“Greetings from Aberdeen, Maryland” ft. Samson

This series of postcards features photographs by Alice & John Penrod and was produced by Dexter Press in West Nyack, New York, maybe in the mid 1960s. The featured typefaces are mostly Ludlow originals, most of which were designed by Robert Hunter Middleton. “Greetings from” is always set in his Mandate (1934).

From the Cardboard America Collection

“Greetings from Berkshire County, Massachusetts” ft. Tempo Heavy Condensed Italic.

“Greetings from South Bend, Indiana” ft. Max Kaufmann’s Balloon (ATF, 1939)

Musée du Débarquement Arromanches is a museum dedicated to the memory of D-Day in the Second World War, located in Arromanches in Normandy, France. It was initially built in 1954 facing the sea where the artificial harbour Mulberry B (B for British) operated. After almost 70 years of activity, a new building opened in 2023. The new museum was designed by the Projectiles architecture agency.

The graphic design for the wayfinding system and the exhibition was done by WA75 (Laurent Mészáros & Yorel Cayla), using BN Times Gothic. The imposing wayfinding information is painted on the concrete walls in a white area, which provides a brutalist response to the building. This graphic composition first appeared on the concrete caissons (Phoenix breakwaters) built as part of the artificial harbour.

A Phoenix breakwaters from the artificial Mulberry harbour in Normandy during World War II.

Via Norman McKnight, who comments:

I bought this card because of the variety of type faces and languages, Armenian, Arabic & French.

The typeface used for the name in Latin letters and the French job title (“Négociant – Commissionnaire” – “Merchant – Commission agent”) is the light weight of a design that went under various names. The left-leaning advertising face originated at Wagner & Schmidt, a punchcutting company in Leipzig that sold matrices to numerous foundries. Those would then cast the designs and typically sell them under different names. In Germany, Stempel and also Ludwig Wagner and Weber carried both weights as Helvetia. Bauer had it as Favorit-Zirkular, Genzsch & Heyse as Caprice and John as Corona. In France, Beaudoire and Peignot & Fils sold it as Helvétiennes and Turlot as Batardes Renversées. In England, Stephenson Blake and Harrild & Sons offered the light weight under the name Engadine and the bold as (Reed’s) Waverley. For more names, see the typeface page.

The upright script used for the place name – “Alexandrie (Egypte)” – is a Ronde, probably of French origin. The specific version is unidentified. For similar fonts that are digitally available, see French 111 (a.k.a. Gando), ITC Redonda, Bon Mot NF, Typo Upright, and the linked related typefaces on those pages.

The Arabic and the open and shaded Armenian are likewise unidentified. If you have any insights into their names, please share in the comments.

Aardvark Wine & Beer is a boutique shop created “to take the snobbery out of wine”. Founded by a self-taught connoisseur turned certified sommelier, Aardvark brings a humble, community focused approach to learning about and loving wine. They arrived with an idea and an off kilter name. We took it from there and created the visual system, character and illustration, and tone of voice that make Aardvark a destination.

The primary Aardvark logo is based on Retail Display, with modifications. It is paired with a custom secondary script logo, and an eclectic typeface palette, consisting of some of the solid styles of ABC Grow plus ABC Laica and Ostia Antica.

Art direction, creative direction: Nonfiction
Exterior murals: Nick Stull
Environmental: Creative Palette
Signage: Graph X Productions
Apparel: Tonic Studios

Megascope interspersed with Ed’s Market Bold Script

Studio Yukiko has created a playful, energetic, and—dare I say—delicious design for Door Dash’s Secret Menu magazine about local food culture. From Studio Yukiko:

This issue dives deep into Miami’s almighty hustle - A food scene boasting one of the wildest most diverse restaurant cultures in America. It follows stories of taco stands morphing into Michelin starred Italian spots, Black-owned vegan restaurants, reinvented Jewish delis, Cuban and Caribbean stalwarts, and so much more…

“Wild” and “diverse” could also be used to describe the issue’s design and typography. The fonts and layouts are playful, colorful, fun, and varied, with each article spread getting its own special typographic treatment. There is no shortage of sunset-like linear gradients, text effects like outlines and glows, and mixing of typefaces on the same line.

