My first project of Year 3 at Nottingham Trent University explores perceptions of the Union Jack and St George’s Cross, a polarising topic in recent discourse. The statements were collected and curated by myself from an online survey and do not reflect my personal beliefs. The photos were taken in various towns across the Midlands. I really enjoyed working on an editorial project.

Printed A3 with a fabric, screenprinted cover.

The logo for Love Cocoa’s packaging is set in Eros by VJ-Type. The accompanying sans is CoType’s Ambit. The brand describes its mission as follows:

Inspired by his great-great-great grandfather, James Cadbury founded Love Cocoa with the purpose of producing delicious, high-quality chocolate in an ethical and sustainable way. They are on a mission to drive positive change within the chocolate industry, creating chocolate that is loved by people and planet alike.

From Wikipedia:

English Heart is the fourth and final studio album by American recording artist Ronnie Spector, released on April 8, 2016, by 429 Records. It’s a cover album of rock and pop songs by British artists of the British Invasion era, except for two tracks.

All songs are by British artists that Ronnie toured with in the 1960s.

[More info on Discogs]

Designer David Calderley of Graphic Therapy combined Bebas with LHF Sofia Script for the cover typography.

The second book by Gerald Jay Goldbert (1929–2020), The National Standard was first published by Holt, Rinehart and Winston in 1968, with a jacket design by Milton Glaser.

Shown here is a different edition; Ballantine’s paperback from 1972, with uncredited layout and typography. Alex Gnidziejko provided the cover art. Title and author name feature Jazzbeau, released in the early 1970s as part of Photo-Lettering’s Decotypes. The synopsis is set in Vogue with its alternate monocular a.

From Cash Box (July 18, 1970):

Take one established British session singer, add an excellent record company that knows what it’s about, sprinkle in arrangers and musicians of style and taste building on rock solid songs and you have some idea of what this premier LP from Kiki Dee is like. But not quite. Here’s a girl with one of the finest new voices around who has been struggling for some time in England with the wrong material. Suddenly, as happened when Dusty Springfield moved to Atlantic, Kiki’s voice is finally liberated. Best cuts include “I Can’t Give Back The Love” and the moving “Jimmy.”

The “excellent record company” that “liberated” Kiki Dee's voice was Tamla, the label that brought to prominence such soul acts as Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, and Smokey Robinson & the Miracles. It's quite clear from the design of the cover (and the title’s nod to Dickens) that Tamla didn't want there to be any ambiguity about the singer’s country of origin.

Pinto Flare is used for the album title and artist name, interestingly taking no advantage of the ‘flare’ – the swash alternates – referenced in the typeface’s name. The designers seem to have been more attracted in the tightness of the font’s letterforms. Microgramma (or maybe all-caps Eurostile Extended) is used for the song titles with Univers taking up the remaining text.

Art direction by Curtis McNair, and cover concept by Tom Schlesinger. Photography by Jim Hendin.

[More info on Discogs]

Almost an entire font catalog on an album cover! This 1973 record compilation of UK television show theme music features at least 14 unique typefaces, each a logotype of a different TV program.

I see Bookman Swash, Stop, Amelia… and a bunch more that I look forward to learning about. The title in particular is one I don’t think I’ve seen before.

[More info on Discogs]

Source: www.flickr.com Uploaded to Flickr by mikeyashworth and tagged with “rockwell”. License: All Rights Reserved.

The official brochure issued in connection with the manifestations that the local council organised. It included simple treats such as a commemorative mug or spoon for school children, a day out for children who lived in council homes (and one shilling spending money) and for the day only, upon production of the pension book, free travel on the local Corporation buses.

The advert is for the well known and popular local grocers James Duckworth Ltd, then in their heyday with over 180 branches and known locally as ‘Jimmy Duck’s’. I remember the shops well although generally as Co-op members in this most Co-op of towns we went and got our divi at the local branch! Founded in 1868 by local man, who was self-made to the point of being knighted in 1908, Duckworth served as Mayor of Rochdale on several occassions before his death in 1915. The family continued with the business until they sold out to Wright’s, the biscuit makers of South Shields, in 1955. The stores were finally run down with the headquarters closing in 1969 and the final shops vanishing in c1975.

The blackletter is handdrawn Old English, combined with typeset Rockwell and all-caps Plantin Italic. The ad on the back is set in roman and italic styles of Gill Sans. The bold condensed grot with straight-sided rounds used for Duckworths is probably not a typeface. Caslon’s Condensed Sans-Serif No. 2 comes close. See also Miller & Richard’s Sans-Serif No. 4 and Stephenson Blake’s Condensed Sans Serifs No. 1.

Source: www.flickr.com Uploaded to Flickr by mikeyashworth and tagged with “gillsans”. License: All Rights Reserved.

On Wednesday 12 May 1937 HM King George VI and Queen Elizabeth were crowned at Westminster Abbey and as part of a week long programme of events the County Borough of West Bromwich, then in Staffordshire, this official programme of events was issued. Printed, in rather an eclectic style, by the town’s major printers, Kenrick & Jefferson, it lists an amazing range of events; parades, fetes, fairs, the presentation of medals, souvenirs and prizes – even an ox roast in Dartmouth Park. All this was spread over 9 May until 15 May 1937.

The programme is supported by numerous adverts for local concerns.

“Coronation May 1937” seems to be (modeled after) the extra bold style of Spartan, the British name for Copperplate Gothic, integrated in reverse into the ribbons. “County Borough of West Bromwich” is in caps from a lighter and less wide style. The other text uses Gill Sans.

FF Prater Sans in (indirect) use in Joe Villion’s jacket design for the Büchergilde Gutenberg edition of Federball (“badminton”).

Orginally published under the title Agent Running in the Field in October 2019, it’s the final book by John le Carré. The British author of espionage novels (who previously worked for the Secret Service himself) died this week at the age of 89.

In her illustration, Villion translates the backdrop of the novel – “the sheer bloody lunacy of Brexit” – to a disintegrating Union Jack and a European Union flag in turmoil, with the U.S. stripes lurking from the sidelines. The letterforms of Prater Sans appear to be drawn manually, with some deviations from the typeface. This is probably most noticeable in the overall roundness and in particular glyphs like a or e – and in J, which has a bar like in FF Prater Serif.

Joe Villion’s lettering (top) compared to FF Prater Sans with the J from Prater Serif (bottom).

Honig (original title: Sweet Tooth) is a Cold War spy novel about a young woman recruited by MI5, staged in 1970s England. So what could be more appropriate than a woman’s face behind a typewriter against a Union Jack? But wait, why does the painted typewriter have a German QWERTZ keyboard layout? Well, the font is Trixie, and Trixie was born on a German typewriter with a QWERTZ layout!

In 1986, Reebok dropped the Union Jack flag from their logo and replaced it with a triangle-swash symbol known as “the vector” inspired by the designs on the shoe sides. The new logo was used for approximately ten years.

Although Reebok hasn’t used the typeface for over a decade, for many consumers Motter Tektura has been the face of the shoe company since the 1970s. In 2002, the brand abandoned the typeface for their main logo, but does break it out with the Union Jack for their throwback product lines (shown below).

This Reebok logo was introduced sometime in the 1970s. It was later revised for the Reebok Classic Collection “a collection of products characterized by the brand’s past”.

This is a good overview of Reebok’s logo history … with one obvious errror: it is not possible that Motter Tektura was used all the way back to the shoe company’s founding in 1895 because the typeface wasn’t designed until 1975.

Touristic campaign for Great Britian.