Gerrit Noordzij, professor of typeface design at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, Netherlands, from 1960 to 1990, defines typography as “writing with prefabricated characters.” Peter Bil’ak, founder of Typotheque, notes that this “implies a complete distinction from lettering, handwriting or graffiti, which are also concerned with creating letter-shapes, but don’t offer a repeatable system of setting these letters.” Many designers have also taken up letterpress printing as a hobby or side interest, which also utilizes aspects of typography or typesetting, depending on the project. Typography is actually a subset of lettering, because it is the study of letters applied to typefaces. In our current digitally-driven design world, this means working with fonts on a daily basis for most of us. It is related to typesetting and can include type design. One definition is stated as “the style, arrangement or appearance of typeset matter,” and is a product of the movable type printing system that much of the world has used for centuries. Typography is essentially the study of how letterforms interact on a surface, directly relating to how the type will be set when it eventually goes to press. Let’s begin by defining how we understand each term. Though the phrase seems to make sense, it’s actually a contradiction in terms - hand-lettering is not typography at all! Before you throw your pens and brushes at me in protest, please let me explain!Įven though lettering and typography share many of the same concepts, and a good eye and understanding of one will enable you in the other as well, they are completely different disciplines. One rather common example of this is the myriad of blog posts and showcases claiming to display “hand-lettered typography” - I’ve even heard university professors say it. This article will help you gain a clearer understanding of what typography is and isn’t, and why. Unfortunately, as with any popularity surge, there have come with it a lot of misunderstandings of some of the terms and concepts that we use. We have seen a number of designers and artists make their careers out of designing type or custom lettering, and it has become common to list typography among our skills and disciplines.
Hand lettered typeface full#
Lettering and typography, so similar yet so diverse, are a huge part of design and thus deserve our full understanding.Ĭoming out of the grunge, graffiti and David Carson era through the ‘90s, there has been a major resurgence of interest in typography.
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