This book jacket for a German edition of Ballif’s Dancers of God, a book about pygmies, is one of the “serving suggestions” that were included in the specimen for Charme (1957). The designer of this brush script typeface is Helmut Matheis, who celebrates his 96th birthday today.

The secondary typeface is the condensed cut of Jakob Erbar’s Candida (also for Ludwig & Mayer). The language of the blurb is not politically correct by any modern standards.

As it was common at the time, the specimen for Slogan (1958) came with a number of made up in-use samples, in all kinds of sizes, colors and paper grades. This leaflet with “maintenance instructions for Leuck car batteries” additionally features Erbar-Grotesk and the breitfett (black extended) cut of Hallo, Ludwig & Mayer’s version of Aurora-Grotesk V. Latter is also known as Annonce.

Slogan can be described as a slightly beefier reprise of Charme, which was published the year before. Both brush scripts were created by Helmut Matheis. Today, Matheis turned 96. He is still active as calligrapher and lettering artist. His latest typeface design, Judo, was released earlier this year.