“ΜΙΧΟΠΟΥΛΟΣ” in Jackson

Μιχοπουλος (Michopoulos) is a fabric shop in Patisia, Athens. The signs on its façade use two display typefaces issued by Mecanorma around 1971, but customized to support the Greek alphabet.

The name is shown in the all-caps Jackson. Most of the required glyphs could be obtained by repurposing the existing Latin characters: X for Χ (Chi), V for Υ (Upsilon), etc. There was no such equivalent for the letters Π (Pi), Λ (Lamda), and Σ (Sigma), so these were added in a matching style. The lettering above one shop window reads “καλύμματα / κουρτίνες” (“covers / curtains”). It’s based on Juke-Box, a lowercase-only typeface. Like Jackson, it didn’t come with Greek characters out of the box. Again, the unknown sign maker used Latin glyphs to approximate Greek letters: k works as a stand-in for κ (kappa) – although the latter usually is ascenderless – a is used for α (alpha), v for υ (upsilon), o for ο (omicron), and a dotless i for ι (iota). The rest is custom(ized) to varying extent: λ (lamba) is made from a mirrored h with a sharp bottom right corner. Turn it by 180 degrees, add another sharp corner, and you get a shape resembling μ (mu). The modular design of Juke-Box with circular counters facilitated the harmonious addition of missing characters.

“καλύμματα / κουρτίνες” in Juke-Box

“καλύμματα / κουρτίνες” in Juke-Box (close-up)

Another Land is the sophomore album by Lucille Furs. Released by the French record label Requiem Pour Un Twister on March 15, 2019.

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The typography featured on the front and back cover is Salvaje Display by type foundry Copper & Brasses. The credits were made on a 1950s Royal Quiet Deluxe Typewriter. A digital font that comes close is Special Elite ().

For summer 1985. Copies of this poster are available from Milton Glaser’s website.

There were many iterations of Milton Glaser’s cat and Catskills posters which were produced for the New York Board of Tourism. Dates on these posters go all the way back from the late 1970s to the mid-90s. All use Glaser’s own Kitchen, a typeface originally produced for the World Trade Center’s cafeteria called “The Big Kitchen.” Some designs use New York State Department of Commerce’s famous “I ❤️ NY” logo (also created by Glaser) which features ITC American Typewriter. Some posters simply featured “I Love New York” or “I Love NY” spelled out.

For the Catskills’s Fireworks, Fairs & Festivals in the summer of 1994. The logo in Kitchen here is paired with Century Oldstyle.

For the Catskills’s Winter Festival in 1981/1982. The typeface chosen for this poster as well as the one shown below is ITC Bookman.

This may have actually been the first in the series. Milton Glaser donated this print to Cooper Hewitt's collection in 1979. [source]

Hardcover edition.

“Sharon Smith’s Women Who Make Movies is an important and timely reference book, the only one of its kind, and it is indispensable to anyone seriously interested in women in film, or in film itself.” — Molly Haskell, Film Critic

The cover uses a film typeface of unclear origin that closely resembles Dave West’s Behemoth Clarendon Italic Swash (PLINC, c. 1967), but is different in many details. It’s shown as Stymie Black Italic in a 1973 Typeshop catalog alongside a Drop Shadow variant, both with numerous swash, biform, and swash biform alternates (up to nine forms for a letter like M, three of which can be seen here). The same range is shown in a 1976 catalog by Lettergraphics as Stymie Black Flair. There’s no real connection to Stymie beyond the name. Tutti Paffuti NF (Nick’s Fonts, 2007) is a digital interpretation.

Paperback edition.

Glyph set from an undated (ca. 1977) Typeshop Selection catalog.

Gayot Ombre in use for a generic record sleeve from Strawberries Records & Tapes.

MeTV:

Don't be fooled by the cute name — this New England–based chain had ties to the mob. Strawberries was opened and owned by Morris Levy, erstwhile owner of Manhattan’s famed Birdland jazz club and president of the Roulette Records label. In 1988, Levy was convicted of extortion in Federal court. The FBI claimed he had ties to organized crime and drug dealers.

Guitars A Go Go Vol. 2 by Jerry Cole & The Stingers, released by Crown Records (USA, 1966).