The eclectic design is united by a core palette of typefaces: Megascope is used across the issue for headlines, a callout to Miami’s connection to Art Deco. Random letters are replaced by Ed’s Market (both Script and Slant styles), bringing some movement and dynamism into the static, geometric typeface. Text is set in Surt and ITC Bookman, with Mrs Sheppards appearing in supporting text such as bylines. Jackpot Italic and Middleton Brush are featured on the cover, and Goudy Two Shoes, Compagnon (& Compagnon Bold), Promenades, Pipo, Generation September and Marlfield make special appearances in individual spreads. One of my favorite details is how the page numbers—mostly set in Megascope—become such a dominant part of the layout. A few tiny appearances of other guest typefaces (for photo credits, or a single word here and there) are not mentioned here.

The design team for this project included Sebastien Millot, Michelle Phillips, and Kir Nazarov, with production by Mike Teevee. David Amsden and Erin Ruffin are the editors-in-chief of the magazine. According to Phillips, “for the Miami Issue for Secret Menu, we wanted to bring the instantly recognisable world of Iconic Miami’s Mimo and Art Deco style together with its lax small-town scrappiness by combining a geometric sans (Megascope), with a brush script (Ed’s Market) to really bring out Miami’s almighty food culture scene.”

Cover ft. Jackpot and Middleton Brush for the title

Table of contents with Megascope for page numbers and headlines and Goudy Two Shoes for “Issue 02”. “Buzzworthy” is set in Compagnon Bold.

Text in ITC Bookman and Surt

Megascope with stacked glyphs and integrated into an image. The bold serif used for “Greater Miami” is Marlfield from Eliott Grunewald.

Megascope plus Ed’s Market with added stripes, compare Gadget. (The font used for “El Palacio de los jugos” is Balloon.)

Compagnon Bold with glossy effect

Megascope combined with Pipo Medium (“Flame”)

Megascope with staircase glyphs and Compagnon for captions

Megascope mixed with Ed’s Market Narrow Slant (“MM”) and Slant (“57”)

“The Great” and “Little Havana” are in Promenades.

Megascope with glow effect plus Generation September set on angle

Credits in Mrs Sheppards, text in Surt

This festschrift celebrates one hundred years and five generations of Anderson Concrete, a family business from Columbus, Ohio. From the foreword by Jessica Anderson, President:

It’s my distinct privilege to recognize and celebrate our first century of business at Anderson Concrete. From our humble beginnings as a sand and gravel hauling company in 1921, we have innovated, adapted, and sustainably grown to become a prominent and successful family business in central Ohio.

As our 100-year milestone was approaching, my family and I wanted to do something special to honor this accomplishment. We decided to create a commemorative book, which resulted in a 194-page culmination of our rich history, showcasing the family legacy, the lifelong relationships, and the generational grit and determination that got us where we are today.

The publication was designed by Zach Wilke and Neil Wengerd at Nonfiction. Copywriting by Brit Eaton, printing by Pressworks Inc.

I wonder, given the winter that lay ahead, if the Borough of Darwen’s Transport Department had any second thoughts of abandoning their last tramway in October 1946, and completing the replacement of their system with diesel buses given the state of the roads? I suspect it is unlikely as Darwen’s system was likely in poor condition after years of wartime demand and neglect and I suspect the trams would have gone some years earlier if war had not intervened.

It was a small system although it was, for a municipal electric network, an early started as the first car ran on 16 October 1900, a year after the Council had acquired the privately owned steam tram lines. This first route ran to neighbouring Blackburn and indeed joint operation of the ‘main line’ took place when that town electrified its share of the steam tramways that appears to have been the case from 1901. In that year Darwen opened the line to Hoddlesden and it was to be the first to close in 1937 and be replaced by buses, Darwen having first introduced such vehicles in 1926.

