Typography | Paperclip Design Project

P A P E R C L I P

what a

GEM

M

The design of t he paperclip familiar today has nev er been patented. It is not known for sure who invented it or where it was invented. What is known was t hat paper clips wit h t he same design were in production in Britain in t he 1870s where it was made by t he Gem Manufacturing Company Ltd, whic h suggests - but doesn’t prove - t hat t hey may have been invented t here. The Gem paperclip, as it became known, was introduced to America in 1892. It went on to become t he most common paperclip in use all over t he world.

The Swedish word for paperclip is “G E M .”

Most everyday objects—like the key, or the book,

or the phone—evolve over time in incremental

ways, and the 20th century in particular revolu-

tionized, streamlined, or technologized the vast

majority of the things you hold in your hand over

the course of an average day. But if you could step

into an office in 1895—walking past horse-drawn

buses and rows of wooden telephone switchboard

cabinets—you might find a perfectly recognizable,

shiny silver paper clip sitting on a desk. What was

then a brand-new technology is now, well over a

century later, likely to be in the same place, ready

to perform the same tasks. Why did the paper

clip find its form so quickly, and why has it stuck

with us for so long?

“

Better t han ordinar y pins for binding toget her

“

Better t han ordinar y pins for binding toget her papers on t he same subject, a bundle of letters, or pages of a manuscript.

use

PAPER

CLIPS

SUGGESTED

USES:

SCRATC H THE CDS AND DVDS OF YOUR ENEMIES USE AS PORCUPINE QUILLS ON PAPIER-MAC HE SCULPTURE USE AS EMERGENCY KEYC HAIN

INY KABOBS FOR TINY ET SNAILS PET INY JAVELIN TINY ROCHET HOOK CROCHET URRENT TESTER CURRENT ERRORISM TERRORISM ALKING STICK FOR WALKING INY MAMMALS TINY

TINY KEBABS FOR PET SNAILS

NORWEGIAN PAPERCLIPS?

Once upon a time, there was a Norwegian inventor named Johan Vaaler.

Vaaler invented a wire device that would fasten papers together. Excited about his invention, and perhaps assuming it would do better outside of Norway, Vaaler applied for patents in Germany and the United States. He didn’t know that there was already a better version of his invention, the Gem clip, already on the market. It wasn’t on the market in Norway. Vaaler’s patents quitely expired, and the Gem clip went on to gain popularity in Norway along with the rest of the world.

In the 1920s, a Norwegian patent engineer visited Germany to register Norwegian paptents. He found Vaaler’s patent. He didn’t see that Vaaler’s clip was missing the last turn of the wire. He assumed that this was the patent for the paperclip that we all know and love. He proclaimed Vaaler to be the inventor of the common paperclip.

Vaaler became known as an “unrecognized Norwegian genius.” Dictionaries and encyclopedias identified him as the inventor of the paperclip.

To make matters even more confusing, paperclips became a big deal during World War II. Norwegian patriots wore paperclips in their lapels as a symbol of resistance to German occupiers.

The people wearing them didn’t always know about Johan Vaaler. To them, the clips said “We are unified. We are bound together.”

After the war, the paperclip became a national symbol for Norway. People tend to ignore the fact that Vaaler did not invent the same paperclip that we use today.

In 1989, a giant paperclip sculpture was put up on a college campus in Oslo. But this sculpture is of a Gem clip, not of the clip that Vaaler invented.

In 1999, 100 years after Vaaler’s clip was patented, a commemorative stamp was issued in Norway. Again, the stamp showed the Gem clip, not Vaaler’s.

TINY KEBABS FOR PET SNAILS

“We fell in love, despite her obsession with staples, and my fondness for paper clips.�

- Jarod Kintz, my love can only occupy one person at a time

A GRAPHIC SYMBOL ON THE DIGITAL DESKTOP: a symbol of office life For many a 21st-century office worker, it is more often encountered as the “attachment” icon in an email program than in the physical form of a bent steel wire.

If Office users needed help, Clippy was there. The animated paperclip made his first appearance in Office 97 and last appearance in Office 2003. He was most famous for tapping the inside of the monitor when he appeared and regularly saying “It looks like you’re writing a letter.”

Office life, despite plane flights and email, just isn’t all that different than it was 100 years ago, and it’s likely to be largely similar in another 100 years. And the paper clip—which is just exactly good enough—is likely to be around to see it.