Creating with Paint, 1967, with illustrations by Peter Landa

Can you bear more Caruso Roxy? Here’s another Use of it – it’ll be the last one from my side for a while, promised.

It’s my personal favorite: a series of creative activity books, authored by Grace Mintonye and James E. Seidelman and published by Crowell-Collier Press in New York from 1967 on. The titles pair all-caps Roxy with lowercase Barclay, and are embedded in gorgeous, topical jacket designs. The interiors – not shown here – are beautifully designed, too. If you’re into crafts and/or this mid-century aesthetic, make sure to browse your thrift store for a copy.

Creating Mosaics, 1967 (second printing from 1969), with illustrations by Harriet Sherman

Creating with Paper, 1967, with illustrations by Marjorie Borgos Blumenkopf

Creating with Clay, 1967 (second printing from 1970), with illustrations by Robert William Hinds

Creating with Wood, 1969, with illustrations by Lynn Sweat

Creating with Papiermache, 1971, with illustrations by Christine Randall. This title uses the Light weight of Roxy.

Shopping Cart Art, 1970, with illustrations by Kaye Sherry. This one was handled differently, probably because of the longer title: caps from Roxy Light are paired with lowercase letters from Gonzales El Royal. The “Creating” part was dropped as well.

White Fungus is an art magazine and project based in Taichung City, Taiwan.

Founded by brothers Ron and Mark Hanson in Wellington, New Zealand, in 2004, as a quasi-political manifesto, copies of the first issue were produced on a photocopier, wrapped in Christmas paper and hurled anonymously through the entrances of businesses throughout the city. Now a magazine featuring interviews, writing on art, new music, history and politics, White Fungus takes a dialogical approach to the work it covers. The name of the publication comes from a can of “white fungus” the Hansons found in their local supermarket in the industrial zone of Taichung City. Each cover of White Fungus is derived from a scan of the can.

The 18th issue of White Fungus features an 80-page interview with New York poet and novelist Eileen Myles. The conversation traces several chapters of their life, including becoming a poet in 1970s New York, reading at CBGB, and writing the cult classic Chelsea Girls. Myles discusses their mainstream crossover in 2015, their involvement in the hit television show Transparent, overcoming alcoholism, their writing process, and many other topics.

The issue also includes an epic feature on Hilma af Klint and the suppressed occult roots of modernist art. Taipei artist Yao Jui-Chung contributes a photo essay documenting animatronic depictions of the Chinese concept of hell, as seen in Daoist temples in Taiwan and Singapore. Yan Jun reflects on the life of Taiwanese noise music pioneer Dino (Liao Ming-He), who passed away in 2022. Also featured is an interview with artist Pavel Pepperstein on the influence of children’s literature and hallucinogenics in conjuring his surreal futuristic landscapes—a style he calls “psychedelic realism.”

Table of contents, set in Söhne, Sometimes Times and Athelas

Opening spread for an interview with Eileen Myles, set in Bell and Letter Gothic

Slightly modified Corinthia introduces the word “Hell”. The title of the artwork is set in the lower left corner in tiny DF Kai SB.

Opening spread for “Through the Prism of the Looking Glass”, pairing Lo-Res with Snell Roundhand.

From 12 October 2024 till 15 March 2025, Fondation Cartier holds an exhibition dedicated to the work of Colombian textile artist Olga de Amaral. The exhibition showcases 80 art pieces created between the 1960s and today.

Angès Dahan Studio took care of creating the graphics for the exhibition, choosing a strong duo of colours, a light red and a darker purple as the recurring cues of the identity, together with NaN Jaune as the main typeface. It’s featured in its Maxi Bold variant for the title with the distinctive closed appertures on a and e. In addition, the Mini Light and Light Italic styles are used for the exhibition texts and signs as well as for the printed matter like flyers and the album booklet.

On the posters, the glass façade of the Fondation and the cover of the album booklet, the dates of the exhibition are set in the condensed Kapra, in all caps. The wordy logo of the foundation is set in Bell with the brand name in their custom script.

