From Wikipedia:

“Mis-Shapes” is a song written and released by English alternative rock band Pulp from their fifth album, Different Class (1995). Lyrically inspired by Cocker’s experiences socializing in Sheffield as an outcast, the song features lyrics that call for misfits to unite and take over. This lyrical theme would make Cocker uncomfortable with Pulp’s growing popularity with “townies” after the song’s release.

“Mis-Shapes” was released as a double-A sided single with “Sorted for E’s & Wizz”, the second single from Different Class after “Common People.” Like its predecessor, the single reached number two in the UK charts and has since seen critical acclaim.

[More info on Discogs]

Typography-wise, the single follows the choices made for the album, with Chromium One for the band logo (also by The Designers Republic) and Windsor Extra Bold Condensed. The palette is completed by italic Poster Bodoni and Helvetica.

Loading screen for the ZX Spectrum video game The Bird and the Bees II: Antics

Bug-Byte Software was a UK software publishing house active at the end of the 1970s and the early part of the 1980s before it dissolved and was re-acquired and used as a brand label.

During its most popular and prolific period, when it published titles like Mazogs, Twin Kingdom Valley, The Bird and The Bees, and the hugely popular and influential Manic Miner, it often used the Bug-Byte wordmark in Television (and Microgramma). Antics, the sequel to The Bird and The Bees and published in 1984, may mark something of a transition: it appears the product packaging used a new neon wordmark, but the loading screen for the game itself has a rendition of the Television wordmark.

I don’t know if Mazogs, June 1982, is the first Bug-Byte advent to use the Television wordmark, but opposite this advert on the opening is a different Bug-Byte ad that has their wordmark in Penny Farthing. The copy in this ad uses ITC Kabel. Sinclair User in the same month runs the Mazogs advert in blue.

Detail from the instructions included with Mazogs, published 1981. The game title is in Profil. Body text is reproduced from material printed on an Epson FX-80 dot matrix printer, or something very similar.

Advert for Twin Kingdom Valley, a text adventure. Or Interactive Fiction as some people now call them. Ad copy uses News Gothic and Futura.

Wordmark rendered on the ZX Spectrum loading screen for The Birds and The Bees; clearly based on Television.

Cassette inlay cover for the ZX Spectrum version of Manic Miner published by Bug-Byte (also later published by Software Projects).

The Bienal de Arte Flamenco de Málaga is a cultural gathering that celebrates flamenco as an artistic expression and living heritage. A space for exchange and visibility around cante singing, dance, and guitar playing, it highlights flamenco tradition and its connection to the city, bringing together artists, audiences, and diverse contexts around a deeply rooted culture. It took place in Málaga from May 27 to August 2, 2025.

To develop its visual identity, we began with a process of research and visual archaeology, diving into flamenco posters from the 1970s and 80s. We were interested in reviving their way of communicating: the typography, the abundance of text, the colors, and that distinctive style characteristic of popular graphic culture. With respect, we reinterpreted this tradition through a contemporary lens, preserving the authenticity, energy, and passion of flamenco.

For the main masthead, we opted for a combination of 20th-century typefaces, bringing together Umbra and Copperplate Gothic. The dialogue between Umbra’s expressiveness and play of shadows and Copperplate Gothic’s solid, classical character creates a headline with presence, personality, and a certain timeless quality. This pairing strengthens the identity’s character while connecting it to the graphic tradition that inspired the project.

For secondary information, we used Annonce and, for residual information, Futura. A project with a highly typographic character. A revision of flamenco aesthetics brought into the present day.

Miller Text, Italic and Display

Victorian Architecture & Dynasticism. Studies in Victorian Architecture & Design is the journal of The Victorian Society. Volume Nine (2025), edited by Joshua Mardell, is set in Miller and Ravenscar. Designed by Dale Tomlinson after an original series design by Dalrymple.

Miller Display with Ravenscar Text

Ravenscar Text Regular and Light

An election poster attacking the government of Adolf Hitler and promoting the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) in the March 1933 German federal election, the last election in Germany before the Nazi Party banned all other political parties.

