Alastair Johnston is a scholar, teacher and letterpress printer. He is the author of “Transitional faces,” a forthcoming biography of Richard Austin, cutter of the Bell and Scotch Roman types and his son Richard T. Austin, a wood engraver. He is co-editor of William E. Loy’s “Nineteenth-century American designers & engravers of type,” and most recently has produced “Typographical tourists: tales of the tramp printer,” from his Poltroon Press based in Berkeley, California.
Most typeface designs are the result of fashion or changes in taste; some are technologically driven. For Helvetica, an explanation of its history helps to explain its longevity.
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In the 18th century, cast-iron bridges sprang across British rivers such as the Tay and Severn. These lovely sculptural archways are resistant to rust, so many are still standing. What are “Industrial-strength types”? In this article Alastair Johnston explores them.
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It has been said that “we read best what we read most”. This quote was used as a type specimen in Emigre magazine in the late 1980’s by Zuzana Licko. It was written in defense of her typefaces, whose elemental shapes—designed with the strictures of the early HP laser printer in mind—challenged the commonly held notions of what made typefaces legible.
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