
Online journal devoted to type design, visual culture and typography
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Interview
Interview with Peter Bilak
26.03.2020‘A man of letters’ — used to call individuals in the Renaissance times who were engaged in critical thinking, reading, research, and human self-reflection about knowledge, life and society. That definition perfectly suits Peter Bilak: he writes, lectures, publishes, and more of that it reflects a literal one dimension of the term — he makes letters. -
Interview
Interview with Brody Neuenschwander
14.06.2018I loved calligraphy but thought that if these people are in charge, it will die. I started to realize that I had to open up to other ideas and then the process started. I was 30 years old by that time — pretty late, I thought. Anyway, at least it happened. -
Interview
Letters from Sweden
26.03.2018People are not perfect, why should typefaces be? -
Interview
Interview with Sumner Stone
9.01.2018Due to the popularity of Sumner Stone’s typefaces, released at the dawn of the digital age, his name has almost become a common noun, but the world-renowned designer and founder of the Adobe Type Department is about much more than his early successes. Especially for Type Journal, Sumner Stone talked to Misha Beletsky about type techniques, life, work, teaching and his plans. -
Interview
An interview with Erik Spiekermann at p98a
18.09.2017We just like to print — one can find the statement on the spreads of the journal PAPER, which Erik Spiekermann publishes with a small team of type-enthusiasts at the letterpress workshop p98a. At 70 years of age, having stepped down as chairman at Edenspiekermann and switched between FontShop to p98a—after the acquisition by Monotype in 2014—he doesn’t seem to be retired (although he mentions the word repeatedly). -
Interview
An interview with studio NORM
24.07.2017Back in 2016, NORM Studio gave a lecture at the Serebro Nabora conference in Moscow. It was a case-study presentation with the main focus on type design. Looking closely at the works, one could find oneself in a world somewhere between their Swiss predecessors’ experience: such as Adrian Frutiger’s systematic attitude to type design and Max Bill’s mathematical way of visual thinking. -
Interview
Now we are talking.
Interview with Typeradio2.12.2015Typeradio is the radio channel on type and design. Since 2004 the archive of the internet radio stream keeps growing and counts at the moment nearly three hundred records of interviews with design professionals. This time Typeradio (Liza Enebeis and Donald Beekman) answers to questions from Ilya Ruderman at the type conference Serebro Nabora, September 2015, Moscow. -
Interview
Interview with Alexandra Korolkova
2.11.2015Since 1982, the Association Typographique Internationale (ATypI) has awarded the Prix Charles Peignot, named after the organisation’s first president, to a designer under the age of 35 “for an outstanding contribution to type design”. In 2013, Alexandra Korolkova won the prestigious award. -
Interview
Interview with Ilya Ruderman
19.06.2015I consider myself to be a practicing type designer who is less focused on the historical basis of his work and more interested in trying to create something relevant and new I take up projects on the condition that there is a possibility to come up with something unique that could contribute to a certain part of type heritage or world culture in general. Although it probably sounds too presumtuous… -
Interview
Interview with Gerard Unger
13.05.2015I’ve always been very curious, and I think curiosity is a very fundamental Dutch quality. When you make a design, the first question you ask when you’ve made it is: What else can I get out of this? Is there anything more? Is there anything beyond what I have done so far? So that was another thing that I’ve learned in the 60s as a student: never be satisfied with what you can do, but always try to get a bit more out of yourself and to experiment. I think this is what I have in common with many of my Dutch colleagues. -
Interview
Serebro Nabora: interview
with Gayaneh Bagdasaryan15.08.2014I was going to a Ukrainian type event, and I was suddenly struck by the thought that here, in Russia, there's nothing similar, while there are a number of such events in Ukraine. I found this so unfair and even hurtful that I thought, “I have to fix this—right now, today”. -
Interview
Masha Doreuli: I learned
to make decisions quickly5.06.2014A successful text typeface to me is the one in which both the character set and the family structure are well organized. That’s what we started our project in the Netherlands with. Even using just a few letters, you can decide on which exact styles are necessary. After all, even a small detail affects everything else. You have to start with a broad overview: what’s going to be part of the family, and how the styles are going to work with each other. -
Interview
Gerry Leonidas on teaching typeface design
27.03.2014Typefaces do not exist in a vacuum: they take form and meaning because they are responses to many other typefaces that exist already, and to changing conditions of use. Good research skills, and a sufficient understanding of typographic history and practice, are essential. -
History
Between the Circle and the Square
July 2018A chapter from the book ‘The Two Faces of One Revolution’ Vladimir Krichevsky and Alexey Dombrovsky.
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