Typophile - Everything from the wheel to the bra strap and two typefaces - Comments

I think that name for

garden — Fri, 9 Feb 2007 11:57:31 -0800

I think that name for Switzerland is Helvetia?
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golden ratio of passion. sansogno.coastaldisturbance.com

Helvetius -a -um and

eriks — Sun, 22 Oct 2006 14:08:17 -0700

Helvetius -a -um and Helveticus -a -um are the corresponding adjectives

You’re right, of course. I can distinguish a noun from an adjective in Latin (did 9 years at school), but this was an oversight. Which proves that one shouldn’t write such important documents at some unearthly time in the middle of the night.

The fact remains that Helvetica is not the name of the country.

so the emphasis was not on

Nick Shinn — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 10:30:52 -0700

so the emphasis was not on any product.

That is the story of consumer advertising for at least a hundred years.
The myth is more important than the reality.
Similarly, Helvetica’s “neutrality” for typographers is no longer a purely formal quality (if it ever was), but operates at the level of myth, as explained here:

Why do you use Helvetica ?
There are many reasons why we use Helvetica. Each is very different and sometimes seemingly contradictory, and they slowly but constantly change. Some of these reasons may be hard to follow, but we like to believe that it is exactly the complicated nature of our reasoning that, paradoxically, makes our designs so practical and clear.
One of these reasons involves Helvetica’s neutrality. Of course, we fully realize that no typeface is neutral, and that Helvetica’s objectivity is a myth. But it is exactly this myth that turned Helvetica into one of the most widely used typefaces in the first place. So it is fair to speak of a myth that created its own reality. In that sense, Helvetica’s neutrality resembles a self-fulfilling prophecy. This neutrality, real or imagined, enables us and the user to fully focus on the design as a whole, neutralizing the typographic layer as a way to keep the concept as clear and pure as possible. There are cases, however, where for specific reasons, the concept demands a less neutral typographic layer. In those cases we never hesitate to use other typefaces. But those cases are rare.

— Norman Dexel, from emigre 65 “Helvetica again”:

Or

timd — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 10:00:54 -0700

Or Arial

http://www.sportsfilter.com/comments.cfm/6742

Given that the product might actually have contributed to an injury that almost (oh, why didn’t it?) kept Rooney out of the World Cup they would prefer that their logo was ignored. More to the point though it was more a “c’mon Inger-land”-type advertisement than a “buy Nike, they will improve your footballing skills” advertisement, so the emphasis was not on any product.

Tim

My point about the

Nick Shinn — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 09:38:37 -0700

My point about the vacuousness of brand advertising has been made by the discussion of Rooney, not Nike. The actual merit of the product, or even what it is, is irrelevant, and that is the case with Helvetica’s fame. People who are barely familiar with typoography and couldn’t tell Helvetica from Comic Sans, and who are unaware that the sample has rendered in straight lines, have an awareness of “Helvetica”.

Yesterday I heard the results of a focus group for a newspaper redesign, for which I am providing all-new fonts. Of the focus group, only one fellow mentioned the text type (so I must be doing ok!) — “Yes, it’s Courier,” he said, “No,” (quite categorically) “It’s Times.” I suspect he would have identified any sans serif as Helvetica.

> perhaps you can explain to

sii — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 09:13:06 -0700

> perhaps you can explain to me in what way Helvetica has little substance?

I didn’t say that, I was offering a possible explanation for Nick’s posting of the ad (Sorry Wayne and David for the mix-up). Personally I’m completely neutral on Helveti(c)a.

>The glamour was given to

timd — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 03:17:18 -0700

>The glamour was given to others

My point was that glamour was removed for Helvetica, and it does the job in its place (although given a choice I would use Univers) however its place is limited and that is not always appreciated by designers.

Tim

“Surely the part of the

Bleisetzer — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 02:58:20 -0700

“Surely the part of the point of Helvetica was the characterlessness in that Modernist way of making machines for living, sitting, reading etc.”

