OEI #84/85: cover

From the OEI website:

OEI is a Stockholm-based magazine for extra-disciplinary spaces and de-disciplinizing moments – experimental forms of thinking, montages between poetry, art, philosophy, film, and documents; critical investigations, editorial enunciations, aesthetic technologies, non-affirmative writing, speculative archaeologies, new ecologies and counter-historiographies.

For each issue, a new typographic treatment is commissioned by different (typo)graphic designers, with the actual production of each issue being done by the OEI editors themselves.

For the two double issues #84/85 (2019) and #86/87 (2020), the same treatment was used twice – for the first time. The issues originally were supposed to be one issue but as the number of pages by far exceeded the maximum, the publication was split into two issues, each counting around 640 pages.

For #84/85 and #86/87, Konst & Teknik / Peter Ström was commissioned. Below is a text that was included in OEI #86/87 on the typography, translated into English from its original Swedish.

14 TIMES TIMES — On the typography in OEI #84/85 and #86/87

Times New Roman is one of the most well known Roman typefaces in current times, originally drawn in 1931 by Stanley Morison for the Times newspaper in London.

During the century that has passed since, the technical conditions of typesetting and type design have drastically changed on multiple occasions. From the metal type that Times New Roman originally was drawn for, via phototypesetting, to the digital typography of the computer era.

Today typefaces are drawn and programmed to work straight on digital screens, either in layout software such as Adobe InDesign (for later reproduction on, for example, paper), or to work exclusively within the computer; in software, on web pages, and apps.

Times New Roman found its way into the personal computer quite early, as it was distributed with the operating system Microsoft Windows 3.11 in 1993. Since then a number of new versions and interpretations have surfaced: Everything from hand-drawn and mirrored versions, via conceptually interesting sans serif versions, to professional interpretations by established typeface designers. Worth noting here are Tiempos by Kris Sowersby (2010), LL Bradford by Laurenz Brunner (2018) and GT Alpina by Reto Moser (2020).

Times New Roman has in a way become as close to a “non typeface” as a typeface can ever be — rivaled only by other Microsoft-distributed typefaces such as Arial and Courier New.

Or, as the typographer (and lawyer) Matthew Butterick phrases it:

When Times New Roman appears in a book, document, or advertisement, it connotes apathy. It says, “I submitted to the font of least resistance.” Times New Roman is not a font choice so much as the absence of a font choice, like the blackness of deep space is not a color. To look at Times New Roman is to gaze into the void.

Today there are more than 20 digital typeface families that, in one way or another, draw references to Times New Roman. The initial idea for OEI #84/85 and 86/87 was to use all of them as a way to create an index of the evolution of printed matter over the last one hundred years. But as many of the fonts lack Swedish (or Danish) characters, are incomplete for other reasons, or are simply illegible, the amount was reduced to 14. All 14 come in both Regular and Italic versions, with a few selected exceptions where the italics have been emulated by manually slanting in the layout software — a homage to the era of early digital typography where italics weren’t always available.

The different versions of Times New Roman used are everything from professional versions, such as Times Ten, to unpublished interpretations used in earlier projects by Konst & Teknik, such as Times MMM Roman, a remix version of Moderna Museet’s own Times MM Roman, to free amateur versions like Tiny Times, a pixelated version based on the appearance of Times New Roman when rendered on low-resolution screens.

The 14 versions:

Times New Roman Regular & Italic
Dutch 801 BT Roman & Italic
Times Regular & Italic
Times MM Roman Regular & Italic
Times MMM Roman (K&T remix) Regular & Italic
Pantasia Regular & Italic
Times Ten Regular & Italic
Happy Times at the IKOB Regular & Italic
Times CG ATT Regular & Faux Italic (13 deg)
Times NR MT Pro Regular & Italic
#PCMyungjo (K&T edit) Regular & Faux Italic (13 deg)
Tiny Times (K&T edit) Regular & Faux Italic (13 deg)
Times LT Regular & Italic
Times ET Regular & Italic

In every project we take on as Konst & Teknik, the research and final decision of the typeface selection is crucial – often to such an extent that we have difficulties returning to the same typefaces more than once. The typeface selections reflect the project and its content so much that it becomes difficult to apply the same typeface selection on later projects.

Times New Roman in its different versions seem to be an exception, a typeface family we have returned to more times than once. Maybe thanks to its rich technical and visual history, making it easy to apply conceptually to different projects and commissioners. It is by far the typeface I have the most different versions of in my computer, making it easy to find a suiting visual expression within the framework of a "clear" typography. Because of this, it has for a long time been an interesting thought to apply all the different version at the same time to a bigger printed matter project thus making it possible to in detail compare the different version properly. OEI #84/85 and #86/87 offered that possibility, both content wise, conceptually and technically.

