing what I’ve read of Jan Tschihold, clarity seems to be a focal point for these designers especially since they are working on designs and with type to create assets that would help people to navigate their daily lives. They both stand strongly by limited types of font and design as well and apply these similar styles to most of the work they do even for different companies.

Vignelli’s work is recognizable even as he does work for different companies and from that I can see that design is a voice – it’s essentially a core set of beliefs and I believe as well that it’s irreplicable.

References:

Image of The Herald Papers: http://www.printmag.com/daily-heller/massimos-heraldic-newspaper/

Typography I: Typographer of Week 2 – Jan Tschichold

TYPOGRAPHER: JAN TSCHICHOLD

One of the first things I read up on Jan Tschichold was a short blurb somewhere about his contributions to Penguin Books. Immediately after, I did a quick search to find out how he looked like and I really hope I’m not the one who thinks that he bears a little bit of resemblance to a penguin. It might be the suit.

A side by side image comparison

That aside, it was really cool to learn what made him one of the biggest typographers of 20th Century.

Some things that I’ve learnt that could have contributed to his role as an important typographer:

Creation of Sabon (as well as a few other fonts such as Saskia, Transit and Zeus)
Die neue Typographie, meaning ‘New Typography’
Briefly the head of Penguin Books’ typography and production, standardizing the look of all Penguin books.

Who is Tschichold?

First a calligrapher, then later developing into a typographer and book designer as well. He was passionate about black letters and script but later moved on to simple, geometric letters, likely influenced by a Bauhaus exhibition in 1924. He later developed an extreme belief in every other typeface, other than sans-serif, and also wrote about Modernist typography.

Later on, however, Tschichold did admit that the book was too extreme and rigid and returned to Classicism in print design.

His stint at Penguin Books

I focused on first finding out what exactly was so incredible about his stint at Penguin Books.

The final logo chosen in 2003 is based on the 1946 version by Tschihold, and is still used today with the occasional minor alteration to the penguin (such as giving it a hat). I’ve read lots of Penguin Books myself, so it feels like it would be very relevant information.

I’ve seen a couple of different covers:

The Great Gatsby cover is an example of one that is standardized by Tschichold. It is highly similar to the middle one. An article from The Writers Academy points out that the font was changed to Gill Sans, the middle white space was enhanced and the logo updated.

From what I can see, the penguin logo was simplified to elegant curves. No longer was there a heavy ‘Penguin Books’ looming over the cover as well, instead replaced by the skinny Gill Sans, reducing the competition to the middle section of the page where the book title was written.

The more I looked at it, the more I thought about how intelligent this minute change was – it immediately directed my eyes to where information needed to be conveyed. It didn’t feel clunky and chunky as well, and this might be abit of a stretch, but I actually felt refreshed and ready to read more as the layout of the cover felt lighter instantly.

Just from this, I definitely feel that Tschichold’s works focus on communication. I felt a sense of focus and a strong, singular voice. His works are crisp and broken up beautifully, with precise control and never chaotic.

Laster Der Menschheit, poster by Tschihold for Phoebus Palast (1927)

When I look at more examples of his works such as his poster designs, it’s almost as if someone slipped a lead around my neck and is guiding me clearly through different sections of the graphic. The clarity in the way he conveys information never fails to startle me as my eyes know exactly where to go every time.

Page Canons, Page Harmony

Convenient gif from the Retinart article that shows how text blocks are determined

I’m (honestly) not much of a reader and a very visual person. Going through this article definitely drove me a little crazy until I saw the gif.

Then it suddenly clicked.

I saw the magic in it.

The text block had the same 2:3 page size ratio, the height of the textblock is equal to the width of the page, and I kept scrolling back to pick up everything. It reminds me of the math behind drawing perspective and products in drawing classes – mathematical perfections! It really reminds me of how much math, design and drawing are intertwined.

Then comes Tschihold – a man who’s able to play with the minds of people through his understanding and application of math in his design. He improves on what seems to already be considered perfection – a canon, a sacred rule. He creates his own, new canon that works beautifully.

There’s so much more to it than just ‘an eye pleasing book’. It’s definitely something I’d like to try out myself sometime!

A Wrap

Essentially, I feel that Jan Tschichold is an extremely meticulous and calculative man – I could feel it from his works! I could feel that every part was deliberated. However, I was pleasantly surprised a man who sees things in such detail was able to pull himself out of his phase of extremity in the middle. His achievements were amazing and extremely admirable as well.

From him, I definitely could learn to cultivate more interest in the formula and math of successful book designs and typography. I’d definitely like to learn and shape my view of what would be considered beautiful books and beautiful texts. It’s already beginning to shift slightly after reading and learning from his canons, works and experiences.

He especially makes for a really great start to understanding more about the printing world and industry.

References:

The Writer’s Academy article: https://thewritersacademy.co.uk/blog/book-cover-design/

Typographica: https://typographica.org/typography-books/jan-tschichold-master-typographer/

Page Canons (GIF): http://retinart.net/graphic-design/secret-law-of-page-harmony/