The headline (“Reward 1,000 Reichsmark”) uses a version of Inserat-Grotesk schmal, possibly the schmalfett style of Phönix-Groteske by Krebs. The other typefaces are all by this Frankfurt/Main type foundry: the bulk of the text uses fette Merian-Fraktur, though there are two lines in schmale fette Brentano-Fraktur. The word “dass” at the beginning of each point is in halbfette Federzug-Antiqua, and the numeral in “Liste 2” likely is from Freihand-Groteske.

The poster was printed by the Offenbacher Abendblatt, a party-owned newspaper founded in 1874 which had to cease publication shortly after when the National Socialists came to power.

This invoice by Eduard Kleefeld’s chocolate and cocoa factory in Hanover, Germany, is set in four sizes of Georg Belwe’s Belwe-Gotisch. The initials just above the fold are from Belwe-Antiqua. Both typefaces were released around the same time (1912/1913) by the Schelter & Giesecke foundry in Leipzig. The roman also appears on the green slip where it is paired with Bravour.

Leo Göpfert had ordered 60 bars of cooking chocolate, 25 rolls of cookies, and 50 bars of fondant chocolate for his shop in Lohr/Main.

Zoom in to see the various ligatures included in Belwe-Gotisch. For example, “Poſtſcheckkonto” has pairs for ſt, ch, and ck.

Jim Parkinson, who sadly passed away last Thursday, June 26th, 2025, was one of the designers of the groundbreaking ITC Bodoni series in three optical sizes (ITC Bodoni 6, ITC Bodoni 12 and ITC Bodoni 72), arguably one of the most spectacular Bodoni revivals of all time.

After decades of somewhat “watered-down” modern versions (from the likes of ATF, Bauer, Berthold, Monotype, etc.), ITC Bodoni was a godsend for lovers of the strong Italian flavour that makes the original Bodoni unique – and Parkinson’s own particular sensitivity and taste for gentle mischief (see his remarkable italics in the smallest optical size), were central to this achievement.

U&lc celebrated the release of the family in its Fall 1994 issue with a lengthy report by Sumner Stone, the lead designer on the project, fittingly entitled “Notes from Parma”.

The front cover shown here is set using ITC Bodoni Seventy-Two Book and ITC Bodoni Twelve Bold and Book, as well as ITC Franklin Gothic Demi.

Advert for Heinrich Jost’s Atrax in Typographische Mitteilungen, volume 23, issue 11, November 1926:

Die neue lichte Werbeschrift von größter Reklamewirkung. Gut lesbare und künstlerisch eigenartige Zeichnung machen die Atrax für die Auszeichnung einzelner Zeilen in Reklamedrucksachen besonders gut geeignet und für jede Druckerei unentbehrlich.

Translated into English, the copy reads:

The new inline advertising typeface with the greatest publicity impact. An easy-to-read and artistically unique design make Atrax particularly suitable for highlighting individual lines in commercial printed matter and indispensable for every print shop.

The roman is Baskerville-Antiqua, a revival of John Baskerville’s types, issued by Bauer in 1924.

A small booklet titled Welsh Place-names and Their Meanings; undated, but appears to be an earlier edition of a 2011 printing with updated covers available from the Internet Archive. The author is Dewi Davies.

The title, top and tailing a rather nice dragon, is in one of the Bookman Swash typefaces; the Letraset version looks quite close. The booklet is undated. I have put circa 1975 for the date, but this is really the vaguest idea, based on the general look and feel and when Bookman and Letraset were popular.

Printed by Cambrian Printers, Aberystwyth.

Source: www.ebay.com demetri1987. License: All Rights Reserved.

Teil IV: Rheinlande südlich bis zur Mosel, Teile von Westfalen und Hessen-Nassau, Hessen, Bayern, Baden und Württemberg (Eifel, Taunus, Odenwald, Tauber- und Neckargebiet) nebst Rundfahrten in den Rheintälern, Eifel, Sauerland, Lahngebiet, Nahetal und Taunus.

Ravenstein’s Radfahrer-Führer is a series of cycling guides issued by Ravensteins Geographische Verlagsanstalt in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. Established in 1830 by Friedrich August Ravenstein (1809–1881), the cartographic publishing house was continued by his son Ludwig (1838–1915).

