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Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal

Contributed by Matthijs Sluiter on Jul 29th, 2018. Artwork published in .
Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal 1
License: All Rights Reserved.

From Behance:

The “Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal” (Dutch Language Institute) researches and describes the Dutch language in all its aspects, such as vocabulary and grammar. Studio de Ronners created an identity in which full name of the institute was incorporated into the logo while keeping it applicable for diverse uses. Two slashes, or virgules where used in the logo, which has both classical and contemporary associations.

From Studio de Ronners’ website:

We chose FF Schulbuch Nord for the logo. This typeface, created by a Dutch type designer has a modern look and is easily readable. DTL Haarlemmer – another Dutch design – functions as the basis for the tags.

The graphic line (marker) can be deployed horizontically as well as vertically, which is a nod to the graphic language in a dictionary. The function of the marker is to explain words, but also to indicate a hierarchy. Studio De Ronners asked for the favourite words of all of the institute’s employees and applied them to personal business cards, t-shirts and other means of communication. This way, the identity also serves as a way to express the involvement of the employees.

Apart from being designed by dutch type designers, the typefaces share an institutional / educational background, that matches well with the Dutch Language Institute. Just van Rossum's FF Schulbuch (‘school book’) is based on mid-20th-century German text books. DTL Haarlemmer is a digital revival by Frank E. Blokland of the hot metal typeface Haarlemmer, originally designed by Jan van Krimpen in 1938 as a typeface in roman and italic, for setting the texts of the “Statenbijbel” – the ‘official’ Dutch protestant bible translation.

Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal 2
License: All Rights Reserved.
Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal 3
License: All Rights Reserved.
Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal 4
Source: www.deronners.nl License: All Rights Reserved.
Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal 5
Source: www.deronners.nl License: All Rights Reserved.
Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal 6
Source: www.deronners.nl License: All Rights Reserved.
Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal 7
Source: www.deronners.nl License: All Rights Reserved.
Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal 8
Source: www.deronners.nl License: All Rights Reserved.
Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal 9
Source: www.deronners.nl License: All Rights Reserved.

2 Comments on “Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal”

  1. One correction: The agency is called ‘Studio de Ronners’ (often set as ‘studio de Ronners’, not De Ronners.

    And here is a little factoid. I worked on the typography of this project, and we made a few minor revisions to the typeface, such as the custom slash, which has a bit more weight to it, and features diagonal instead of horizontal terminal cuts so it stands out more in display format. Internally, this revised typeface was named ‘Schoolboek’.

    It didn’t matter for the design of course, but we were quite pleased with the name, given that the brand identity was for a pedagogic institute of Dutch language.

  2. Thanks for the correction, Martin! I’ve updated the name (turns out there are several projects of theirs on Fonts In Use already, thanks to you and others), and added the “modified typeface” tag.

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