A splendid little booklet issued by the British Transport Commission to support the exhibition of London Travel in the Nineteenth Century in 1953. This was held in the historic Shareholders’ Meeting Room at Euston station; the Commission thought that there was “no better way of making this Room accessible to the public” at the time but sadly, less than a decade later, this historic space along with the other major components of the Victorian station were bulldozed in an act of redevelopment that is still a conservation cause célèbre.

The booklet is beautiful typeset and printed by the Shenval Press who, at the time, were acknowledged as one of Britain’s finest printers. The layout and typography are very typical of the Commission’s careful ‘look’ that saw them take great care in the graphic design of their publications. The cover and title page are shown.

GHT Global is a Strategic Consultation, Risk Mitigation, Threat Assessments and Crisis Management company that delivers specialized operational support to government agencies and commercial organizations around the world.

I had the task of creating an animated sequence that presents the services they offer, which are divided in three pillars: Green (Illuminate), Blue (Mitigate) and Black (Facilitate). The main typeface is Suisse Int’l, supported by Bell and Simplon Mono.

Design and animation: Amélie Lehoux
Creative direction: nohands

Suntup Editions is publishing a new limited letterpress edition of Richard Matheson’s seminal horror novel Hell House from 1971. The story was the basis of the 1973 film The Legend of Hell House, and was referred to by Stephen King as “the scariest haunted house novel ever written”.

The new edition, set for release in summer of 2024, features illustrations from William Basso (who sadly passed away shortly after completing the illustrations), introduction by R.C. Matheson, foreword by Mike Flanagan, and afterword by Nancy A. Collins.

The edition is offered in three states: “Artist” (750 copies, with dust jacket), “Numbered” (250 copies, ostrich leg leather binding), and “Lettered” (26 copies, full ostrich leather binding with goatskin headbands in quarter goatskin box). Five orders of the book will also be selected at random to win a copy with a unique red colored spine.

The book was designed by Michael Russem (who has designed several other books for Suntup Editions) using the Fanwood typeface (based on Fairfield) for body text, and my own Margo typeface (based on classic film and bookjacket lettering) for titling, headings, and initials. I was happy to see Margo’s contextual alternate stairstep ‘ll’ pair make an appearance in the title.

The novel is broken up between dates and timestamped sections following the events of the story. Russem used large initial caps of Margo for new sections, however the initials appear partway into their respective lines, preceded by the smaller timestamp text. Stylized brackets from Monotype Bell enclose the running headers, facing ]out[, and page numbers, facing [in].

The book is available for preorder from Suntup Editions.

Originally published in the 1860s by G. Routledge and Sons in London and New York, The (Illustrated) Language of Flowers by Mrs. L. Burke (Anna Christian Burke) is a delightful and amusing book with beautifully illustrated flowers and floriology, presented alphabetically by name, with their symbolic meanings from A to Z. Also included is a variety of romantic poetry by various authors. It is a reference book for floriologists and plant lovers alike.

This edition was published by Price Stern Sloan in Los Angeles in 1965, from the 1963 British edition published by Hugh Evelyn Limited, London.

Bookman (with the catchwords The and of) is the point of the charm, combining the Victorian sense with the glyphs of Romantiques No. 2 AKA Carnival for the alphabet at the start of the chapters. And inside the book, Bell makes an appearance all at once, for preface copy, chapters and the index.

Dust jacket for the first edition of Ian Fleming’s debut novel Casino Royale, devised by the author himself. The titling is likely illustrated, but based on Fry’s Ornamented. The title on the spine of jacket and hardcover is closer to the typeface’s original letterforms, see S. Text on the jacket is set predominantly in what looks to be Times New Roman. Title page text set in Bell.

Dust jacket (front)

Full dust jacket with inner flaps

Cover and spine

Title page

In 2011 Nick Curtis made a digital revival of Turtle, a by then largely forgotten Letraset face originally designed by Bob Newman in 1971, and released it under the name Turtellini NF.

