For the fiftieth anniversary of the Stonewall uprising, an anthology chronicling the tumultuous fight for LGBTQ rights in the 1960s and the activists who spearheaded it, with a foreword by Edmund White.

June 28, 2019 marks the fiftieth anniversary of the Stonewall uprising, which is considered the most significant event in the gay liberation movement, and the catalyst for the modern fight for LGBTQ rights in the United States. Drawing from the New York Public Library’s archives, The Stonewall Reader is a collection of first accounts, diaries, periodic literature, and articles from LGBTQ magazines and newspapers that documented both the years leading up to and the years following the riots. — Penguin Random House

Alias Cactus and Futura are used for a special over-cover. The cover underneath again uses Futura, paired with Mrs Eaves Italic.

Sans Serif Shaded and Helvetica on a protest poster. No date but prior to 1973 as the draft was abolished early that year; no place cited.

The Student Mobilization Committee was formed in 1966 “to coordinate opposition to U.S. involvement in the war in Vietnam among college and high school students.” Originally named The Vietnam Day Committee the SMC organized protests on campuses and in cities in addition to being one of the first groups that included civilians and soldiers alike. Based on a letter from 1969, the SMC had centers in 15 cities around the country but began to disband, like many anti-Vietnam groups in the early 1970s (1973) in conjunction with the U.S. beginning to withdrawing troops from Vietnam. [Brown University]

This selection of posters, flyers, leaflets and other ephemera shows that the cross-country group didn’t use a coordinated visual identity with recurring graphic elements. Made by anonymous designers with varying degrees of skill and experience, the unifying feature is the DIY quality. We see a mix of different techniques including typewritten text and rub-down type, photography (incl. cutouts), woodcuts and more, brought together in paste ups for reproduction. The smorgasbord of fonts provides a good sample of the typographic choices that were available in the late 1960s and early 1970s, with many standards and a few less commonly seen ones. Remarkably, there are none of the novel typefaces that one would nowadays associate with 1960s counterculture.

Student Mobilization Committee Boston (October 20, 1970) feat. Windsor Elongated, News Gothic, Cooper Black Italic, and typewritten text, among other things.

Student Mobilization Committee Boston (March 3, 1971), feat. Univers.

Playbill, Futura Condensed Bold Italic, and Venus Italic on a flyer about the October 21st, 1967 March on Washington to end the Vietnam War.

Eight-panel brochure, SMC New York. Appears to be from late 1970 or 1971; one photo shows a demonstrator with a sign calling to “Free the Kent State 25.” Permanent Headline, Adonis (“To End the War in Vietnam”), and Helvetica (text).

The open shaded grotesque appears to be Filmotype Vanity.

Flyer for a show at Paula Cooper Gallery as a benefit for the Student Mobilization Committee to end the war in Vietnam. Set in Franklin Gothic, with “for peace” in Optima Italic.

“Remember our murdered brothers and sisters at Kent State, Jackson State, and Augusta. Demonstrate to bring all the GI’s home from S. E. Asia now!” Poster by the SMC San Francisco, featuring tightly spaced Annonce and Futura Display. The logo appears to be in Akzidenz-Grotesk, also in all-lowercase letters.

“The war will go on in ’72 without you… don’t let it.” From Pandora’s Box, Feb. 16, 1972, York College of the City University of New York. ITC Ronda, ITC Avant Garde Gothic (with alternates and ligatures), and Univers.

Pamphlet by SMC Cleveland, feat. Kabel Black and an unidentified outlined and shaded grotesque. The use of a flipped W for M suggests a technique like dry-transfer lettering.

Poster publicizing the April 24 March on Washington in protest of the Vietnam War, 1971. SMC, New York. The typefaces are Helvetica Bold, British Inserat, and Volta. These faces were available from dry-transfer manufacturer Mecanorma.

Page #4, with comparison table and overlaid usage.

This leaflet, titled “The Impact of Impact”, showcases the typeface’s great power for being overlaid on an image, and also compares it to other typefaces. It was prominently featured in Vox’s 2015 article/video about the typeface’s ubiquity in memes, written by Phil Edwards.

Geoffrey Lee, Impact’s designer, sent scans of the brochure to a user in a 2004 Typophile thread, in which he comments about the design under the username “gyl”. Later in the same thread, the pdf files were shared publicly by Geraint Franklin (“geraintf”).

The leaflet includes a comparison with the letters ah from nine competing bold display sans serifs. From the top left, these are: Placard Bold Condensed, Franklin Gothic Extra Bold (sic) Condensed, Grotesque No. 9, Venus Bold Condensed, and Folio Bold Condensed. The bottom row shows Permanent Headline, Placard Medium Condensed, Univers Bold Condensed (67), and Folio Extra Bold.

