Helveticism - DT05

My fifth D&T blog post is (vaguely) inspired by a talk we had at the Glasgow Art School venue, organised by Communcication Design. The talk included various graphic designers and type designers introducing us to their craft including Imogen Ayres, the founder of independent type foundry Möbel Type, Erin Bradley-Scott, a hand sign-writer based in Glasgow,  and Guðmundur Úlfarsson, one half of the Icelandic/Danish type foundry Or Type.

Möbel Type, Lacuna Regular

E.B. Scott, Paulin Watches signage

Or Type, L10 Sample

Instead of focusing on their contributions too much however, I intend to quickly sidetrack this post towards a discussion on my number one love in the world of typography, Helvetica.

Helvetica was designded by Max Meidinger and Eduard Hoffmann in 1957, as an attempt by the Haas foundry to intoduce a new modernist grotesk font, closely based on the precedent of Akzidenz-Grotesk which came from the 18th century. It marked a turn away from more geometric fonts such as Futura, as the world was quickly taking up humanist, modernist typographic principles as part of the new International Typographic Style.

The book 'Helvetica forever - Story of a Typeface' (thanks Duncan) contains the whole story, but it's most interesting pages are the scans of the physical design journey which take us through the intricate process of the two designers in crafting this exceptional typeface.

It is clearly not a boring font; firstly, it does not suffer from the geometric temptations of fonts like Futura, and as the above documents prove, it has proven itself as a relatively hand-crafted creation - the ambition, I believe to find the essence of the typed form.

It certainly caught on - It was well adopted by graphic artists such as Massimo Vignelli, Otl Aicher and Josef Muller Brockmann, famous for his book Grid Systems in Graphic Design. And has subsequently held power in the graphic identities of some of the biggest world brands, as well as my examples of 'high design'. My focus however, is not on it's application as a highly considered phenomena of the design world, but on it's ubiquity. As ESTHETACORP has proven, it's everywhere. And, more importantly (and not for the worst), it doesn't always find itself in beautiful, highly considered situations.

The fact that it is everywhere is nowhere near a problem with the typeface, it is probably it's best attribute. Helvetica is a font with a highly proven visual power, and even if it didn't have this power, it is still used with such ubiquity that it has built up notoriety through repetition. When used today, it is used both as a filler, where making a decision on what font to use is seen as too much bother. More importantly, as the-font-of-all-fonts it is the font a designer chooses when they purposely want to 'join the club'.

The rise of comic sans, arial and calibri in hyper-amateur design has made the apparent presence of Helvetica seem even greater, compared to when it was actually the default font of typesetting. The uninitiated probably don't notice consciously, but the semi-initiated know it is the first choice to make. At the higest level, the use of Helvetica could even be seen to be a kind of 'in-joke': using Helvetica seems purposeful and conveys that you are joining in with the continuing celebration of graphic design that Helvetica has always been part of.

In the film Helvetica by Gary Hurstwit, this stature of Helvetica is questioned by the likes of Dave Carson, Paula Scher and Stefan Sagmeister. They look to promote creativity and individualism and to oppose the constraint that Helvetica apparently represents. The film gives us a good look into the offices and workspaces of these revolutionaries, which is an interesting look into the world of postmodern and 'grunge' design.

Office of Erik Spiekermann, Helvetica

They're all very boring, aren't they?

Office of Stefan Sagmeister, Helvetica

Office of David Carson, Helvetica

Now, one could definitely accuse me of Ad Hominem here, but if the most cursing of Helvetica's critics are unanimously in favour of Apple, Herman Miller, Artemide Tolemo's, beige furnishings, white walls and Vitsoe style shelving - the Helveticae of their respected categories - then something in the postmodern revolution is amiss.

Office of Paula Scher, Helvetica

Clearly, the domain of these designers is in the graphic world. They are looking to free the graphical world of what they perceive to be boredom, and are employed to do as such. But when they themselves are presented with the opportunity to choose design of a different scale, they go straight for the default.

When the need arises for a comfortable, helpful and useful solution, Helvetica - and what I will term Helveticism, when applied to design solutions of a different scale - is the solution. The golden mean. Most of these design solutions come from the same era - the apex of modernism. Helvetica is conformity perfected. That's how it always was. Haas were in some way only copying other typefaces, they just got it right.

Where a design solution looks to 'expand possibilities' on a certain scale, be that Architecture, Interior, Product or Graphic, the fundamental inability of humans to stretch to a total vision inevitably leaves them lacking in 'excitement' beyond a certain stretch.

Fondation Louis Vuitton Interior, USM

Fondation Louis Vuitton Interior, USM

For example, the interior of the Fondation Louis Vuitton by Frank Gehry, perhaps one of the most expressive pieces of architecture this century, inevitably accepts Hevelticism as an interior and product solution, in it's USM furniture, Tolemo Lights, beige walls and, hell, even DELL computers.

And Karim Rashid, one of the most colourful and exuberant product and interior designers, literally has most of his office's website set in Helvetica, showing him in all white, wearing all white.

Shots of his own office reveal strikingly modernist air vents and rectilinear architectural forms.

And I can't really criticise interior design projects, given that they have no choice but to be situated in the architecture they are for, but rectilinear forms and minimalist details here actually give the rest of the products, graphics and textiles space to breathe.

Now i'm not trying, not here at least, to destroy individualist design and exploration; but in a long post which started on type design and distracted itself along the way, I have shown that there might be a golden mean, a background we have already agreed upon as being basic, unobtrusive and fit for purpose. I have called this Helveticism.

While the individualist designers fight conformity, there are those of us that don't want to encourage conformity per se, but seek to adjust and improve the 90% of a persons life in which they are too tired to give it their own spirit.

The focus is to maintain and keep up the high standards of Helveticism. As we have seen, even the most avant-garde artists will use the same plug sockets as the rest of us. An effort to impart individual expression upon every facet of ones life is both futile and counterproductive.

The most strict adherents to this dogma will, of course, take it the whole way: use Apple, drink coke, wear all black, sit on Herman-Miller and write in Helvetica (or in unadorned '< p >', as is the case in this website). But more generally it is a celebration of the beauty of the negative space in our lives, and an aspiration to place our focus there and to make it even better.

Long live the king.