Updates and Insights from Nguyen Gobber #2
Jun 24, 2022 8:01 am
Hey!
We’re happy to send you the new issue of our studio newsletter!
As promised, we don’t spam you with irrelevant updates every week or two. Instead, we wait until we’ve gathered a rich package of exciting news, insights, and more. And today, it’s about time to send you exactly that.
In this issue we announce the release date of Lucifer and tell you about our Most Beautiful Swiss Books award, our article on how we understand and work with typography, our How-To article on Adobe, our recent book design “Baslerische Landsitze”, the K-Pop phase one of our typefaces went through, and much more.
If you think this newsletter could be of interest to someone you know, hit the forward button and send them this new issue. And if you got something on your mind you want to tell us, simply reply to this email.
Enjoy reading!
Hoang & David
NEWS
LUCIFER RELEASE ON THE 30TH OF AUGUST 2022
Announcing the release date of our biggest type family
We’re excited to announce Lucifer’s release on the 30th of August 2022!
Lucifer is our biggest type family yet. It features contemporary aesthetics while being deeply rooted in a lesser-known part of Swiss design history as the typeface’s sharp, expressive serifs and overall organic look are inspired by the hand-lettering of Swiss designer Robert Stöcklin in his poster for the Schweizer Mustermesse Basel in 1924.
We’re happy to say that the Swiss Art Council Pro Helvetia decided to fund the production of Lucifer, which underlines the relevance of this typeface. With their support and thanks to our collaboration with Schriftlabor, Lucifer got expanded to a full type family, optimised for the needs of contemporary design professionals, and extended to support a wide range of Latin-based languages, including Pinyin (the romanization of Standard Mandarin Chinese) and Vietnamese.
WE DESIGNED ONE OF THE MOST BEAUTIFUL SWISS BOOKS 🏆🍾
The Future Tense was awarded in this year’s edition
In the last issue, we already introduced you to “The Future Tense”, a publication we designed to go along with Russell Perkins’ art installation of the same name. Since then, the exciting news has reached us that our project has been selected by an international jury as one of The Most Beautiful Swiss Books 2021.
We’re immensely honoured about this recognition from the Federal Office of Culture in Switzerland. The list of winning titles has always been a reliable reference for outstanding design for us, so we’re overjoyed to be part of this year’s edition. We’re also very flattered about the kind words they used to describe our work:
“Although the skill with which it has been crafted stands out, it does not descend into art pour l’art. It is rare for typography to be executed with such love and joy, and rare for it to be accorded so much time and space.”
You’ll be able to see our publication exhibited together with the other winning titles later this week from 23rd to 26th June at the Helmhaus Zürich in Switzerland. And if you can’t make it, don’t worry. Many more exhibitions in Switzerland and abroad will follow. You can look up all upcoming exhibitions here.
INSIGHTS
EXPRESSING IDEAS THROUGH TYPOGRAPHY
The art and craft of typesetting and type design
In our new article “Expressing Ideas Through Typography”, we think about the communicative surplus of typesetting and type design. Some consider typography to be “good” when all technical parameters are adjusted to achieve the highest possible readability. We think that proper typography goes way beyond making a writing system visually accessible. We explain how typography can be used to express ideas and give a few examples by sharing the reasoning behind some of the design decisions in our projects.
OUR HOW-TO ARTICLE ON ADOBE
Learn a little technique for Illustrator from Hoang
Some time ago, Adobe approached Hoang to create a unique artwork with an accompanying tutorial. The result got recently published on their website. It’s a How-To article you can follow along to learn a simple but effective technique with the blend tool in Adobe Illustrator. While going through the article, you’ll also be introduced to a little playlist Hoang put together for Adobe, so you might discover something new on that level too.
SELECTED PROJECT
BASLERISCHE LANDSITZE
A book about historical country estates in and around Basel
Earlier this year, we’ve finalised the book design for “Baslerische Landsitze” in close collaboration with Bosco Ferreira. And we’re quite proud of how it turned out, especially the embossing on the cover. The book is an annotated and expanded reprint of the art portfolio “Blätter der Erinnerung an Baslerische Landsitze” by the art historian Daniel Burkhard-Werthemann. The reprint enriches the original descriptions and woodcuts of the Basel country estates from 1938 with an introduction and commentaries by editor René Salathé, texts by Clewin Zaeslein and Margaretha Schwab-Plüss, photographs by Julian Salinas, and a newly drawn map that includes a glossary of all relevant family crests.
OUR FONTS IN THE WILD
MONOPOL FOR TOMORROW X TOGETHER
One of our typefaces went through a K-pop phase
The graphic identity for the second studio album of the K-pop boy group Tomorrow X Together makes excessive use of Monopol. It visualises the album’s core theme through the fragmentation of various graphic elements including the typeface itself. TXT’s release is a three-part album packed with a wide variety of booklets, posters, cards, stickers, and more, all of which were designed by Ordinary People.
FARMACIA FOR STRANDBUDE MORAK
A new visual identity for your holiday stay in Carinthia
Agentur Lux developed an upbeat and loud visual identity for Strandbude Morak, an affordable hotel for young visitors who want to enjoy some relaxing days at the Wörthersee. The identity stands out for its use of vibrant colours in combination with Farmacia as the headline typeface. Farmacia was used for a variety of applications including a big sign above the hotel’s entrance.
FROM OUR ORBIT
SWISS GRAPHIC DESIGN HISTORIES
A compendium of new perspectives on Swiss graphic design
This publication consisting of 3 volumes is full of insights into Switzerland’s graphic design landscape. It’s based on extensive research by scholars of design history and with a multiple and inclusive approach, it reaches beyond the usual canon and the well-known epicentres Basel and Zurich as the birthplace of the famous Swiss Style.
The best part of this 688 pages published at Scheidegger & Spieß is its creative commons licence. This means that a digital copy is available for free! Here are the links to Volume 1: Visual Arguments, Volume 2: Multiple Voices, Volume 3: Tempting Terms, and the reference booklet.
THIS PERSON DOES NOT EXIST
Portraits of non-existing people
Although it appears to be online for some time now, we only recently stumbled upon this website that generates images of people that don’t exist. It’s fascinating and somehow also a bit creepy. But hey, this might come in handy if you need some placeholder images of people without getting entangled in any issues regarding usage rights.
BAR CODE RAVE
Jamming with stripes, cashier style
And lastly, we say goodbye with some graphically induced, stomping beats from the fellows at Electronicos Fantasticos! What you’ll see when clicking on the link below was created by Hideki Tanaka, Ei Wada, and Nicos Orchest-Lab and performed by Ei Wada and Akira Ataka. Enjoy the show and rave along.
NEED HELP?
You’re working on something valuable and important that unfortunately doesn’t look so? We can help you out and craft a compelling and professional appearance for your idea or project. → Get in touch with us!
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Do you want to read previous issues? → Explore the archive!
Instagram → @t.m.hoangnguyen & @david.gobber