All typeface names from competitors are anonymized as “x”. The only names that are given in full are Impact and Grotesque No. 9, both by Stephenson Blake. Lee had mentioned that the comparison included Helvetica Inserat, but he must have misremembered. The text font is Adonis, another 1960s release by Stephenson Blake.

The pdfs were numbered 1 through 4, but in the given order, the flashy picture pages would come last, with the specimens coming first. This would be a weird advertising choice. Hence, I have assumed that the pdf were numbered backwards, and put the PDF ordering of the pages in the image captions.

Page #3, with overlaid usage and announcement of small size cuts.

Page #2, with large size specimen and ad copy.

Page #1, with specimens.

The name of this social enterprise already says a lot: Arquitetura na Periferia ("Architecture in Periphery", in Brazilian Portuguese) is an unique initiative that provides housing improvement to low-income neighborhoods in Brazil. What its name does not say is that this is a project made by and for women. They are the ones who plan, design and get their hands dirty. They are the ones who believe in each other and in their own potential. Inspired in the feminine icon, we have developed a singular graphic shape that communicates the women's leadership in this scenario.

Made with the concept “women are the key”, the visual identity expresses the ideas of emancipation, trust, knowledge and habitation in a minimalist and a symbolic approach. Just as like the other graphic elements, Nexa and Cera Pro Bold are rounded, geometric and strong typographies. Therefore, they were chosen to support this brand system. Nexa is used for the campaign logo. Cera is used for setting both slogans and smaller text, such as information on business cards.

Cover of Womanspace journal, vol. 1, no. 1, 1973. The Getty Research Institute, Gift of Hal Glicksman, 2009.M.5.20. Courtesy of Judy Chicago.

From the Getty website:

In the 1970s, Los Angeles became an epicenter of the feminist movement. Engaged artists responded to the sexism they encountered in the male-dominated art world by constructing separate spaces. Womanspace Gallery was one such institution, converted from a former Laundromat.

Judging from the width of W, the counter of O, and the shades of O, S, C, this appears to be Buxom, and not the earlier and very similar Baby Fat.

Copy from the SFMOMA (San Francisco Museum of Modern Art) library

"Act For Democracy" is the focus of the 2018 edition of the Forum On European Culture, a biennial event focusing on the strength, impact and value of art and culture for Europe. Amsterdam-based design studio Van Lennep opted for an urgent looking variation on the identity they designed in 2016 for the first edition of the event. Both editions use a (custom?) stencil version of Colophon Foundry's Relative.

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Merriweather was used extensively by Together For Yes, the successful campaign for a Yes vote in the May 2018 referendum, removing the Eighth Amendment’s constitutional ban on abortion in Ireland.

From King in Exile:

Gillian Crampton Smith and Sarah Curtis […] worked closely with the London borough of Wandsworth to create these comics promoting contraception and safe sex to London teens in the style of stories from popular teen magazine Jackie. They promoted the use of contraception and family planning clinics, explaining how to use both condoms and the pill. They also highlighted the stigma surrounding teen pregnancy at the time and aimed to warn teenagers against being pressured into sex.

Too Great A Risk! drawn by Ian Gibson (source)

Front cover with plastic wrap

An Interview with Cu Rua, released by ismellpainter and the Society for a Sonic Enrichment of the Air in 2015, is the documentation of artist Peter Strickmann’s travel to Vietnam and his recorded interviews with Cụ Rùa, the ancient and popular, well-loved turtle of lake Hoàn Kiếm in Hanoi. Read more on Peter’s blog.

Very sadly, Cụ Rùa was found dead on January 10th, 2016. From that day on, all records were outfitted with an obituary notice. An Interview with Cu Rua may very well be the last vocal statement of a very fine and legendary creature.

The album art uses Brezel Grotesk by Stefanie Preis and Milieu Grotesque. Both sleeve and cover were printed locally and assembled by hand by the artist.

Back cover

Inside cover, obituary notice, LP sleeve

Inside

Inside, LP out

Inside, Asia-centered world map

“The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena.”
— Carl Sagan, Astrophysicist

Supernova is a magazine which explores a different aspect of space in every issue, such as the moon landing, the animal contribution to cosmonautics, our very own solar system, or the former planet Pluto.

We humans have marvelled at the stars and the universe since our humble beginnings. To ponder what lies beyond the sky, is a deeply human sentiment, connecting us for millennia. It is this curiosity and fascination that Supernova tries to capture.

“To infinity … and beyond.”
— Buzz Lightyear, Space Ranger

Graduation project by Sandra Hartung. Fonts in use: Futura & Sabon.

The Center for Urban Pedagogy, illustrator Pratima Mani & design studio Partner & Partners teamed up to design this nice issue of Making Policy Public which features a visual breakdown of programs that help the thousands of immigrants in New York State to keep their health care costs affordable, and lays out their health care rights.

The publication, set in Minotaur & Gemeli Micro is freely downloadable here.

