N G I S DE for
S E I M UM
D
A beginner’s guide to design By Rachael Layzell
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CONTENTS Chapter 1: Typography and Typesetting Serif, Sans, Slab...............................................................................5 Weight...............................................................................................6 Tone....................................................................................................7 Metaphor..........................................................................................8 Association.......................................................................................9 Connotation....................................................................................10 Dissonance......................................................................................11 Colour................................................................................................12 Axis.....................................................................................................13 Modulation/Stress........................................................................14 Ink-trapping....................................................................................15 Readibility vs. Legibility..............................................................16 True type/Open Type..................................................................17 Extended characters....................................................................18 Ellipsis................................................................................................19 Acutes and umlauts.....................................................................20 Em / En...............................................................................................21 Em dash / En dash / Hyphen.....................................................22 Non-breaking space.....................................................................23 Thin space........................................................................................24 Ligatures...........................................................................................25 Proportional old-style numerals.............................................26 Point size..........................................................................................27 X-height............................................................................................28 Ascenders / descenders.............................................................29 Kerning.............................................................................................30 Font metrics....................................................................................31 Leading.............................................................................................32
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Chapter 2: General Design Entry / Focal point.........................................................................35 Navigation........................................................................................36 Hierarchy...........................................................................................37 Contrast.............................................................................................38 Symmetry..........................................................................................39 Balance...............................................................................................40 Axis.......................................................................................................41 Negative space................................................................................42 White space......................................................................................43 Grids....................................................................................................44 Gutters...............................................................................................45 Proportion / harmony..................................................................46 Golden ratio / golden mean.....................................................47
Chapter 3: Printing Offset lithography........................................................................49 CMYK.................................................................................................50 RGB.....................................................................................................51 Bleed..................................................................................................52 Trim....................................................................................................53 Crop marks......................................................................................54 Registration....................................................................................55 Creep.................................................................................................56 Signatures.......................................................................................57
Chapter 4: Art Movements Arts and Crafts...............................................................................59 Art Nouveau...................................................................................60 Cubism.............................................................................................61 Constructivism..............................................................................62 Dada..................................................................................................63 Bauhaus...........................................................................................64 Art Deco...........................................................................................65 Surrealism.......................................................................................66 Pop Art.............................................................................................67 Minimalism.....................................................................................68
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CHAPTER ONE y h p a r g Typo & g n i t t e s e p y T
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Serif, Sans-Serif & Slab-Serif Fonts
Aa
Serif fonts
Bb
Sans-serif fonts
Xy
Slab-serif fonts
are categorised by the little extra stroke that appears at the ends of the verticle and horizontal strokes of the letters.
are categorised by their lack of serifs. In French, “sans� means without.
are categorised by their large, slab-like serifs.
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Weight
Tone
Weight, in typography, refers to the relative darkness of different strokes resulting from the relative thickness of the strokes. This is described by the terms light, regular, medium, semibold, bold, black, etc. Below are some examples:
Tone, in typography, refers to the use of different typefaces to express a piece of writing’s tone of voice, mood, personality, gender, etc. Below are some examples:
Semibold Bold Regular Medium 6
Dear Sir/Madam
I love you
Friday the 13th 7
Metaphor
Association
Metaphor, in design, is established by how a page will be laid out. Thus the designer’s combination of pictures, the size of these pictures and the designer’s use of differing typefaces and colour all establishes Metaphor.
Association is established by the historical symbolism that is associated with an object or representation.
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An example is the typeface called Magical Me designed specifically for Harry Potter, and therefore associated directly with it.
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Connotation
Dissonance
The connotation of something is the idea or feeling that is invoked by an object or typeset, in addition to its literal meaning. The connotation is both objective and subjective, which means that different recievers may interpret the same typeset differently. This interpretaion is based on a variety of things, including the receiver’s views and experiences of the representation.
To understand dissonance, one must first have a grasp of what consonance means: a feeling of balance and harmony. Thus dissonance happens when one’s consonance is distorted, and an imblanace occurs. To make use of dissonance, designers attempt to imagine what the given audience would expect to see, and do something completely different.
Below is an example of Imperial font which is the body font used in The New York Times. Readers who enjoy this newspaper may see this typeface elsewhere and thus find it to have positive connotations.
