Fuz

Happy St Patrick’s day ☘️

A muse to read on St Patrick’s

What’s green, has three leaves and is a good craic? - fuz St Patrick’s Day, an example of brilliant branding. I think of branding as your avatar that works 24/7, so must reflect the who, what and why of you.

The way to a designers heart - delicious paper samples from the fabulous can’t wait to unwrap it!

Gong Xi Fa Cai
Happy New Lunar year!

The Dragon swishes his tail and brings a year of change – and change can also bring new opportunities sparking creativity and innovation.

I am a rat and in the Year of the Dragon, rats ‘will experience growth and energy and will have the opportunity to grow in their careers’. A big Yeah! to that!

Dragons are a magical legendary creature that appears in the folklore across the world. Often been depicted as winged, horned, and capable of breathing fire in the West (Like St George’s dragon), and in the East, clever serpentine, wingless and four-legged.

For us in the West they depict the sum of our fears, so are slain.

In the East they are an auspicious symbol of strength and power, and are associated with protection, good fortune, wisdom and success.

I am blown away by Adobe Illustrator – I thought I’d try the image generator (AI) and with prompts it created this image! I just hope someone somewhere isn’t losing out on a fee for having drawn it in the first place!

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 24. Neo

Neo Sans designed by Seb Lester (1994) a ‘versatile, futuristic typeface that didn't look "crude, gimmicky or ephemeral" (Monotype). I have been using it in my logo for a number of years because I love its friendly feel. Like a lot of good fonts, it has lots of weights. For online use I found similar web font called ‘Titillium’ that I use too.

Advent – arrival.

White to black – straightforward, that's how I try to be.

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 23. Helvetica

Helvetica designed by Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann (1957/60) a neo-grotesque font influenced by Akzidenz-Grotesk (also a lovely font 1890). Prolifically used because it’s so damn beautiful.

Advent-a – about to arrive ...are we there yet?

Purple to white – floral and wham bam... suffragette!

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 22. Rosewood

Rosewood from Adobe (1994) is based on Clarendon and modelled after a “Chromatic” (multi-coloured) design from William Page (1874) (1866). So, you get two fonts to play with (one for the decoration, and one for a base colour - not shown!). It’s hugely decorative and resonate of an era, so hard to use in everyday use, but really quite beautiful, can you imagine those woodblock letters being carved, and comes for free from Adobe.

Advent-urous – like a wild west pioneer!

Orange to purple – controversial, intuitive, velvet crush plush.

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 21. Impact

Impact designed by Geoffrey Lee (1965), is one of the last typefaces released in metal by Stephenson Blake foundry, acquired by Monotype, licensed to Microsoft, it’s been ‘free’ to use since Windows 98. Ever posted a meme? Impact was probably the typeface used because it’s easy to read, like a newspaper headline.

Advent-itious- happenchance.

Red to orange – passion, creativity, feisty, shouty

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 20. American Typewriter

American Typewriter designed by Joel Kaden and Tony Stan (1974) a slab serif, with proportional letter spacing, used most famously in the I Love New York (I ♥ NY) logo by Milton Glaser.

Advent-ure – the story of start-ups and pivots.

Lime to ruby red – zesty passion, for the brave or apple lovers (real apples).

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 19. Zapf Dingbats

Zapf Dingbats is a Pi or pictogram, ornament, a font without letters and numbers, a glyph only font designed by Herman Zapf (1977) and originally one of 35 PostScript fonts built into Apple's Laserwriter plus. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve used one of these symbols, you will have too if you’ve ever written a bullet list or needed peace sign, star or a snowflake.

Cult ref: music magazine Ray Gun, printed an interview with Bryan Ferry in Zapf Dingbats (1994) ...because it was so boring!

Advent – I've been finding words that begin 'advent' when you add an affix it means so many different things

Teal to lime – analogous refreshingly optimistic, even when mixed

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 18. Verdana

Verdana (verd-ant) designed by Matthew Carter for Microsoft (1996) a humanist font designed to be readable at small sizes on the low-res screens and so became a font of choice (along with Trebuchet & Georgia) for many websites.

Advent-itia- protective connective tissue

Pale blue to light teal – dive in, it's warm in here

Advent calendar of my favourite type.
Day 18. Verdana

Verdana (verd-ant) designed by Matthew Carter for Microsoft (1996) a humanist font designed to be readable at small sizes on the low-res screens and so became a font of choice (along with Trebuchet & Georgia) for many websites.

Advent-itia- protective connective tissue

Pale blue to light teal – dive in, it's warm in here

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 17. Futura

Futura designed by designed by Paul Renner (1927) in the spirit of Bauhaus and lovely if you want a font that feels ‘rounded’. Superbly legible and full of expression. Used by Nike, Fedex, D&G, Omega.

Advent-ured – explore your type

Purple to pale blue – relaxing & dreamy -punchy when they're mixed

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 16. Modern No. 20

Modern No. 20 designed by Stephenson Blake (1905) re-cut by Edward Benguiat (1955) a ‘didone’ typeface. Back in fashion now that digital typefaces are made good for online use.

Advent-uress – female seeks excitement (that’s me, in the New Year – open for new design adventures!)

Green to purple – wham bam suffragette

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 15. Sabon

Sabon designed by Jan Tschichold (1960s) based on the work of Garamond (c 15th), used by University of Cambridge. The mark of a good book font is that it is easy on the eye, so information goes straight to the brain.

Advent-urous – risk taker

Red to green – used by Matisse to make colours dance where they meet. Not one for the colour blind. Very Xmassy!

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 14. Eras

Eras designed by Albert Boton & Albert Hollenstein in 1976, a humanist sans-serif typeface has a forward-moving feel with its 3˚ tilt, it’s been the star for a few logos of mine. It comes in a few weights - all shown here!

Advent-ureful – given to adventure

Dark pink to red – buzzing with the different weights multiplying.

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 13. Meridien

Designed in 1957 by Adrian Frutiger - possibly the king of type. This wedge-serif has sharp, exaggerated serifs, perfect for body text with character.

Advent-s – arrivals

Brown to dark pink – yummy and chocolately.

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 12. Franklin Gothic

Designed in 1904 by Morris Fuller Benton in one weight – this ‘Heavy’ cut not appearing until 1979, designed by Victor Caruso. Used for the first logo I designed for abcam

Advent-ure – the story of start-ups

Orange to brown – great things happen when you multiply and overlap.

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 11. Gill Sans

Designed by Eric Gill (1926). Look familiar? It’s based on Edward Johnston's 1916 "Underground Alphabet", the corporate font of London Underground, and is a much copied Humanist font.

Advent-itiously - unexpected

Light blue to orange – for a real buzz.

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 10. Stencil

Designed a century ago twice, at the same time, by Middleton and Gerry Powell, it is the go-to font for anything military, but also fits perfectly for The Home Depot and non-branding branding for Jerry Springer.

Advent-urist- no risks barred

Indigo to light blue – calm, corporate, note the blue on blue overlay making something new.

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 9. Copperplate

Designed by Goudy (yes that’s a font too!) over 100 years ago, there’s no mistaking this Gothic wedge serif. I always think of it as the archetypal Victorian letterpress business card font.

Advent-urer- have calling card, will travel!

Yellow to Indigo - uplifting, spiritual. Smiley.

Advent calendar of my favourite type.

Day 8. Rawson

A new-ish font family designed by Alfonso García and Latinotype Team, who make some pretty darned good funky fonts. New fonts are designed to work across all media from the get-go, so great for branding.

Advent-urism- improv!

Purple to yellow complementary, lush, clashing in you don’t colour safely!