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What’s Online no. 3: The Catich Collection—addendum
The quotation in the previous post about trying to date the shift from the use of the reed as a brush to its use as a broad-edged tool caught my attention when sifting through the Catich Collection...
View ArticleVideo View: Helvetica and the New York City Subway System Signage
Last February—with the assistance of Abby Goldstein and Jan Conradi—I organized Navigating the Labyrinth: Unimark International and the New York City Subway System for AIGA New York. The event was a...
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Patrick Cramsie response to Blue Pencil no. 10
Since Blue Pencil does not post comments without moderation (and I am a very slow overseer of the blog) I was not aware of Patrick Cramsie’s attempt to respond to my dissection of The Story of Graphic...
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From the Archives no. 12: The Formation of American Type Founders
The Formation of ATFThe new year is a good time to air out mistakes and acknowledge errors. In several past Blue Pencil posts I have taken others to task for stating that American Type Founders was...
View ArticleComments June–December 2010
This is the only comment received since June 2010. Although Tholenaar died before the book was published, I believe he was alive and responsible for the captions as well as some of the introductory...
View ArticleFrom the Bookcase no. 1—French Renaissance Printing Types
This is the first in a new series of posts. These are not Blue Pencil autopsies of books nor are they conventional book reviews. Instead, these are reports on what I have learned from reading books....
View ArticleBlue Pencil no. 11—Design and Science: The Life and Work of Will Burtin
Design and Science: The Life and Work of Will BurtinR. Roger Remington and Robert S.P. FrippAldershot, Hampshire: Lund Humphries, 2007Designed by Chrissie Charlton & Company[fi ligatures not used;...
View ArticleBlue Pencil no. 11 addendum
R. Roger Remington and Robert S.R. Fripp, the authors of Design and Science: The Life and Work of Will Burtin, expend a lot of effort to prove that Will Burtin was responsible for the popularity of...
View ArticleFrom the Archives no. 13—Frederic Goudy
Recently I was looking through back issues of The New Yorker online in order to “Glorifier of the Alphabet”, a profile of Frederic W. Goudy written by Milton MacKaye and published in the January 14,...
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Blue Pencil no. 12—Born Modern: The Life and Design of Alvin Lustig
Born Modern: The Life and Design of Alvin LustigSteven Heller and Elaine Lustig CohenSan Francisco: Chronicle Books, 20010Book design by Tamar CohenThis is not the usual Blue Pencil post. The book...
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From the Archives no. 14—Linoskala
The High School of Graphic Communication Arts in New York City, originally founded in 1925 as the New York School of Printing, is changing with the times and one casualty is its extensive library of...
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From the Archives no. 15—Helvetica and Standard
Something else that I came across at the High School for Graphic Communication Arts were two issues of a former local trade magazine called Graphics: New York. Both were from 1965 and they help to pin...
View ArticleComments on Tutorial no. 2—Addendum no. 2 Castle William and A
Johnny (Alex Morgan), Demo and ecs,I don’t usually post comments on Blue Pencil without filtering or editing them first, but I think these testaments about Faust and Sure are deserving of being put up as...
View ArticleUpdate: Helvetica and the New York City Subway System
The original, limited edition version of Helvetica and the New York City Subway System (Blue Pencil Editions, 2009) has been sold out since the end of February 2010. Neither I nor my colleague Abby...
View ArticleA Case Study no. 1—Chocolate & Zucchini—Addendum
The typeface used for “Chocolate” in the title of Chocolate & Zucchini is ITC Eclat (1984) by Doyald Young (1926–2011) who unfortunately passed away recently. You can see some of his sketches for...
View ArticleWhat’s Online no. 4: Inland Printer
Several months ago I stumbled across the complete 1899 issues of the Inland Printer on Google Books. I downloaded the bound set and in skimming the pages this item caught my attention. It is not...
View ArticleWhat’s Online no. 5: Inland Printer 1901
Here is another interesting tiny article from the 1901 Inland Printer which, like the 1899 one, is also available through Google Books. This time the article is related to printing. It is an early...
View ArticleFrom the Archives no. 16—Choosing a Typeface
Among the items that interested me in the former library of the High School of Graphic Communications Art have been books, pamphlets and articles that promise to shed light on an often overlooked...
View ArticleOpinion—Standard Deviations
On January 24 of this year the Museum of Modern Art announced that they were adding 23 fonts to their Architecture and Design Collection. I paid little attention at the time to the news, other than to...
View ArticleOpinion redux—Deviations from Standard Deviations
I am gratified that the first out-and-out Blue Pencil opinion piece has received a warm welcome. However, several people have posted comments or emailed me privately with corrections or comments that...
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