The general rule of thumb when creating contrast in typography is to use one serif font and one sans serif font, and to not use too many typefaces. However sometimes designers delibaretly break this rule of thumb to create a festive atmosphere, or to make historical or venecular references, such as in the figure below.
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“Colour”
Axis
Colour, in typography, refers to texture and variation in the type style. Thus, the colour of a page is based on the designer’s use of different typefaces on that page. It is also based on the use of differing sizes of these typefaces, their weight and whether they are italic or not. Some designers might choose to use only one font for a specific reason, however, most designers use different typefaces in order to make the page more “colourful”, and thus keep the reciever engaged.
In typography, the axis of a letter or character is the imaginary line drawn from its top to its bottom. The angle of the axis of the lower case O is used to measure the angle of stress, in typefaces that have contrasts in the thicknesses of the curved strokes of the letters.
For instance, the pages below are “colourful” in their use of text because they make use of different typefaces, and different sizes and weights of these typefaces.
Below are three examples of the lower case O, with different axes: The axis is perpendicular to the imaginary line on to which the type has been written or typed. Therefore it has the smallest degree of stress of the three examples.
The axis is only slightly skewed, and therfore has a medium amount of stress.
This axis that has the largest angle of the three, and therefore the highest amount of stress
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Stress/Modulation
Ink Trapping
Stress, also referred to as modulation, is determined by the thickto-thin ratio of the diagonal, vertical and horizontal strokes of a typeface. Stress is established by drawing a line through the two thinnest parts of a lower case letter O. Typefaces that have uniform strokes, have no stress.
Ink traps are a property of typefaces designed specifically for being printed at a small size. In ink trapping, corners or details of the characters are removed, as once the character is printed, the ink will spread into the portion of the letter that has been removed. Without the ink traps, excess ink could potentially spread out of the area reserved for the charcter. Below is an example of ink trapping. This typeface is a variation of Bell Centennial, which was designed for the Bell Telephone Company. It was to be used in the printing of Telephone Books, which are typically filled with a small typeface. Some of the ink traps have been circled:
Slightly Diagonal stress
Vertical Stress
Diagonal Stress
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Readability vs. Legibility Readability refers to how inviting a piece of type is for the receiver to read. It is based on how words and blocks of type are arranged on a page. Legibility refers to how easily one is able to physically read a text, and the ease with which one is able to recognise individual characters in a text. Readability therefore refers to how the typeface is used by a designer, whilst legibility refers to how the typeface is designed.
True Type/Open Type True type, also referred to as open type , is used to describe fonts which are composed of thousands of characters. In the past, tyepfaces consisted of a set number of 256 characters. However. all modern typefaces are true type, because they are digital, which means meaning that they are able to include many variations of letters, such as differing weights, accents, acutes and umlauts, and various sets of glyphs.
Although a type may be highly readable, this does not make it legible type, therefore you should choose your moments carefully for making type readable. This is seen in the example below:
Design Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design is fun. Design
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This font is Mistral and may be highly readible as a display type, for example as a heading in a magazine that is trying to convey elegance. The same font Mistral has been used but at 9 point, the traditional size for a newspaper. It is not easily legible as a body text.
An example of an umlaut.
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Proportional oldstyle numerals Proportional old-style numerals are numbers which have varying heights and alignments. This is in contrast to lining numerals, which are all uniform in both height and alignment. This is seen in the example below:
Ellipsis An ellipsis functions grammatically to indicate that a piece of the text has been taken out. Many people mistake an ellipsis to be three full-stops placed after one another. However, an ellipsis is a character in and of itself, and cannot be made up of three full stops, as the stops are spaced in a particular manner. For example:
EL
... ‌ 18
LIP
SIS
These are three full stops placed after one another.
This is an ellipsis character.
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Acutes and Umlauts
Em/En
Acutes and umlauts are accents placed on characters in different languages.
Em and en are units of measurement in design. Their names come from the fact that a capital ‘M’ and a capital ‘N’ in any given typeface were used as units of measurement. In the past, the capital ‘M’ was often the same as the point size of the font, and the capital ‘N’ was often half of the point size of the font, which is how the units of measurement obtained their names. Thus, an em is equal to the specified point size of a font, so that if the font has been set to 14 points, the em will be 14 points. Similarly, an en is equal to half of the specified point size of a font, so if a font has been set to 14 points, the en will be 7 points. These units are therefore the same for all typefaces at a given point size.