In 1940 the tramway service between Whitehall and Circus went but by then, with wartime controls on the delivery of new buses and also of diesel fuel, the tramway was expected to ‘carry on’ as it did. Blackburn’s last tram ran in 1949. The fleet interestingly included some very modern, streamlined cars with central entrances, that look very “Blackpool” in style. The booklet however is suitably “edwardian” in style to match the opening of the system with a gothic style typeface and much use of printers decorations. It also carries, with suitable municipal pomp, the names of the Mayor, the Chairman of the Transport Committee, that of the General Manager G Beckett, and the Town Clerk.

Printed by the local Wardleys (Printers) Ltd.

Poster for Stefanie Egedy’s lecture concert that took take place on Friday, May 5, 2023, at Saal Altes Theater of the Duale Hochschule Baden-Württemberg in Ravensburg, Germany.

Stefanie Egedy (São Paulo/Berlin) has studied public administration and philosophy. In the last years she has established a career as sound artists/musician, working exclusively with subwoofers as instruments and sub-bass as sonic medium.

Allé Allé is a boutique workspace located in Frederiksberg, Denmark. The visual identity was designed by graphic designer Daniel Julien. The custom type used for the wordmark is accompanied by Waldenburg Schwarz Halbschmal.

Soulful Sessions is a Belgian event organisation focused on “soulful music” as they call it: Dangerous Disco, Sweet Soul, Brazilian Boogie, Adventurous Afrobeat, and Holy House. “Soulful Sessions brings you a fine selection of artists from all over the world to different and unique locations”.

Tijsje Revalk is “a one-woman graphic design studio based in Antwerp, Belgium.
Specialising in illustration and animation, she creates original and colourful designs for use across print, digital or blended for both.” She rebranded Soulful Sessions in 2021, using CoFo Chimera to make a perfect match between the bold colours and shapes and text. The logo uses BioRhyme by Aoife Mooney, sometimes extended with a wordmark set in Coustard by Vernon Adams.

Source: www.absolutetruthpress.com Christoffer Leka, Kaisa Leka. License: All Rights Reserved.

Front cover featuring lettering based on DIN 1451, Bodoni, and Narrow Roman Stencil JNL

Please note!

Given the abhorrent war Russia is engage in in Ukraine this project is of course cast in a different light than when it was first conceived.

Like many neighbouring nations, Finland too has a troubled past with Russia. At the time of our journey our aim was to try to cast aside past wounds and try to get to know the people. But some three years later old fears and prejudices have unfortunately resurfaced and been proven valid.

For this we are truly sorry, as the people we met during our voyage were anything but the rabid warmongers we now encounter in the daily news. But let us be clear, we do, in no uncertain terms, condemn the unlawful and completely senseless occupation of Ukraine that Russia is presently absorbed in.

Despite this less than cheery disclaimer we hope you can appreciate this project for what it is – an attempt to build bridges instead of burning them. Something we feel the world is in dire need of.

*

It was not a very well thought out idea, but very few adventures start with being meticulously planned. At least our adventures. But at least we had a rough outline of what we would attempt to achieve:

Our aim was to paddle from the small town Kem located on the shore of the White Sea all the way to St Petersburg.

These two places are connected by a number of locks, rivers, and lakes to each other, and upon learning that it was at least theoretically possible to kayak from one to the other we decided it was well worth trying. On the 9th of June 2018 we set sail southward.

But enough about the background, you are here to read about fonts. And we’re getting there. Just one quick thing we need to mention first:

During our voyage Kaisa kept a diary in which she recorded what happened during the trip. When we reached St Petersburg seven weeks later she had filled four small journals with drawings and text.

Source: www.absolutetruthpress.com Christoffer Leka, Kaisa Leka. License: All Rights Reserved.

Title page, with the custom digitization of Secession’s Cyrillics and LTC Remington Typewriter

In 2020 we published these diaries in book form under the title Русские Дневники (Russian Diaries).