People buy letterpress fonts in my online shop.
Mostly they are printers. All of them love the old letterpress stuff.
They spend their money buying fonts from Group VII - Antiqua Varianten and Group VIII - Schreibschriften (DIN 16 518). But very often they forget to buy fonts like Helvetica, Akzidenz-Grotesk, Folio-Grotesk. After a year or so they start to ask for e.g. Helvetica. Because they learned that they need it.

You need fonts for the standard text. To make special fonts more important. If you only use special fonts, its confusing and does not look nice.

Helvetica was a very good solution for all these standards.
This was a well working font. The glamour was given to others. But Helvetica did the job.

Georg

www.bleisetzer.de

Surely the part of the point

timd — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 02:23:05 -0700

Surely the part of the point of Helvetica was the characterlessness in that Modernist way of making machines for living, sitting, reading etc.
Tim

Sii, you seem eager to clear

mlvr — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 01:54:06 -0700

Sii, you seem eager to clear things out for me. And after clearing out that it was actually Wayne Rooney on the poster and not Becks as you suggested - perhaps you can explain to me in what way Helvetica has little substance?

(Worth to mention might be that Helvetica is by far not my favourite typeface, I just find it hard with people always accussing it for lacking character etc.)

In “Seemann, Handbuch der

Bleisetzer — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 01:28:18 -0700

In “Seemann, Handbuch der Schriftarten” from 1926 are more than one “Breite Grotesk” listed, e.g. from Bauersche Giesserei from “before 1867”.

Georg

www.bleisetzer.de

>Mr Beckham, although the

timd — Fri, 20 Oct 2006 00:45:50 -0700

>Mr Beckham, although the world’s most famous man, has little substance

Actually the spud-faced nipper is Wayne Rooney, and although I don’t have much good to say about him in the way he conducts himself both on and off the pitch, he is well-known, in the UK at least, because he is a sportsman, he is not famous for being famous, I’m sure we can all imagine a better example of that level of vacuousness.

Breite Grotesk looks too characterful to have been the source for Helvetica, but I suppose if one was trying to iron out any “humanity” it could be an inspiration.

Tim

Typographische Mitteilungen

wolfgang_homola — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 17:16:36 -0700

Typographische Mitteilungen [typographic reports] was a magazine published by J. G. Schelter & Giesecke to promote their new typefaces and the efforts of the company to modernise their whole type production methods.

If anyone has more information about the Breite Grotesk, please let me know.

FF Bau is is based on the ‘Breite Grotesk’.

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/fontfont/bau/

Erik, thanks a lot for

wolfgang_homola — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 16:50:26 -0700

Erik, thanks a lot for posting this letter, that’s great! One day this letter will be a document as important to future typographic historians as the Le Bé Memorandum
;)

Was Helvetica modelled only on Akzidenz Grotesk, or did Miedinger use also the ’Breite Grotesk’ by Schelter & Giesecke as a model? Are there any proofs for this claim, or are these only based on similarity?

Here’s the first appearance of the Breite Grotesk by Schelter & Giesecke
(the ’Magere’ weight only) in
Typographische Mitteilungen, 3. Band 4. Heft 1890, p 673

(In ’Handbuch der Schriftarten’ you can read that the Breite Magere Grotesk dates from 1870, but this is clearly wrong)

>And please Nick Shinn I am

sii — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 16:15:05 -0700

>And please Nick Shinn I am curious for you to ellaborate what you consider vacuous with that Nike ad?

I think you’re missing the point here. I think Nick is saying Mr Beckham, although the world’s most famous man, has little substance - just like Helvetica.

Everything from the wheel to the bra strap and two typefaces

timd — Mon, 16 Oct 2006 06:21:28 -0700

Helvetica rendered in straight lines
http://www.peoplesdesignaward.org/detail_view.php?nomination_id=70

Myriad doesn’t come out too well either
http://www.peoplesdesignaward.org/detail_view.php?result_set=0&q_conditi...

Tim