Below is an example of an acute accent:
Café
Below is an example of an umlaut accent:
Führer 20
MN 21
Em dash / En dash / Hyphen Em dashes, en dashes and hyphens are all dashes, however, they differ in length and purpose.
Non-breaking space This relates specifically to digital typesetting, in which non-breaking spaces are space characters which prevent automatic line breaks when they are used. When a non-breaking space is placed between two words, it prevents them from being separated by a line break.
With its sleek curves and lack of edges, the design of the new building reflected the architects vision of a power-saving building of the future. With its sleek curves and lack of edges, the design of the new building reflected the architects vision of a power-saving building of the future. An em dash is the longest of the three and is used in place of commas, parenthesis and colons. An en dash is half the width of an em dash and slightly longer than a hyphen, and is used to link text in instances such as figures, time and distance, or in compound adjectives. A hyphen, the shortest of the three, is used to create compound terms, as well as for word division.
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With its sleek curves and lack of edges, the design of the new building reflected the architects vision of a power-saving building of the future.
Broken over a line
Non-breaking space
No break
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Thin space
Ligatures
A thin space is a space character that is usually a fifth or a sixth of an em space in width. Its purpose is to add a narrow space between characters, for example, in separating glyphs. Below is an example of varying spaces petween ‘s’ and ‘p’ in the word ‘space. A thin space is seen in comparison to the larger em and en spaces, as well as the smaller hair space.
A ligature is when two or more letters appaear to be joined and become one unit. Thus, a ligature is a character that consists of two or more letters. This is seen in the example below:
Em S pace En S pace Thin S pace Hair S pace 24
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X-height
Ascenders & descenders
The x-height is the height of a lower-case x in any given typeface. Thus it is the distance between the baseline and the mean-line of lower case letters.
Ascenders are the parts of lower-case letters that rise above the x-height. Descenders are the parts of lower-case letters that extend below the baseline. Ascenders and descenders make words easier to read.
This is demonstrated in the example below:
This is demonstrated in the example below:
cap-height x-height Baseline
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Typography
cap-height x-height Baseline
Typography Ascender-height
Descender-height
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Extended characters
Point size
Extended characters are letters or symbols in specific typefaces that have higher ascenders and lower descenders than other letters in the same typeface. Extended characters are often used by designers to make typefaces aesthetically pleasing.
Point size refers to the height of the body type, from the top highest ascender to the lowest point of the lowest descender.
Examples of extended characters are seen below, in orange:
abcdefghij klmnopqrst uvwxyz 28
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Kerning
Font metrics
Kerning is the adjustment of the spaces between characters in one’s type. Kerning is used to achieve a proportional balance of space between each character, to make the type aesthetic pleasing to the viewer.
Font metrics refers to the measurement of text. Font metrics includes cap height, x-height and ascender height, and descender depth. This is seen in the example below:
Below is an example of the widening of kerning at intervals of 30.
Design is fun, Design is fun, Design is fun
cap-height x-height
Design is fun, Design is fun, Design is fun Baseline
Design is fun, Design is fun, Design is fun
Typography
Ascender-height
Descender-height
Design is fun, Design is fun, Design is fun Design is fun, Design is fun, Design is fun Design is fun, Design is fun, Design is fun
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Leading
Drop caps
Leading refers to the spacing between two lines of type. Traditionally, pieces of lead were placed between lines of type in order to seperate them, hence why it is called Leading. Today, leading is automatically set in proportion to the size of the digital typeface, however it can be manually adjusted in programs such as Adobe inDesign.
Drop caps normally appear as the first character in the first paragraph of a story or article, and are characterised by the way in which they “drop” down over two or more lines. Drop caps are significantly larger than the text in which they appear, and are often used in order to make the hierarchy of a page clear.
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rop caps are typically the first character in the first paragraph of a story or article, and are characterised by the way in which they “drop” down over two or more lines.