Peter Ström
Konst & Teknik
January 2020

OEI #86/87: cover, spine, and back

OEI #84/85: spread

OEI #84/85: spread

OEI #84/85: spread

OEI #84/85: spread

OEI #84/85: spread

OEI #84/85: spread

OEI #84/85: spread

OEI #84/85: spread

OEI #84/85: spread

OEI #84/85: spread

OEI #84/85: spread

East-West/West-East thesis posters

East-West/West-East is an MFA graphic design thesis project. After knowing the situation that there is a lack of accessibility and clarity on East-Asian typography knowledge for a broader range of audience, the thesis project aims to research and design a series of references on how to use East-Asian typography and Latin typography.

While at a macro level, notions of globalization and nationalism are shifting between the two over time. Cross-culture communications in our daily life scenario are still unstoppable. Among those communications, the dialogue between East-Asia and the west is one of the driven forces. To raise the accessibility, clarity, and appropriate uses of East-Asian typography and Latin typography is needed. The resources and references shall be decentralized. It should not only limit to certain practitioners and scholars but also open to a broader and even younger audience.

The results are executed through items that can often be seen daily. Those deliverables include a book, a series of informational posters, a teaser motion, a typographical ruler, an online reference website, a series of conceptual packaging designs.

To visually execute this thesis project, one of the core strategies is to create an identity system to maintain the visual consistency of the thesis. As this thesis is creating a series of references, “neutral”, “black & white”, “typographical”, and “educational” become the keywords that lead the design and typographical choices.

For the core identity system, TWK Lausanne, Source Han Sans and Source Han Serif are the three typographical choices. Lausanne, designed by Nizar Kazan, has a neutral appearance and high legibility. Source Han Sans, developed collaboratively by Adobe and Google, has a complete set of types that can apply to Chinese, Japanese, and Korean languages. This type family also includes seven weights and supports Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. It also includes Latin, Greek, and Cyrillic characters from the Source Sans Pro family. Source Han Serif is the serif version of the Source Han type family, being a counterpart.

Specifically, in the thesis book, Dutch 801 (Bitstream’s version of Times) is used to enhance the feeling of being educational and informational. The appropriate character height-width ratio makes itself a typeface fitted for both large and small scales. Its softness and roundness from the serifs, bowls, teardrops, and terminals create its high readability for audiences. Lyon Text is used to display Latin languages along with Source Han Serif in captions and other small descriptions. For demonstrating type terminology and characteristics in the book, Nanum Myeongjo is sometimes applied to replace the Korean fontset from Source Han Serif. The Korean characters within Source Han Serif family have more roundness and edginess, creating more brushstrokes-like features. The sharpness and cleanness from Nanum Myeongjo seem to fit more with Chinese and Japanese types from Source Han Serif.

As one of the critical parts of this thesis project, East-Asian typefaces pairing with Latin typefaces are addressed. These pairing examples (not shown in this post) include the following:

Hiragino Mincho and Monotype Baskerville
Luckytype Juzhen and Self Modern
Sandoll GothicNeo and Garnett
Hiragino Kaku Gothic and Sentinel
AR Yuanti and Gotham Rounded
MF Jinhei and Bickham Script

Disclaimer: The end of an MFA thesis project is certainly not the end of its practice. The next steps would include researching deeper on East-Asian typography and sharing my results with other designers/students who might be interested in such a topic. Due to the variety and quantity of existing East-Asian typography realm, this thesis project is open-ended and willing to contribute to any ongoing studies, conversations, projects, and digital platforms which explores such topic.

Find more images on my website, or browse through the process documentation.

East-West/West-East poster details

The thesis book consists of two parts. Part I is East-Asian Typography Atlas while Part II is Thesis Process. The final book will be crafted with a do-si-do binding technique. The form is a representation of the coexisting relationship between these two parts.

The thesis book spread example

The thesis book Part I contents page

The thesis book Part I example: the formation of East-Asian characters

The thesis book Part I example: the terminology of East-Asian characters

typographical rulers for East-Asian typography and Latin-typography

How We Die is How We Live Only More So is a collection of writing exploring vulnerability and intimacy, death and dying in the digital era, and the politics of illness. Co-edited by Oreet Ashery and George Vasey and published by Mousse Publishing. The publication archives Ashery’s work from 2014–2019 and includes new writing from Rizvana Bradley, T J Demos, Mason Leaver-Yap, Bárbara Rodríguez Muñoz and Imani Robinson. Editorial coordination by Guia Cortassa. Designed by Marcello Jacopo Biffi. Cover in three different colorways. Monument Grotesk by Kasper-Florio (Larissa Kasper & Rosario Florio) is used for cover and interior. The body copy is set partly in Monument Grotesk, partly in Dutch 801 (Bitstream’s version of Times).

The title has a glossy UV coating, some extra covers have been cut into halves to make bookmarks.

The new £10 banknote issued by the Royal Bank of Scotland features the RBS brand typeface, RN House Sans. Numerals are a redrawing of a specimen from the Glasgow School of Art case room and most closely match Modern No. 20.

Scientist Mary Somerville’s quote and Norman MacCraig’s poem are rendered in Dutch 801 Italic (Bitstream’s version of Times) and a hand-drawn Scottish secretarial script, respectively.

Explore the elements of the currency at RoyalBankTen.com and visit O Street's design case study.