The guides were edited by Ernst Ludwig Richter, long-time chairman of the touring committee of the German Cycling Federation. Shown here are volumes IV, V, and VI, each of which covers certain regions of Germany and neighboring countries. This specific edition from around 1910 was distributed (or endorsed?) by the Arbeiter-Radfahrerbund „Solidarität“. This association is known today as Rad- und Kraftfahrerbund „Solidarität“ Deutschland 1896, or RKB for short. From Wikipedia (translated):

The RKB was founded in Offenbach am Main in 1896 as the “Arbeiter-Radfahrerbund Solidarität”. An initial founding act in Leipzig in 1893 had still been banned despite the repeal of the Socialist Law. The national office was initially located in Chemnitz, but the association moved its headquarters to Offenbach am Main in 1907. In the Weimar Republic, the ARB was the largest cycling association in the world with several hundred thousand members. The name Solidarität (Solidarity) was intended to express that this association saw itself as part of the workers’ movement.

The association’s name and its address are shown at a dramatic angle, set in two italic typefaces: Reklame-Kursiv by the Krebs foundry and (one of the many versions of) Halbfette Cursiv-Grotesque, a design that, according to research by Dan Reynolds, originated at Juxberg-Rust in 1874. The upright grotesks look like Breite magere Grotesk and Neueste schmale Grotesk, both by Bauer.

Source: www.ebay.com demetri1987. License: All Rights Reserved.

Teil V: Rheinland südlich der Mosel, Rheinhessen, bayrische Pfalz, Elsass-Lothringen (Vogesen), Baden, Württemberg (Schwarzwald), Schweiz nebst Teilen von Frankreich und Rundfahrten im Schwarzwald, Schweiz und um den Bodensee.

Source: www.ebay.com demetri1987. License: All Rights Reserved.

Teil VI: Bayern, Tirol, Salzburg, Steiermark, Kärnten, Ober- und Niederösterreich, Böhmen, Mähren und Rundfahrt durch Tirol, Steiermark und Vorarlberg.

Philobiblon, vol. VII, no. 5

Philobiblon was a bibliophile journal from Vienna, published by Herbert Reichner (1899–1971) from 1928 to 1936. After the Anschluss – the annexation of Austria into the German Reich in 1938 – it was taken over and continued by the nationalist Rudolf M. Rohrer Verlag. As opponents of the Nazi regime and as Jews, Reichner and his wife had to flee the country. They first went to Switzerland on 13 March 1938, and further to the USA in 1939. Herbert Reichner opened an antiquarian bookshop in Manhattan. In 1956, he moved to Stockbridge, Massachusetts, where he continued to run his bookshop.

In 1934, the cover of the “magazine for book-collectors” featured Wallau. The original halbfett style of Rudolf Koch’s rotunda interpretation was first cast by Klingspor in 1930. Early adverts for the typeface show it with an angled i dot, like on the Philobiblon cover. From around 1934, this detail was changed to a short horizontal stroke.

The advert by Maggs Bros. is set in four sizes of Tiemann-Antiqua-Kursiv, featuring its alternate swash caps for M, P, and A. Walter Tiemann’s eponymous roman is also a typeface by Klingspor. The italic was released in 1925.

Philobiblon, vol. VII, no. 8

A decent example of Miller & Richard's Grotesque No. 4 Italic, which, for all its quirks, looks perfectly at home on a no-nonsense government notice. I particularly like the flinching f, echoed in Fred Smeijers’ vintage-inspired Ludwig, which uses it—quite pragmatically—in ligatures.

The other typefaces are mysteries to me, and I would appreciate any help in identifying them—especially the interloping 3s in “30th SEPTEMBER” and “3 a.m.” and the O in “On and after,” which differs a bit from the others.

Ludwig Black and Black Italic by Fred Smeijers. The f flinches à la Grotesque No. 4 Italic to make way for l, f, t, and i, but stands (or leans) straight next to o. (The second f in “off” flinches in solidarity with the first, I suppose.)

Paper bag advertising M. Georg Püschmann’s “first specialist store” for tobacco in Neukirchen im Erzgebirge, Saxony.