Design really is fun to do
Leading
Baseline
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CHAPTER TWO
Entry / Focal point The entry point, also referred to as the focal point, is the point within a page to which the eye is initially drawn. It is therefore the objective of the designer to design a page in such a way that the eye is drawn to the most important part of the page from the first glance
l a r e n Ge gn i s e D
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The point of entry in the newspaper example below is indicated by an arrow:
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Navigation
Hierarchy
Navigation refers to the way in which one’s eye is drawn across a page after it has been drawn to the focal point. Traditionally, Western readers read from left to right and from top to bottom, whilst in multiple Asian countries, type is written and read from right to left. Therefore as a designer, it is important to acknowledge one’s audience and the way their eye’s would naturally be drawn across any given page. This is seen in the example below:
The hierarchy of a page or of facing pages correlates with the navigation of the page. One’s eye should be drawn from the most significant story or image on a page, to the second most significant story or image, etc. Thus the designer needs to visually indicate this to the reader in a clear way. Below is an example of hierarchy, with the level of importance indicated numerically:
1 2 3
4 5 36
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Contrast
Symmetry
Contrast refers to the arrangement of different components within a page. For example, contrast could be created by the juxtaposition of light and dark colours, rough and smooth textures, or large and small shapes. Below is an example of how contrast has been used by different sizes of headlines, use of colour and arrangement of pictures:
Symmetry is the correlation of size, shape, and the respective placement of components on opposite sides of a dividing line or about an axis. Generally, designers avoid making pages symmetrical, as symmetry often means that a clear hierarchy cannot be established. However, as seem in the example below, symmetry can sometimes work in the favour of the designer:
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Balance
Axis
Balance is established by the distribution of the visual weight of a visual image in design. It typically occurs around a vertical axis, and in order for people to find a page aesthetically pleasing, the visual weight should be equal on both sides of the axis. Therefore, compontents of the page should be placed in such a way that will allow objects of varying visual weights to balance one another around a pivot.
In design, an axis is the most customary used organising principle. It is an imaginary line (vertical, horizontal or diagonal) used to arrange a group of elements in design. Once the axis of a page has been established, the page is then designed around the axis, in such a way that there is a form of balance with regards to the two sides. Below is an example of different axes:
Horizontal
Vertical
Diagonol
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Negative space
White space
The negative space within any given image is the space that surrounds the subject(s) within the image.
White space is the portion of a page which is left completely untouched. White space is essentially the lack of text and graphics, and is used to break up text and graphics, in order to leave breathing room for the eye. White space is generally used to ensure that the reader is not overwhelmed by the page.
Below is an example of how negative space can be used effectively in typography, where the body of text on the left is difficult to read because there is an evident lack of negative space, whilst the negative space in the body of text on the right makes it easy to read:
I found a dimpled spider, fat and white, On a white heal-all, holding up a moth Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth Assorted characters of death and blight Mixed ready to begin the morning right, Like the ingredients of a witches' broth A snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth, And dead wings carried like a paper kite. What had that flower to do with being white, The wayside blue and innocent heal-all? What brought the kindred spider to that height, Then steered the white moth thither in the night? What but design of darkness to appall? If design govern in a thing so small.
In the example below, arrows have been used to indicate the white space:
I found a dimpled spider, fat and white, On a white heal-all, holding up a moth Like a white piece of rigid satin cloth Assorted characters of death and blight Mixed ready to begin the morning right, Like the ingredients of a witches' broth A snow-drop spider, a flower like a froth, And dead wings carried like a paper kite. What had that flower to do with being white, The wayside blue and innocent healall? What brought the kindred spider to that height, Then steered the white moth thither in the night? What but design of darkness to ap-
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Grids
Gutters
A grid, in design, is a structure that is generally two dimensional and is made up of a set of intersecting straight or curved guide lines. It is used to structure the contents of a page.
Gutters are the spaces between the columns of a printed text. Below is an example of gutters, which are highlighted in orange:
Below is an example of a grid:
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Proportion/Harmony
Golden ratio
The proportion, also referred to as harmony, of any given design refers to the relative size and scale of the elements within that design. It can also be defined as the spatial relationship between one element and another.
The golden ratio is also referred to as the divine proportion, the golden mean and the golden section. The actual ratio is 1:1.618, which derives from the famous Fibonacci Sequence. The Golden Ratio is the basis that most people use in determining what they perceive to be beautiful. The perception of the object’s beauty is the result of the symmetry created by using the Golden Ratio measuring rod.
The image below is the famous Leonardo Da Vinci’s ‘Vitruvian Man’. It is a representation of the proportionality of human beings, with the shapes surrounding the man being used as guidelines for the relative length of his body and limbs.