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Hi Records, 1972

The debut album of Otis Clay (1942–2016) from 1972 combines big green type with a photograph by William Cantrell. The swashy letterforms are from West Behemoth Italic — possibly with some customizations like shortened ascenders of h or l, for a tighter setting. The glyphs included in this sample demonstrate how close the knockoff Stymie Black Italic (or Flair) is to Dave West’s design. The differences here are mainly in the counters of e or v. Also, the copy didn’t include a y with diagonal as shown here.

The cover was designed by Farmlett, Barsanti & Wood Inc., a design firm founded in 1966 by Tony Barsanti (1931–2018) and Harry Farmlett (1932–2016). Located in Manhattan on 208 Fifth Ave., it wasn’t too far away from the Photo-Lettering office on 216 E 45th St.

Fat Possum reissue, 2013

The cover of Aretha Franklin’s eleventh studio album from March 1967 — including “Respect” — represents an early use of the Italic Swash style of West Behemoth, designed by Dave West for Photo-Lettering. While the non-swash Behemoth Clarendon Italic 11 was shown already in Alphabet Thesaurus Vol. 2 from 1965, this swash variant appeared only in Vol. 3 (1971), as Behemoth Clarendon Italic Swash. It’s distinguished by swash forms for the capitals and several lowercase letters including d g h k l n r t v y. Unlike the swashless variant, it has no entry strokes and less pronounced exit strokes on a i m etc.

West Behemoth was revived by Martin Wenzel for the digital PLINC reincarnation. This version includes the italic, but unfortunately not the — apparently more popular — swash italic. Among digital fonts, Tutti Paffuti NF is probably the closest option. Nick Curtis based his interpretation on Stymie Black Italic, which seems to be an anonymous knockoff of West’s design that appeared in catalogs by Typeshop (1973) and Lettergraphics (1976, as Stymie Black Italic Flair).

Stereo release

Back cover

Color variant for World Record CO.’s pressing (SLW-1629), Taiwan

Second City Volume 1, Number 6 by a group of students from Chicago in late 1968. It mostly covered social issues of the day.

The editors of Second City declared the purpose of the paper in the first issue published on November 23, 1968: “Second City is not intended to be just another ‘underground’ newspaper. Second City is intended to be a voice of the Movement in Chicago… It will be owned and managed democratically by its staff which will represent the entire spectrum of all those engaged in the struggle against war, racism, poverty, oppression, and the denial of civil and human rights.” — Graeme Evenson, DePaul University Library

Motown LP 621

Ed Benguiat's psychedelic Photo-Lettering offering Laurent was a perfect match for Sesame Street's goofy, furry monster Grover and his vinyl LP entitled Grover Sings The Blues. There currently isn't a digital version of Laurent available. (Jimi, by Rebecca Alaccari for Canada Type, comes close but is actually based on a related design called Mecanorma Poster.)

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“Model 2215B. Sexy. Sadly not mine, just borrowed until my (also very sexy) Tandberg is happy again.” — Nina Stössinger

Many of the control labels on these 1970s-era Marantz receivers are set in Metropolis, the typeface from which the custom Marantz logo is presumably derived.

The extra frilly type (by audio equipment standards) used for the model label and “Stereophonic Receiver” is Davison Spencerian, a script from the Photo-Lettering library that was recently digitized by Mitja Miklavčič and the PLINC team at House Industries. The digital version has a conventially cursive ‘r’ form but I assume there was an alternative romanesque ‘r’ available in the film type days.

The use of these two typefaces goes all the way back to the company’s founding in 1952 when Saul Marantz launched the Consolette. 

Model 2220 “It not only sounds good, it looks good too. The dial and meter light are a GORGEOUS shade of blue. It weighs in at about 26 pounds. Back in 1973 it retailed for about 300 bucks, which in today's dollars is about $1400.” — Ron Davis of Revolver

The ad typography uses Kabel and Helvetica.

Pocket Library PL37, 1957

For this book cover, two very similar copperplate scripts have been paired: While the editor’s name is set in Bank Script, the rest is in Commercial Script. A possible reason is that maybe the latter was simply not available at a bigger size. Note that this is from the 1950s, when type was not as easily scalable as it is today. Also, the former has fancier capitals.