An Interview with John Hudson, co-founder of Tiro Typeworks, world-class type designer and expert in font technology. We talk with him about the award-winning superfamily, Brill, the challenges of multilingual typography, volcanoes and walking the dog.
In episode one of my new Ask ILT series, I answered, What’s the difference between Grotesque and Neo-Grotesque? In episode two I tackle, Why do fashion brands and magazines use so much Bodoni & Didot? Collectively these typefaces are known as Didones, a mashup of Didot and Bodoni, the type designing early proponents of the […]
For the first in my brand new series of reader questions, I begin with two common type classifications. They sound pretty much the same and they do have a lot in common, but their differences are significant, and that makes them suitable for different applications.
There are the many ways with which to understand letterforms. There are schools of thought that focus on the impact of punchcutting and metal type on the outlines of letterforms, or on the historical period in which a style of typeface first emerged.
After more than 50 years, the Association Typographique Internationale (ATypI) chose to de-adopt (dump) the Vox-ATypI font classification system. Why the breakup? And does it really matter? Is there anything to be gained by devising replacement systems? Do we need font classification at all? And what’s a typographic dog?
Issue #3 of Fonts in Focus takes a look at Joona Louhi’s weird and wonderful, high contrast display typeface, Louche. Unusual weight distribution and some unorthodox and quirky details make this new release well worth a second look.
Women of Letters is the first in a new series of short interviews. We begin with a collection of four interviews with creatives from New York to Saigon: Lynne Yun a NYC-based type designer, technologist, and educator; Deb Pang Davis, a product designer with The 19th in Texas; Coleen Baik, a designer and artist in […]
After a decade, our annual Favorite Fonts list is back. In addition to a top-ten of favorite typefaces, there are now another 50 typefaces in the Honorable Mentions list. There’s also a section devoted to my favorite glyphs or characters from fonts released in 2020, and a few words about the magical selection process. Oh, and there’s even a typographic Space Invaders Easter egg! The list is back!
For more than a thousand years the meaning of Egyptian hieroglyphs was completely lost. For centuries, many assumed that they were magical symbols that might never be understood by mere mortals. The breakthrough only came with the discovery of a 2,200-year-old black basalt slab. But what does that have to do with typography, dragons and unicorns? Read on to find out.
Tens of millions of broadsides were printed from the very earliest days of printing. Many were cheap and ephemeral, eventually being recycled or ending up in the trash. Others, like rebus and puzzle broadsides were novel and engaging enough to live longer lives. This is my very brief look at some early examples of these curious so-called hieroglyphic broadsides.