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CHAPTER THREE
Offset lithography Offset lithography is a printing technique, typically used in the printing of newspapers and magazines. The inked image and/or text are transferred (or ‘offset) from a metal plate to a rubber blanket and then put onto the paper.
g n i t n i Pr
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CMYK
RGB
The CMYK colour model is a model used to describe the process of colour printing. CMYK stands for the four colours that make up the model: cyan, magenta, yellow and key (black). Ink is usually applied in the order of the abbreviation, and different combinations of these colours at differing strengths creates a near infinite number of colours.
Similarly to CMYK, RGB is also an additive colour model. However in RGB, the colours stand for red, green and blue, and the process makes use of these three colours in differing combinations to create different colours. However, most digital printers work in CMYK.
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Bleed
Trim
The bleed of a page is the area of the page that is intended to be trimmed off, once printed. Therefore, when the designer extends the colour, image or text of a component past the actual size of the publication for which it has been designed, they are essentially ‘bleeding’ the component off the page. Typically, the process of trimming is not accurate and thus designers leave about a 3mm bleed to avoid white lines on the edges of their pages.
Trim refers to the edge of the paper of a finished product. The trim of a page is thus the edge of a piece of paper once its bleed has been removed.
Below is an example of the bleed of a page:
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Crop marks
Registration
Similarly to the trim of a product, crop marks are thin lines that appear at the corners of images, pages or design pieces. These lines instruct the printers as to where a final page should be cut or trimmed to a finished size.
Registration marks are typically marks used to assist with alligment. The marks are printed outside of the printed area and are used in order to correlate the differing colours or plates used in offset lithography. A registration mark is typically a circular mark with a cross through the middle of it and is placed in each corner of any given print page. Its purpose is to ensure that all of the colours used in the publication have been printed correctly. Below is an example:
Below is an example of an image with crop marks:
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Creep
Signatures
When a large number of pages are bound together by stitching, because the outer pages of the booklet have more surface area to cover, the centre pages appear to ‘creep’ out of the cover of the booklet when folded. This is seen in the example below:
A signature is a single sheet of paper upon which multiple pages are printed on both sides of the sheet. Once a signature page is trimmed, folded, bound and cut, it becomes a specific number of pages depending on the size of the pages and the size of the sheet on which they have been printed.
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CHAPTER FOUR t r A nts e m e v Mo 58
Arts and Crafts The Arts and Crafts movement falls under the rise of the AvantGardes, and existed between 1860 and 1900. It was founded by the designer, writer and activist William Morris, who lived from 1864-1896. It began in Britain, and spread across America and Europe, and then to Japan. The name of the Movement originated from the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society, founded in 1887. The movement occurred during the Industrial Revolution, which existed between 1760 and 1840. The Arts and Crafts movement originated as a reaction to the Industrial Revolution. It was a fierce fight against modernization and the destruction of old buildings, which arose as a result of Industrialism. Decorative design sought to bring back the humanity, beauty and fine detailing of crafting work. Influences were derived from nature, and romantic attachments to forests, flowers and birds. There were also influences from mythical and emotional themes that are apparent throughout the works. This movement influenced the typeface called Kelmscott Chaucer, and was designed by William Morris and illustrated by Edward Burne-Jones. The typefaces were designed and cut, ornamental borders crafted and title pages styled like that of medieval manuscripts. However, the typeface died out in 1898, as it became too costly to produce the intrinsic details.
An example of Kelmscott Chaucer
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Art Nouveau
Cubism
The Art Nouveau movement began around 1890 and ended in 1910. The movement was aimed at modernizing design, seeking to escape the diverse historical styles that had previously been popular. Artists drew inspiration from both organic and geometric forms, evolving elegant designs that united flowing, natural forms resembling the stems and blossoms of plants. The emphasis on linear contours took precedence over color, which was usually represented with hues such as muted greens, browns, yellows, and blues. The movement was committed to abolishing the traditional hierarchy of the arts, which viewed the so-called liberal arts, such as painting and sculpture, as superior to craft-based decorative arts. The style went out of fashion for the most part long before the First World War, paving the way for the development of Art Deco in the 1920s, but it experienced a popular revival in the 1960s, and it is now seen as an important predecessor - if not an integral component - of modernism.
The Cubism movement began in Paris around 1907, and was led by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque. Cubists explored open form, piercing figures and objects by letting the space flow through them, blending background into foreground, and showing objects from various angles. Some historians have argued that these innovations represent a response to the changing experience of space, movement, and time in the modern world. This first phase of the movement was called Analytic Cubism. In the second phase of Cubism, Synthetic Cubists explored the use of non-art materials as abstract signs. Their use of newspaper would lead later historians to argue that, instead of being concerned above all with form, the artists were also acutely aware of current events, particularly World War One. The movement was conceived as ‘a new way of representing the world’, and paved the way for non-representational art by putting new emphasis on the unity between a depicted scene and the surface of the canvas.
