Comments on: Typography Resources?

By: John Precious

John Precious — Fri, 26 Aug 2005 16:43:18 +0000

Eric Spiekermann said of David Carson. “Learn the rules before you break them.”
Could someone please tell me the original context in which this quote appeared?
Robert Bringhurst’s book is the best I’ve read on typography.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 23 Jun 2005 03:42:22 +0000

Triple the recs for the bringhurst, spiekermann, and kunz books. Amazed that no one posted the books carried by you work for them (well the kunz is there). Look under typography and graphic design. Recommend work by Müller-Brockmann, Bill, Weingart, Hofmann, Ruder, etc. The Swiss pretty much defined our understanding of typography post-Tschichold, etc.

By: kadavy

kadavy — Sun, 19 Jun 2005 22:49:55 +0000

There are too many comments for me to read all of them, so I am sure I am repeating some recommendations: The Elements of Typographic Style By Bringhurst is a must read. Anything by Jan Tschichold. He is/was a god: The New Typography (interesting parallells to digital media). A Treasury of Alphabets and Lettering (quick but informative read). The Form of the Book Fred Smeijers' Counterpunch explains well the relationship between design methods and form. Ilene Strizver of The Type Studio has posted some great PDF articles about typography, too.

By: Chuck McKinnon

Chuck McKinnon — Sun, 19 Jun 2005 08:07:29 +0000

I can’t believe that with 61 comments, nobody has mentioned Daniel Will-Harris yet.
Check out Typofile and Esperfonto, a system for choosing the right fonts based on the message you want to convey to your readers.
The site is a little dated, but the amount of knowledge contained in one place is huge. Plus one the whopping two occasions I’ve emailed him, he’s always been quick to respond.

By: Kevin Sweeney

Kevin Sweeney — Sat, 18 Jun 2005 01:57:17 +0000

David Carson should NOT be used as an example for good typography. He did some radical and amazing things in the early 90s, but the only reason he made a name for himself is because his style reflected the ideas and overall style of his audience.

By: Becky Melton

Becky Melton — Thu, 09 Jun 2005 02:08:53 +0000

I like Wendy Peck’s Great Web Typography.
It has great suggestions on how to use type for the web. The book has tips for preparing images with type, and she gives examples of CSS styles that work work well in browsers. There are illustrations with examples of why styles that do and don’t work, and the book has tips to improve readability and good design.

By: Ryan Berg

Ryan Berg — Mon, 06 Jun 2005 17:42:12 +0000

In my insomnia over the last week, I’ve started reading all the books my typography teacher assigned last semester but never assigned reading from. Ellen Lupton’s thinking with type goes into some rich detail about the history and philosophy of typography, and shows a nice, modern emphasis with mention of typography for the web, and a surprising nod to standards-based HTML and CSS.
I’m currently immersed in (an autographed copy of) Willi Kuntz’s Formation + Transformation. Willi does a wonderful job of breaking down the elements of typography, on both micro and macroaesthetic levels, with a plethora of examples from his own portfolio.
While Lupton’s book seemed to provide a solid overview, I felt it sometimes lacked a desired depth. Kuntz’s book is rich with this depth, pointing out nuances that make it feel more than worth the time it’s taking to get through.

By: English

English — Mon, 06 Jun 2005 10:50:28 +0000

ParaType Multilingual Fonts and some articles

By: Jens Meiert

Jens Meiert — Sat, 04 Jun 2005 16:26:59 +0000

Robert Bringhurst’s “The Elements of Typographic Style”. Definitely.
There are also some good books of Hans Peter Willberg and Friedrich Forssman – a friend of mine just recommended them to me.

By: Tony Buford

Tony Buford — Fri, 03 Jun 2005 06:05:57 +0000

For type at its most creative (I walk the halls of design school with the latest issue under my arm at all times), the magazine (now online) is Upper & Lower Case from ITC (International Typeface Corp).

Originally published in a firehouse turned design studio in New York City by a group calling themselves Pushpin Studios (Milton Glaser, Tony DiSpigna, Jim Spanfeller, etc, etc) it's priceless. Interviews with type designers, breakdowns of fonts, and history of Typography in a readable way. Nice looking web site from a typographer's standpoint. Tons of archives, too.

And so we have the link