Designer Tom Brown (TMBRWN) jumped right on it and put the vintage typeface design to striking contemporary use. Turtellini is prominently featured in the 2012 “Islands issue” of DestinAsian. Brown utilized the fact that some of the letterforms in Turtle/Turtellini are divided by stencil-like bridges, resulting in graphic shapes with rounded corners that resemble the segments of a turtle shell. He gave some of these “islands” a different color, staging playful typographic arrangements that complement the photography.

DestinAsian is a “luxury travel and lifestyle magazine for those who love to travel, and travel in style in the Asia-Pacific region and beyond”. It’s published in Indonesia by Mahapala Mahardhika.

F37 Bella by F37 Foundry in use for Square Mile magazine. From F37 Foundry Brand Fonts:

Square Mile is a luxury men’s lifestyle magazine distributed in the City, London’s financial district. It features style, celebrity interviews, cool gadgets, cars, watches and more. Square Mile magazine wanted a contemporary typeface to use on its covers and feature articles. The look and feel of the typeface needed to appeal to its target audience — mainly high-net-worth males working in the City of London.

F37 Bella is a really stylish typeface. It helped to visually support the shift we made with the magazine to be more fashion and style focussed. Those razor-thin serifs are so distinctive … it’s an absolutely beautiful display font.

Matthew Hasteley — Creative Director, Square Up Media

The magazine logo is based on Interstate. In additional roles: Bell, Bell Gothic, and Trade Gothic, among other typefaces.

Pineapple Collaborative is on a mission to connect and celebrate women who love food. They believe that sharing knowledge, supporting each other and coming together for a meal is the best way to create community. This sentiment lies at the heart of their new line of pantry staples featuring their first women-made olive oil and apple cider vinegar.

We started this project by looking at Pineapple Collaborative’s primarily online brand to understand how we would bring it to life through physical packaging. We explored a lively colour palette and provided naming and messaging options before landing on “The Olive Oil and The ACV” which are brought to life through playful typography on a relatively formal grid.

To create a sense of nostalgia for the recyclable olive oil pack we worked with a traditional tin maker. For the ACV, we landed on this unique glass silhouette with a tactile wood & cork top. The Olive Oil is produced in three contemporary colours so you can choose which one best compliments your kitchen.

The primary typeface chosen for the project is Viksjø by Monokrom, used with a customized V. It is paired with ABC Ginto Nord by Dinamo and Bell by Monotype.

The female founders of Pineapple Collaborative take pride in their highly engaged female following, and they’re proud to be working directly with women producers & growers, so we called this out on the back.

A series of stamps designed by Derek Birdsall in 2004 for the 250th Anniversary of the Royal Society of Arts. The only typeface used here that isn’t quintessentially British is Typo Upright, a 1905 American Type Founders revival of French script styles.

Using a color familiar to Readmill users, Bedow & Andreas Källbom composed a lovely new website for the private Swedish bankers Erik Penser AB.

Webtype Blog: “The Swedish company Stutterheim, manufacturer of raincoats, just re-lauched their website using Bell webfonts from Webtype. The transitional English serif is suiting Stutterheim just fine. With numerals this elegant even larger sums look attractive. The design of the website is modest and airy. A good example for how webfonts can gives your site a lot of personality.”

Google’s Think Quarterly is one of my favourite blog designs. Beautiful illustrations, crisp photography and, of course, Bell MT. This from Microsoft:

The original of this face was made 200 years ago and is thought by some to mark the introduction of the "modern" faces. It was made for Bell's Type Foundry by Richard Austin at about the time that the face we now know as Firmin Didot also appeared. Bell did not have a bold weight at that time. This new TrueType version, made in 1992 by Monotype Typography, tries to emulate the roughness that they imagine characterized typefounding in the 1780s. The metal version was a favorite of many designers who used it to bring some character to the text they were printing.