The Art Nouveau typography from today originated in magazines like Munchner Jugend, The Studio and Yellow Book or period advertising, poster or sign design. Collections of typography today include some of the most recognizable styles of the period (Ariosto, Munch, Pantagruel), but they also include unique faces which are based on rare hand lettering.
Typography was influenced in many ways through the use of Cubism, such as with its practice of integrating letterforms into paintings which influenced subsequent art and design movements in type. Cubists would blend letters into paintings to influence freeform typography of later movements such as Futurism and Suprematism.
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Art Nouveau Typography with floral and fruit elements.
An example of cubism typograpghy
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Constructivism
Dada
Constructivism began in Russia, and was developed by Vladimir Tatlin around 1917. It initially acted as a lightning rod for the hopes and ideas of many of the most advanced Russian artists who supported the revolution's goals. It borrowed ideas from Cubism, Suprematism and Futurism, but at its heart was an entirely new approach to making objects, one which sought to abolish the traditional artistic concern with composition, and replace it with 'construction.' Constructivism was marked by the organization of abstract, geometrical elements to make dynamic or visually stable forms. Designs were typically simple, flat, symbolic colours, and extensive white space. Some designers insisted on the value of abstract, analytical work, and the value of art per se; these artists had a major impact on spreading Constructivism throughout Europe. The seed of Constructivism was a desire to express the experience of modern life - its dynamism, and its new and disorientating qualities of space and time. But also crucial was the desire to develop a new form of art more appropriate to the democratic and modernizing goals of the Russian Revolution.
The Dada movement was an artistic and literary movement that began in Zürich, Switzerland and existed between 1916 to 1924. It arose as a reaction to World War I and the nationalism that many thought had led to the war. It was revolt against value system of ruling establishment and was a reintroduction to accessibility of art. Its output was wildly diverse, ranging from performance art to poetry, photography, sculpture, painting, and collage. The movement dissipated with the establishment of Surrealism, but the ideas it gave rise to have become the cornerstones of various categories of modern and contemporary art.
Constructivism influenced typography, as designers began to combine different sans serif typefaces for their visual and formal properties as well as their literal meanings. On the right is a poster designed by El Lissitzky, who was one of the most innovative and proficient designers of the constructivist ideal.
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‘Beat the Whites with Red Wedge’ Poster designed in 1919
Typography was influenced massively during the Dada movement. The Dadaist would rebel and protest all that would be normally approved at the time and reinvented the way type was used. They would use as many different fonts as they wanted, punctuate in unconventional ways, and a typical charactersitic was to drop random letters or symbols throughout their pages. They would also print both horizontally and vertically on the same paper, composing indifferently in any direction. Visual impact became a vital part of their posters and every page had to explode since they wanted it to “yell” at the viewers. They achieved this with extreme hierarchy, very heavy use of capital- lowercase, condensed, and lightsemi-bold type.
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Bauhaus
Art Deco
Bauhaus started as an art school in 1919 and was founded by Walter Gropius, in Weimar, Germany. The art school was founded with the avant-garde ideal of combining hand-work and crafts with the fine arts and to bring all forms of art together as one. Its typical characteristics are: form follows function, simplicity and accessibility in design, and a return to the basics of craftsmanship. It is very geometric based and uses the ideal of “less is more”, using simple geometric shapes, and usually sticking to primary colours only. Bauhaus emphasizes craft and mass-production, and combining beauty and utility, by blending arts with engineering.
The Art Deco movement originated in France in the 1920s and 1930s and continued until 1939. This movement influenced the design of buildings, furniture, jewellery, fashion, cars, movie theatres, trains, ocean liners and everyday objects, and represented luxury, glamour, exuberance, and faith in social and technological progress. This movement was popular during the roaring twenties, a time of opulence, indulgence and pleasure. However, during the 1930s, the movement lost its popularity due to the Great Depression which created a culture of fear, panic and uncertainty. The ostentatious style no longer suited this new and unpredictable environment. Art Deco is characterised by angular forms, bold colours, spirals, sunbursts, high-quality materials and craftsmanship, stylised or geometric decoration, zig-zags, dancing figures, bolts of lightning and vibrant colour.