While “Gute Zigarren” at the top is lettering, the remaining six lines are set in six different fonts from four typefaces: Inserat-Grotesk schmal (with thick-thin underline), Bernhard-Antiqua, two weights of Säculum, and two sizes of a yet unidentified bold and rather wide Grotesk.

The design is undated, but based on the release dates of the identified typefaces, it must be from after 1911.

A 1973 poster for the reggae classic film The Harder They Come, starring Jimmy Cliff. The title treatment is set in Zipper, a Letraset classic. The curved type with Jimmy Cliff’s name looks to be photographically adjusted to better conform to the curve. Note the slight trapezoidal tapering towards the bottom of the letters. Compare the C, M, and Y glyphs in the name and title. The top quote on the poster is set in Helvetica and Bookman Bold Italic Swash, with the credit line set in Stymie. The quote uses hanging punctuation well! Trade Gothic shows up in small print at the bottom. The film critic quotes are typed on a typewriter. The border is a scotch rule (thick-thin-thick style) that could have been made using a dry-transfer process (not the slight misalignment where the curved corner meets the straight line. Letraset catalogs don’t show this style of border.

This poster is the “Style B” of the poster and differs significantly from the other promotional posters for the film, which are done in the blaxploitation style. The bottom left corner of the poster is meant for the placement of the details of the local theater screening the film.

Detail of the main title’s type treatment. You can make out the faint sun shape made out of Ben Day dots (or done using a dry transfer tone) in the background. Trade Gothic is used for the “Roger Corman presents...” credit line.

In 2022, Shauna Buckley of Other Office designed the fourth issue of Hot Potato magazine, a bi-annual publication created by Naoise O'Keeffe.

Aimee Mclaughlin from Creative Review describes it as "the newspaper for people who don't read news," emphasizing its unique approach to current affairs, resembling more of a fashion magazine. The magazine, established in 2019 as a "new newspaper," incorporates elements of photography and fashion to captivate those in these industries.

Two-color advert by the Verlag des Bildungsverbandes der Deutschen Buchdrucker, the publishing house of the Educational Association of German Letterpress Printers in Leipzig, in Typographische Mitteilungen, Issue 6, June 1924.

The author names, Ernst Preczang and Wilhelm Eule, are set in caps from Max Salzmann’s expressionist Dolmen, first cast by Schelter & Giesecke in 1922. The book titles, Freie Gedanken and Wanderschaft, are in the decorated version named Zierdolmen, which was added in 1923. The copy including the two promotional slogans – Das Leben wird reicher und schöner durch klare Bewusstseinsinhalte / Froher wird der Tag, den edle Wahrheiten durchleuchten (“Life becomes richer and more beautiful through clear awareness / The day becomes happier when noble truths shine through”) – is set in another release by local foundry (and sponsor?) Schelter & Giesecke: it’s Schneidler-Latein by F.H. Ernst Schneidler.

Eduard Ege’s eponymous Ege-Schrift was first cast by Genzsch & Heyse around 1923. In 1926, the foundry added a solid version, Basalt, which in 1934 was supplemented by a lowercase.

The diagonally hatched caps of the original design can here be seen on the dust jacket for The Temptation of Anthony, a novel in verse accompanied by other poems, written by Isidor Schneider (1896–1977). This is the first edition published by Boni & Liveright in 1928.

CD cover

Horse Rotorvator is an album by English band Coil, featuring John Balance and Peter Christopherson. This is the band’s second studio album.

From Wikipedia:

The album title was inspired by a dream of Balance’s in which the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse slit the throats of their horses and assembled their jawbones into a device large enough to “plough up the waiting world.”

Initially released in the UK in 1986 by Force & Form, this post shows the 1988 re-release.

The cover was designed by Peter Christopherson himself. In the center, a fisheye photo by John Balance is framed by a circular contour. The title and the band name are shown in the four corners – COIL / HORSE / ROTOR / VATOR – in capital letters from Palatino.

The pale tones of the background and the typography, together with the image of a bronze horse, create an unexpected medieval aesthetic. I find the interior of the CD interesting, and by complementing the design with the fish-eye photo of the marble statue, there’s a connection between the ancient subject and the more or less modern style of photography. The Coil logo on the left-hand page with the acknowledgements also takes its place in this medieval aesthetic with a yellowish hue.

