Typographer of the Week: Jan Tschichold

I need to say, that I had no formal training, in typography before enrolling in this class. I have never heard of either of Jan Tschichold nor his Page cannons, before today. But the funny thing is, I am very sure that I have subconsciously applied his theory and believes into my design.

Brief Background of Jan Tschichold:

Jan Tschichold is a notable german, illustrator cum artist, who has revolutionised the progression of typography. He placed san serif fonts at the forefront and most importantly, created a layout guide: the page canons.

“A method to produce the perfect book.”

Page canons were created as a standard format for the penguin publishing press. This canon was sworn to by bookmakers as the perfect book. Using math, grids and ratio, Jan Tschichold found harmony between the page and the text. It amazes me how this simple guide still used today.

Thoughts:

All in all, I love how Jan Tschichold created harmony between the text and the page. His elegant use of space and text in an experimental way was revolutionising back then. His page canon gave order and structure to books. Books began to function as a utility but as an artwork.

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