The whole publication was translated to Spanish.

Imperfect is a community restaurant that was created with the aim of helping people at risk of social exclusion to reintegrate into society, by offering personal help and training in catering. It is a local project that aims to serve the community and focuses on reintegrating people into society and work. The brand essence, ‘we love imperfection’, speaks of giving a second chance – it has an impact on everyone who goes through the programme and they clearly learn that although we are all imperfect, we are all useful and valuable.

Sr. y Sra. Wilson created the brand strategy and identity and were in charge of the naming and the design of coordinated elements in the restaurant, as well as the signage. We also helped to design some of the spaces in the restaurant.

We wanted to use design to communicate the message and values of Imperfect, and to help to promote a social project that has an impact on people – on those who take part in this social programme and also on the customers, as they are invited to reflect on and identify with the project when they come to the restaurant.

To develop the branding we drew on the philosophy of the Japanese technique of ‘kintsugi’, which views breakage and repair as part of the history of an object that should be displayed instead of disguised, as this history and transformation makes the object even more beautiful. Imperfect is ‘kintsugi’ applied to people.

We created an identity based on direct messages to users, to raise awareness of how ‘we love imperfection’, to highlight that imperfection can be useful and reused.

Using the aesthetic notion of ‘wabi-sabi’, a Japanese term that highlights ‘the beauty of imperfection’ and that is presented as elements with a natural or rustic look, or elements from nature, we wanted to give all the designed elements a warm composition, with materials that resembled nature, like recycled paper. The identity had to be produced at a low cost, and to reduce the cost of the production of the printed elements we worked with Fedrigoni and Manter.

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Imperfect is a clear example of design for good. Using design combined with a low-cost production, we can create the ideal atmosphere that helps to improve society.

The poster, trailers, and social media material for I Am Not Your Negro use a variety of condensed sans faces.

Ciro Esposito is an art director and teacher located in Milan and Catania. He writes about design at Tiragraffi.

The album's shrinkwrap, with sticker. Eviscerated open by me. Tiempos and Knockout on the sticker.

It’s a joy to see one of my favorite fonts — Tiempos — being used on the packaging of the fantastic new album by one of my favorite bands, Destroyer. The Tiempos is printed in metallic foil on the back, no less! This is the kind of pleasure you can’t get from a digital download, especially if you’re a font geek like me.

I’ve used Kris Sowersby’s Tiempos from Klim Type Foundry on previous projects, and am in love with its form and readability. The Pitchfork Review uses it, as well, in body text and in select display text. Its always such a clean read when I pick it up off the coffee table.

Destroyer’s new album, Poison Season, appears to be using Tiempos Headline Black. Liner notes acknowledge Maggie Fost of Merge Records as the designer. Maggie’s designed a bunch of great album covers, including another of my favorites: Eleanor Friedberger’s Last Summer.

Besides the sticker on the plastic wrapper above, I’ve attached examples of the many places where Tiempos is used on the Poison Season packaging.

The lyrics and credits in the liner notes are set in a different font. It appears to be Knockout from Hoefler & Co.

The Disc. Artist name and album title set in Tiempos.

Inside. Song titles set in Tiempos.

Back of the album set in Tiempos and a metallic foil!

Back of the liner notes. Song titles set in Tiempos and lyrics set in Knockout.

Album cover, minus wrapper.

“This Girl Can is a national campaign developed by Sport England and a wide range of partnership organisations. It’s a celebration of active women up and down the country who are doing their thing no matter how well they do it, how they look or even how red their face gets. Fear of judgement is stopping many of us from taking part in exercise. But as thousands of women up and down the country are proving, it really doesn’t have to.” — This Girl Can

“We know that loads of you love our #ThisGirlCan ads – now you can make your own! Click here to get started: app.thisgirlcan.co.uk” — This Girl Can on Facebook

Launched in February 2000, truth is an organization backed by the American Legacy Foundation, a Washington, D.C.-based national public health organization devoted to tobacco-use prevention and education. “FinishIT” is their 2014 campaign against underage smoking which cites statistics showing the declining numbers of teens who smoke.

One of several online advertising videos for the #FinishIT campaign.

Antagónica is a biannual publication that intends to reflect on the information that is given to us and establish a tool that allows us to know all points of view so we can get a proper conclusion. Its main feature is that it is a reversible book and it can be read in both directions. The first volume is about the Nobel Peace Prize of the new Millennium.

Czech design studio Designiq choose three of our typefaces for the new fresh design of Prague's theater newspaper, DN divadelní noviny. Bree Extrabold is wonderfully used in headlines and titles, showing sometimes the alternate letters for more clarity. Karmina excels as main text face and the occasional subtitle and its partner Karmina Sans shows off in captions, subtitles and tables. Overall it is an inspiring and very pleasant design in the handy Berliner format on good quality paper.