In 2021 our small book was included in the collection of the most beautiful books of the year in Finland. It also received the Hopeahuippu prize (silver) in the annual Finnish design competition Vuoden Huiput.

As for the typefaces, we came upon the Cyrillic version of Secession in an old type specimen book in our library and felt it fit our purposes perfectly. The problem was that we couldn’t find a digitised version of it.

Here our friend Teo Tuominen came in the picture. As an accomplished type designer it took him little time to render beautiful versions of the needed letters from a scan we provided him with.

Source: www.absolutetruthpress.com Christoffer Leka, Kaisa Leka. License: All Rights Reserved.

The specimen book on which Teo Tuominen based his digitization

As for the body copy we went with LTC Remington Typewriter, a nice typeface that also came with the much needed Cyrillic characters.

For more information about the project and our journey you can pop over to the project website.

Alongside with the book we also made a poster in which we posed with our expedition flag. It was a horribly cold and miserable photoshoot (you can see the frost on the rocks in the foreground!) but the picture itself turned out really nice. At least we think it did.

(Oh, and for all the real maritime design nerds out there: On the cover of the book, as well as on the poster we spell out “Русские Дневники” in the Soviet Signal Alphabet. Admittedly not a font, but still interesting for letter lovers.)

Source: www.absolutetruthpress.com Christoffer Leka, Kaisa Leka. License: All Rights Reserved.

Reproduction of an illustrated spread in the original diary, with lettering

Source: www.absolutetruthpress.com Christoffer Leka, Kaisa Leka. License: All Rights Reserved.

Reproduction of an illustrated spread in the original diary, with lettering

Source: www.absolutetruthpress.com Christoffer Leka, Kaisa Leka. License: All Rights Reserved.

Poster showing the mounting of our expedition flag, as well as the title “Русские Дневники” spelled out in the Soviet Signal Alphabet

Thomas Huot-Marchand, 2010:

At the School of Fine Arts in Besançon [now known as Institut supérieur des beaux-arts de Besançon], with my colleague Rainer Oldendorf, we convened a group of first year students for the creation of a display wall. We used Garaje 0503 Monospace, designed for the school’s visual identity. Each glyph was photocopied in two sizes, A4 and A6. A grid of 750 A6 boxes was drawn on the wall, which Rainer with Gilles Picouet engraved. This physical grid allowed, throughout the year, the weekly collage of all the school’s news messages.

Garaje 0503 Monospace is a fixed-pitch version of Garaje 53 Unicase Black. It’s actually a fake monospace, because the M and W are wider. On the other hand, there is only one line thickness in the entire font, a value that is also found between the letters, and between the lines, and in the counterforms.

In these letters Adrian Frutiger writes to Mike Parker (then Director of Typographic Development at LInotype) about Concorde, his sans serif from 1964, and the typeface that would soon become Frutiger. The letterhead plays off the uppercase alphabet of Serifa, Frutiger’s slab serif released in 1966.

The letters were shown by Matthew Carter in a Frutiger tribute speech he gave in New York on April 27, 2016. He paraphrases the first letter:

Mike had shown an interest in Concorde as a potential photocomposition face. Adrian writes thank Mike for his interest and to say,

“It’s not possible for me today to tell you my intentions for this face. In my imagination it all was a matter of making a sans serif typeface that was very neutral, a little in the vein of Gill, but with a less classical appearance. Concorde, as it is now, has become perhaps a little bit too impersonal, and I wonder if it would be enough to simply correct certain letters in order to give it a new allure.”

And it is the last sentence which I think is absolutely key here.

“Because, I have other ideas for sans serif faces.”

I think this is the first gleam in Adrian’s eye of a sans serif beyond Concorde — in other words, Frutiger.

One year later, 1971. “I send you here enclosed two first proofs of the alphabet Roissy. The relationship between Concorde and this new alphabet certainly exists in the general area. The Roissy realization is quite new and adequate to the legibility of architectural typography. Nevertheless it could be possible that this study could be interesting to the typographical area.”

A new letterhead in 1974.