General Electric

General Electric Christmas Light Set

Florian Hardwig — Thu, 25 Dec 2025 17:05:00 +0000

The Headliners Inc., providers of photoprocess lettering, announced their Catalina in April 1957, see their ad in Art Direction, Vol. 9, No. 1. The casual gothic with slightly flared stems spanned six weights in four widths. Together with the (obliqued?) italics, the family offered “48 refreshing new alphabets designed to meet today’s demand for creative, modern gothics”.

One of Catalina’s bolder weights can here be seen used in red caps for a set of Christmas lights produced by General Electric.

Detail of the advance showing of Catalina in Art Direction, Vol. 9, No. 1, April 1957

The secondary typeface on the box is Univers. Likewise announced in 1957, Adrian Frutiger’s seminal sans was praised for its comprehensive range of weights and widths. A mid-1960s specimen by ATF depicts four widths in three to four weights, with only the medium widths equipped with (obliqued) italics, for a total of 21 styles. That is less than half of Catalina’s range. A good reminder that style count isn’t everything. And also that Univers may have pioneered the concept of a large, coordinated typeface family – but only in the realm of metal type. Manufacturers of phototype were there first.

The number “15” and the words “Light Set” on the side of the box are set in Venus Extended, and the captions to the little cartoons highlighting the product’s benefits (see below) are in News Gothic.

The majority of images of the Christmas Light Set are courtesy of Heather David.

This version for outdoor use has a green GE logo and shows the colored light bulbs in reversed order.

This post was originally published at Fonts In Use

Peter Max clocks for General Electric

Reybach C — Sat, 11 Oct 2025 18:30:00 +0000

Contributed by Reybach C

Source: clickamericana.com License: All Rights Reserved.

Ad in LIFE magazine, October 11, 1968

New imaginative styles by Peter Max. Three wild designs to choose from. Repeat alarm wakes you – lets you snooze – then awakes you again. Daring and decorative – great gift.

Every time I come across a Peter Max work, whether it’s a pair of jeans (ad) or the cover of his own magazine—my eyes literally overdose on all the colors and swirling forms. Peter Max is not just another “hippie” artist, rather he’s a kind, caring and loving person who’s influenced a whole generation of artists and people abroad. Even if his name has never crossed your eyes or ears, you’ve probably seen his art somewhere. So many others around the world admire Max and his artwork, although these days it absolutely breaks my heart to see how others treat him in his current state.

Let's move on to something lighter… literally!

From 1968 to 1970, Peter Max was commissioned to design clocks and a poster for General Electric. The poster, advertising some absolutely wonderful wall clocks is set in Millstein Orientale for “New from General Electric” and below, with some Helvetica for the tinier text.

Moving on to the 1970 Snooz-Alarm clocks advertisement which shows Norton Futuramic, a Photo-Lettering face that was issued in the 1940s, paired with Obese E, a Psychedelitype (link two) released in 1967—note that this wouldn’t be the first or last time Obese would be used in Max’s work. Jefferson Aeroplane appears for the Symmetry clock, and Davison Arabesque for the Spectrum clock. Aura is just Futuramic, repeated, and below the three is presented in Futura for the price and bold words, Bodoni for the quoted text.

The actual Symmetry clock uses an illustrated form of Obese, Spectrum uses Art Nouveau-esque numericals not unlike Benguiat Laurent, and the Aura clock uses custom numerals not specific to any phototype… but still looks rad anyway!

Ad in Courier Journal, March 22, 1970

Symmetry

Spectrum

Aura (black version)

Flower Girl

“Holy Batmask!” ad by General Electric

Thu, 19 Mar 2020 20:02:00 +0000

Photo(s) by Bart Solenthaler on Flickr.

Latin Bold, slightly extended (but not as wide as Latin Wide), for a promotion by General Electric, 1966. The copy is set in three weirdly short and narrow columns set in News Gothic. Note how all the eligible relatives are listed in both male and female variants, but the TV dealer is assumed to be a man.

Holy Batmask!
To get this all-new, all-color Batmask FREE, all you have to do is take your father or mother or aunt or uncle or grandmother or grandfather down to your participating G-E TV dealer. Hey! He’ll even show you how it flips over and turns you into Robin.
Just in time for Halloween – Only from General Electric TV dealers.

This post was originally published at Fonts In Use