Naming, creative and art direction and brand design by EMME & Co:

Milee is an Institute of Development & Early Stimulation located in Mexico formerly known as Ducky. Our challenge was to create a brand that could resonate with a local audience by a strong storytelling & a visual system that could connect with people.

As a result, we build a playful, colorful, and interactive brand with a wide color palette, contrasts and a cheerful and dynamic logo.

The new brand typefaces for MIlee are Beatrice by Sharp Type and Clearface by Monotype. Together they gather an enjoyable brand, with a design system that reveals a series of collateral that helps the user connect with the brand.

Grafika 1 (1970), ft. Bauhaus Prisma K from Ed Benguiat’s Bauhaus Prisma & Prisma Bauhaus. This series of multiline faces was introduced in the same year and showcased in PLINC’s Art Deco-themed Alphabet Directions No. 11.

Covers for various clip books of line art issued by Harry Volk Jr. Art Studio, Pleasantville, New Jersey. See the previous post about the clip books issued in 1955 for more information on Harry Volk Jr. Art Studio.

These booklets belong to a subseries titled Grafika. It was introduced in 1970. Until 1972, 18 numbered issues were produced. From No. 19 on, the number was no longer shown prominently, and Grafika were merged into the regular series of clip books. Collector Bart Solenthaler comments:

Volk published several titles in addition to the regular clip books – including Grafika – that started out with a distinct mission, but they all eventually became interchangeable in content to their other offerings.

Although not yet used for the first issues, ITC Fat Face soon emerged as the identity typeface for the Grafika series, and was maintained for later additions, see e.g. No. 113 from 1980. Like ITC Avant Garde Gothic and ITC Ronda, ITC Fat Face is the work of Herb Lubalin and Tom Carnase. These three typefaces were all released in 1970.

Grafika 2 (1971) ft. ITC Avant Garde Gothic, with the numeral 2 from Craw Modern or similar tucked into the counter of the monocular a.

Grafika 3 (1971) appears to use a solid, filled-in modification of Bauhaus Prisma. When compared to Bauhaus Alpha or Bauhaus Geometric (PLINC’s precursors of ITC Bauhaus), the differences are most notable in the counters of R (not round) and A (much larger), as well as the K with more even arms. G was trimmed for tighter spacing.

Grafika 5 sees a return of Bauhaus Prisma K, here with an “Arabic” numeral. This thick-thin-thin-thick-thin face is also used for No. 7.

Grafika 8 (1971) proudly features ITC Fat Face, with ligatures for ra and fi. While the latter was included in the font, the former appears to be a clever custom invention. This eventually became the de facto logo of Grafika.

Grafika 9 (1971) uses a phototype version of Clearface. According to the One Line catalog (1971), Photo-Lettering, Inc. offered the design in 4 weights and 2 widths, plus italics. In 1978, ITC released a version in 4 weights, credited to Victor Caruso. ITC Clearface is narrower than the variant used here. The text in light lowercase letters inside the counter is set in ITC Avant Garde Gothic.

Grafika 11 (1971).

Grafika 12 (1971).

Grafika 14 (1972). “A Gallery of Contemporary Art” is in tightly spaced ITC Ronda.

Grafika 15 (1972).

Grafika 16 (1972).

Grafika 17 (1972).

Grafika 18 (1972).

“America” (No. G20, 1972) ft. tightly spaced caps from Futura Light, with a custom CA ligature. The small text here is set in all-caps Helvetica.

“Design Devices” (No. G22, 1972) ft. Advertisers Gothic.

“Ad Animals” (No. G25, 1972) ft. Mania.

Ad for the first edition of Sexual Politics (1970).

The devastating, definitive book of the Women’s Liberation Movement—“as outrageous as truth spoken loud and clear at a politician’s bier.”—Publishers’ Weekly. Selected by The Book-of-the-Month Club and Psychology Today Book Club. Just published, and a new bestseller at booksellers now. $7.95

The font in use is a film version of Clearface Heavy. The Clearface series was originally designed by Morris Fuller Benton with his father, Linn Boyd Benton, as advisor between 1906 and 1911. Photo-Lettering, Inc.’s One Line catalog from 1971 shows an adaptation of Clearface in five weights plus italic, condensed, and semi-condensed styes. In 1978, under license from ATF, the International Typeface Corporation commissioned Vic Caruso to develop ITC Clearface, a family of four weights with corresponding italics.

Appeared in Life magazine, 1971.

I posted this to my blog years ago, but thought this would be a good place for it.

In 1977 at age 21, I was production manager (officially) and assistant art director (unofficially) for Metropolis, a weekly newspaper in Minneapolis. I was the resident “type expert” on staff, and the editor encouraged me to write a piece for “Final Draft,” a recurring miscellany page in the newspaper. I chose to survey the landscape of type clichés of the day.

This item from the California Historical Society is undated. My guess is it was produced sometime shortly after the 1906 release of Clearface Bold. I am unable to identify the typeface on the side flaps.