As you might imagine, I buy a lot of old books and ephemera, mostly for the type and illustrations. Here I’ve got a bound volume of “The Girl’s Own Paper” for 1882. The “G.O.P.” was a periodical for young women, published in England from 1880 until the 1950s. Bound periodicals aren’t very valuable in general, but this one is also coming apart, and the insides are a little fragrant – not really a keeper. The content, though, is most interesting!
Whatever sank ABC’s short-lived series Time after Time, it certainly wasn’t the prop design. The amazingly talented graphic artist Jannick Guillou created reams of utterly believable historic documents, many of which feature fonts, ornaments, borders, and images from the New Victorian Printshop design kits. Dead Man’s Hand WF from the Wild West Press adds rustic handwritten annotations to these elaborate documents. Curiously, several of the documents appear to be signed by Stonewall Jackson, U. S. Grant, and other Civil War personalities. These signatures come from the Union Signatures and Confederate Signatures fonts that are part of the Civil War Press design kit
The other night I started watching Good Omens, the new Amazon Prime show. I hadn’t read the book and didn’t know what to expect. But I was done with Chernobyl, and I’ll watch anything with David Tennant, so why not. A few minutes in, and the props have a very familiar look about them. Sure enough, the prop designers made liberal use of the New Victorian Printshop fonts!
Earlier this month I attended a tech conference in San Francisco. At the last minute, my Monday schedule shifted and I’ll have all afternoon to myself. What to do? Visit the Letterform Archive, of course! I first learned about this non-profit when they opened in 2015. They are keepers of everything to do with the history of written communication; I’ve heard their library of type design sources is massive. This place would draw me like a moth to fire any day, but even more so right now: I’m in the middle of research for my next design kit, I’m already in San Francisco, and now I’ve got the time, too. Hell yeah, I’m going!