The design reinforces the neopagan spirit that the group asserts in its music and in the aesthetics it constructs.

[More info on Discogs]

CD booklet with acknowledgements in Palatino Italic

CD booklet with faux small caps

Front. “June Imray / The Torry Quine Again / Written & Performed by June Imray”

A charity shop find that I initially thought was Harquil but turns out to be Artistik. I admit that I was momentarily misled by the fact that the sample for Artistik here on Fonts In Use uses the bell-top A that no one appears to use in practice. For good reason. The asymmetric A with overshoot, as used here on the album cover, is a better match for the rest of the letters.

Artistik was popular in the 1970s, at least judging by the Fonts In Use showings, and was a Letraset favourite. This recording is marked “℗ 1977”, and the copyright on the bottom of the Letragraphica sheet is 1977, so this might be an early use of the Letraset adaptation.

The “Quine” of the title is probably the Scots word meaning, among other things, “girl”.

The bus livery is consistent with Aberdeen Corporation busses in the 1970s, and they presumably ran the route to Torry.

[More info on Discogs]

Various sleeve notes, including “Recorded by ‘PHOEBE’ the REL Mobile Recording Unit at the Aberdeen Arts Centre and REL Studios, Edinburgh. / Engineers: Neil Ross & Roy Ashby”

The roundel/logo is the word REL stylised so that it might appear to be BEL.

In the years before the outbreak of World War 1 “motoring” started to be one of the popular pastimes of the ‘well-off’ and upper classes. This can be seen in this series of motoring guides produced by the Cheltenham based publishers E J Burrow & Co Ltd in conjunction with the Royal Automobile Club and this, the Scottish volume, in connection with the Scottish Motoring Club. The various volumes give details of routes and destinations, including maps, and are peppered with adverts for motoring services to be found on the way – important then in the early days of motoring when to be able to find a mechanic or petrol supplies was vital – as well as for hotels and for ‘goods’ useful for motorists; these include accessories and clothing suitable for motoring. The guides are written by Charles G Harper who was a well known travel writer.

E J Burrow’s became a prolific publisher of guides and handbooks, often “official” in that they were produced in conjuction with local authorities or organisations. This is interesting in that it notes amongst their addresses Bradford as the fact their London Agent was Percy Lund, Humphries & Co Ltd. I suspect this small format book may have been printed at Lund Humphries ‘County Press’ and had not previously been aware of some link between the two companies.

In the ad shown above, Windsor Condensed is set on a curve, with the initial letter inserted from regular-wide Windsor. Other typefaces used include Cheltenham (sold by Caslon as Cheltenham Old Style), Jenson Old Style (sold by Stephenson Blake as Italian Old Style), and a bold Grotesque.

Can there be any more iconic name in connection with Glasgow’s Tea Rooms than that of Cranston’s? It even gets a mention in the 1938 GPO documentary Night Mail. This advert however relates not to Miss Catherine – or Kate – Cranston whose Tea Rooms designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh are the stuff of legend, but the chain founded and owned by her brother Stuart Cranston. Both siblings followed their father’s footsteps into the business of tea and tea rooms. Stuart died in 1921, his sister despite having given her tea rooms up in 1918, outliving him until she died in 1934 leaving a substantial estate to ‘the poor of Glasgow’.

The ad shown below likewise uses Windsor, complemented by De Vinne, also in two widths, and an Old Style.

The Scottish Motor Traction Co Ltd, better recalled as ‘the SMT’, was formed in 1905 and although it was around early motor cars that the business was based, they soon began to operate motor buses. Thanks to railway investment in the late 1920s, the company became the dominant force in the Scottish bus industry, owning other concerns notably W Alexander’s. Nationalised in 1948, and forming the basis of the later Scottish Bus Group. The non-bus and coach interests that I think had been formed into a separate subsidiary as SMT Sales & Service Ltd., selling and repairing motor cars, before WW1, was retained in private ownership and continued in existance until 1991.

These premises in Fountainbridge, Edinburgh, were suitably aimed at the sort of clientele who could afford motoring in pre-WW1 days with Ladies and Gentlemens lounges – as well as skilled engineers and 24-hour service.