Well, it's Friday so why not – the last FTF was way back in January 2014. As Ms. Fili knows much better than I, Italia is awash with typographic joy. If you follow me on Instagram you'll have seen these and more, but I think they're worthy of another showing.
Forgotten summer type. From that day in Italy when we took the train from Lucca to Florence and we all sat down in our seats and Karen turned to me and said, "I'm feeling a bit peckish", expecting me to pull out a snack when in fact I hadn't earlier shouted, from one to room to another, that, "yes, I have packed the crackers", but had in fact said, "yes, I have packed the plasters", and we all looked at each other and our four stomachs rumbled in unison as the train rattled along the tracks – the city and its snacks an hour or so ahead of us.
Rumble, rattle, rumble, rattle.
It's the one hundredth FTF! And I'm honoured to present the findings of the Penguin Collectors' Society's James Mackay. Lettering from, "different prosperous eras in Goole". James also updated me on the further investigation into that mysterious "A". If you want to find out more about that you'd better join the PCS. Definitely worth the modest subscription, the next edition comes with an illustrated memoir of Abram Games and Penguin Books by his daughter Naomi.
I'll post about it when I get mine but it will be available to non-members too.
Casual Optimist, Friend from the Internet and all-round nice chap, Dan Wagstaff, pointed me in the direction of Ulrich Planer's typewatching blog. It's refreshingly simple and is packed with great examples. Being European, there are loads of great script logos. Ulrich very kindly agreed to let me bring some of his images over here.
Not much has happened around these parts since last Friday. Just a massive pile of work to consume very every waking hour and then some. I did stumble across Tom Gifford's excellent gathering of found type over on Flickr. Tom very kindly said it would be OK if I snaffled some for here. Thanks Tom!
I'd kind of forgotten all about FTF. And we were so close to a century. So I'm going for one last push; just a few more to go.
We're fast approaching the big One-Double-Zero FTF. Well, when I say "fast", I mean fast like evolution is fast or like the blue whale is fast or like how our tomatoes ripened fast this year.
So, "slowly" is, of course what I really mean. Slow like the speed it's taken me to get this copy of An Elementary Essay on the background of English Literature posted.
Designer/printer John Boilard, under the name of JP Boneyard, has just completed his latest project: redrawing then screen printing 27 found letters from his collection of around 1,000. You can see them, read more about them and take a look at his other print work here.
Still on the boat. And some worryingly painted over information. Looks important.
Seb Lester's work is amazing, stunning and jaw-dropping. And astonishing. And also phenomenal. The man that brought us the mighty Soho and Neo Sans is a master letterer and collector of found type.
Courtesy of Tom Gifford.
While I dearly love you all and recognise that you all have your merits, I love Italy most. Others, rightly, love France, with its* long breads and thin chips, its superb steaks and beautiful pastries, its wonderful art and remarkable capital city. Many, many people adore Spain with its bulls and their fighters, the excellent Barcelona with all its Goudiness and that amazing Miró Museum up on that hill. Throngs flock to Germany that, generously, gave us Ludwig van B, Amadeus, Bach, Wagner, Kraftwerk and Scorpions; Kafka, Mies van der Rohe, Gropius and Dr Oetker. The Swiss? What can I say? Triangular chocolate, Helvetica and the watch I wear.
I won't go on and mean no offense to the many I haven't mentioned because, in those, I include my own homeland.
You are all fine countries with so much to give. It's just that, well, Italy is best. OK, it might not have the best flag (that's your's Switzerland) and it might not have the best graphic designers (because we've got them) but it has got the best cold cuts, the best scooters and Tuscany. Just ask the Dutch; they know, they're all there right now. And who can blame them; Italy is flippin' ace.
Yours respectfully,
Ace Jet 170
* Thanks Henry!
David Bivin sent in an image that speaks for itself. Thanks David!
Yes, I know it's not Friday. But it was Friday (last Friday) that we visited Headhunters.
To be honest I had low hopes for this place but by the end of an über-wet week in NI's, well, wettest county, Fermanagh, in-door entertainment was the order of the day. But hats off to Headhunters; the surprising Barber Shop/Railway Museum combo was a top-notch destination - even if you don't need a snip and a trim, which we didn't. The Salon-come-Museum is hidden away behind a block of shops and offices and is jam-packed with Trackie memorabilia, including masses of print and some spooky dummies to freak out the kids.
It's all really well displayed, very professionally done - really impressive and a must if you're ever in Enniskillen. Only don't go on a Monday.
Find out more here. Or ask design-criminal and general toss-pot Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen; he's been there too (along with his pointless pseudo-foppishness) for last year's series of the BBC's Northern Exposure.
A week or two back Ben holidayed in Yorkshire, where my Mum comes from and where we spent many summer holidays. (Damn him, he's made me feel home-sick for old Blighty!) Whilst there he visited the Museum of Rail Travel at Ingrow. If you're in the area, drop in.
"They" have been turning our local Tesco Superstore into a Tesco Meglamarket; day after day it grows and grows.
At one corner of it's furthermost reaches stand enormous concrete tubes, marked with mysterious...er...markings. What can they mean? Their sinister purpose can only be guessed at.
OK, here it is after all. FTF-Lite. Hopefully you'll be unfamiliar with these but I found it pushed into a bush near our studio. Thought it looked brilliant. Wondered how it had got there.
David's been on his hol's to Tunisia. More pics here.
So we holidayed in North Donegal again, where you'll find some of the most amazing scenery and some of the shittest tourist attractions. This year's low-light being the (let's face it with a name like that it's never going to be a barrel of laughs) Famine Village at Doagh Island.
Shawn's in Chicago and has an ongoing found type project...er...ongoing. So far, he's got lots. Here's just some: