Sunday 12 March 2017

OUGD503- Investigating British Typography (4)

I want to investigate to see if there is a particular British style fluent through typography, marking 'quintessential Britishness' in itself,


Lettering considerations:  

  • Is the resolution predominantly for screen or print? > What size will it be?
  • This will inform the thickness of stroke > Legibility, suggestive typography
  • Will it be a mixture of Upper and lower case letterforms- or all the same? > Incorporate ligatures and hand rendered typography?
  • Reflecting the brand? > Incorporate new typefaces for additional collateral and identity based ideas


18th Century Ligatures and Fonts by David Manthey

Practically allEnglish printing from 1735 to 1800 was done using the Caslon font. Around 1754, the Baskerville font was introduced by John Baskerville (1706-1775), which was used for some fancier documents and bibles. Printers didn't care for Baskerville and claimed that it was hard to read and bad for the eyes. As a reference, Benjamin Franklin used both of these fonts in his print shop.

Caslon Typeface traditionally has three styles: roman, italic, and swash. The italic form of Caslon does not include italic numerals. Numerals were written in one of two ways: 0123456789 in standard text, and  0123456789  for figure captions and drawings. The swash form is a fancier version of italic that is used only in principal titles. The swash form was not in general use in the early 1700s, yet was more regularly used by 1761 when Greenalls first established.

Ligatures are an interesting aspect of traditionalist typography I am interested in, yet do not want the incorporation of them to move too far away from Greenalls clean identity. 




Famous British Typefaces 

British typography echoes a contrast between a thick stem and a thin stroke lines, working in balance. In the chapter 'Famous British Typefaces' in Display Type the emphasis is on the Serif band of typefaces and explores decorativiaty through making the type a feature in itself. 








By expanding the scale of the letterform, the stem and serif's are expanded, allowing an illustrative component to be integrated within the design. These type compositions exploring Caslon have a whimsical summertime quality to them. This pattern making could easily represent rosemary sprigs, juniper berries, or additional herbs and flavour aspects we associate to gin. 

A drop shadow style block is applied to the typeface echoing a three dimensional quality descending from the bottom left upwards. This stroke aspect gives a prominence to the overall letter shape, aiding legibility despite internal decorativeness. The premise of this could be applied to many additional type compositions, manipulated in ways for branding or decorative purposes.




Hand rendered typography is also used as an aesthetic within typically British culture. Hand drawn shop signs, coffee shop/bar boards and the association of swirly serifs for 'regal' ie. 'British' in some cases, to represent Britishness. The below example not only outlines areas of quintessential Britishness, but re-enforce the research previously into the simple means which keep us content. Food and drink feature highly on this, represented in hand rendered type in different styles and strokes. Serifs with a decorative tail seem popular, possibly giving a dainty 'Great British bake off' connotation via 'feminine' delicate strokes.




Debbie Kendall - Printmaker focusing on British culture and hand lettered typography. A Bold contrast is visible between the two main aspects of the composition, one of decorativiaty and historical serif-swirl type, boldly contrasting a sleek san-serif and block serif. The use of a narrow san-serif for 'enlightened' suggests a modernity, visible through type choice. In addition, the use of a bolder serif for 'hound', suggests a traditional heritage with the overall stance standing proud- much like the little sausage dog.
Contemporary language and Typography to consider

Emoji's are becoming more commonly used in societal language, with an emoji recently making the Oxford Dictionary 'word of the year' ranking. This shift between linguistic tools to visual is apparent by the success of the emoji, with a simple emoji an emotion can be instantly conveyed. This is also a tool used recently used on social media by Southern Comfort to gage reaction; as well as within Apple's latest in store graphic design... an emoji takes up less compositional room than actual words, so could be a handy compression tactic for designers and visual communicators.


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