Joost Schmidt taught the lettering course at Bauhaus, exploring typography in its most intricate form: the shapes and angles of letters, the colours they could be filled with, the flexibility of their shapes and sizes, and – of course – their foundational composition of circles, squares, and triangles. His ideal was for typography to be standardised internationally. However, it was Herbet Beyer who developed the first typeface of Bauhaus, called Universal, which would later develop into the well known typeface Bauhaus 93 typeface. This typeface makes use of both uppercase and lowercase lettering. It exemplifies the visual clarity Gropius was striving. Another well known font that was developed from Bauhaus is Futura, of which there are many variations. FUN FACT: Futura BdCn BT has been used in all the headline fonts of this book.
Bauhaus 93 64
Futura Md Bt
Art Deco changed typography in that it placed more emphasis on straighter shapes. It also included neutral colours – like black, white and grey – as well as metallic trimmings. Art Deco typography was more aesthetic rather than legible. Sans serif letters were given different variations as some were inclined, geometrically shaped or decorated. The cross bars of capital letters were above or below centres while lowercase letters had a reduced x height, large ascenders and short descenders. An example of a typeface that developed from Art Deco is Boradway, and can be seen below:
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Surrealism The surrealism movement was founded by the poet André Breton and began in Paris, in 1924. Surrealism’s goal was to liberate thought, language, and human experience from the oppressive boundaries of rationalism. Surrealism spread across Europe, becoming one of the most influential styles of avant-garde art. It evolved out of the nihilistic “anti-art” Dada movement, most of whose members became surrealists. However, while every bit as “revolutionary” as Dada, Surrealism was less overtly political and advocated a more positive philosophy. Breton envisaged something greater than just the art movement we know today. In fact, he wanted a completely new order of society, and felt that it should be liberated by us drawing more from who we were. Who we were, in turn, should be found under the bonnet in our gearbox. To crystallise and share his ideas, he decided to write his surrealist manifesto in 1924. In part, this course of events helps explain why it was more a literary movement to begin with and why some refer to it as a broader cultural movement including politics and music. Surrealism is very rarely associated with typography. However, on the right is Alphabet, a typeface designed by Roman Cieslewicz for Guide de la France mystérieuse, in 1964.
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Pop Art Pop art was founded by New York artists Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, James Rosenquist, and Claes Oldenburg. They drew on popular imagery and were actually part of an international phenomenon. Following the popularity of the Abstract Expressionists, Pop's reintroduction of identifiable imagery (drawn from mass media and popular culture) was a major shift for the direction of modernism. Pop artists celebrated commonplace objects and people of everyday life, in this way seeking to elevate popular culture to the level of fine art. Perhaps owing to the incorporation of commercial images, Pop art has become one of the most recognizable styles of modern art. By creating paintings or sculptures of mass culture objects and media stars, the Pop art movement aimed to blur the boundaries between “high” art and “low” culture. The concept that there is no hierarchy of culture and that art may borrow from any source has been one of the most influential characteristics of Pop art. Design in this style features saturated colors, heavy outlines and bold typography, all of which are eye-catching and visually appealing. Pop Art-based design sets a mood of high energy, fun and style. This is seen in the example on the right.
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Minimalism Minimalism began in New York in the early 1960s among artists who were self-consciously renouncing recent art they thought had become stale and academic. A wave of new influences and rediscovered styles led younger artists to question conventional boundaries between various media. The new art favoured the cool over the "dramatic" and their sculptures were frequently fabricated from industrial materials and emphasized anonymity over the expressive excess of Abstract Expressionism. Minimalists distanced themselves from the Abstract Expressionists by removing suggestions of biography from their art or, indeed, metaphors of any kind. This denial of expression, coupled with an interest in making objects that avoided the appearance of fine art, led to the creation of sleek, geometric works that purposefully and radically eschew conventional aesthetic appeal. By the end of the 1970s, Minimalism had triumphed in America and Europe through a combination of forces including museum curators, art dealers, and publications, plus new systems of private and government patronage. Simple forms apply to fonts as well. Minimalist fonts are crisp, straightforward, and lack any decorations. Serifs are not forbidden by default but they are rarely used. An example of a minimalist font is Helvetica, which is the font that this paragraph is written in.
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