Happy Halloween!

Enjoy your Halloween weekend with Alphabeast from Heather-Lynn Aquino.


[Link thanks to Patric King at Today's Obsession]

U&lc now for download

We are happy to see that the back issues of U&lc are now available online for high-res and low-res download. Fonts.com has scanned all 26 years of issues and is planning to make one year's worth of issues available every month. The first year is up right now so get the first issue with art and editorial direction by Herb Lub­alin.

NYC Event: MARIAN BANTJES: I WONDER

The talented Marian Bantjes will give an insightful talk on Monday, November 1st here in NYC about her career, her design and most importantly her beautiful typography. Paula Scher will introduce her and at the end of the event you can pick up Bantjes' new book called I Wonder. Tickets are still available.

Eye Candy: Custom Lettering of the 60s & 70s book

Our good friend Britton Walters brought to our attention an awesome book called Custom Lettering of the 60s & 70s that has culled all the great hand-drawn fonts from the 60s and 70s by designer Rian Hughes. A treasure trove of amazing typography for any hardcore type addict.

Typographer for Lawyers... and so many others

Typography for Lawyers is the layman's guide to good typography. While some of the information is quite specific to the law profession, the use of semi-colons, small caps, "curly" quotes and so many other simple facts are universally applicable. I would recommend this to anyone in a position to produce printed documents -- bankers, insurance agents, doctors, et al. Good typography is not just for designers.

(Thanks to Madeline at Tag Team Tompkins for the recommendation)

Comic Sans Hatred Continues

Discovered via Neatorama. Let the hatred continue. Can I nitpick the excessive use of caps in the reply sign too?

Typographic Children's Book

We love typography here at Pica + Pixel so we were delighted to discover the Hyperactivitypography Book by the Norwegian design studio, Studio 3. The book is structured like a how-to-children's book with awesome lessons on how to kern and what ligatures are. The first edition of the book is sold out for now, but they plan to print more. Neat!

[Thanks to Jake for the tip!]

Calligrapher: Leigh Wells

Beautiful hand lettered type from Leigh Wells.

Historia Type Specimen by Emigre

Emigre just released a 64 page new type specimen book showing how to mix and match their fonts in a dozens of creative and beautiful ways. The book is only $3 and comes with an additional five type specimens including the Mrs Eaves, Mr Eaves, Matrix II, and Vista catalogs.

Semana caligráfica : Silvia Cordero Vega

Silvia Cordero Vega AKA Letrerias is a calligrapher from Argentina whose work is quite unique. This is a silkscreened piece she is creating as part of a collection for Calligraphy Week (Semana caligráfica) at Papelera Palermo in Honduras.

See more of her work on her Flickr or visit her web site.

Blog: Fast Company's Co. Design

Fun design blog from Fast Company. Love their post about how to choose a typeface. Awesome.

Erik van Blokland draws letterforms

On Sketching from Erik van Blokland on Vimeo.

Erik van Blokland’s (of Letterror fame)  letterform sketching method, passed down from Gerrit Noordzij and taught at the The Hague.

(via Stüf Stuff and tipped off by Frank Chimero's Twitter feed -- thank you very much!)

Illustrator: Gemma Correll

The other day we got a lovely email from illustrator Gemma Correll and all of her work made us smile. We loved her quirky, cute illustrations of cats, pugs and humans along with her whimsical patterns and typography.

I'm Comic Sans, Asshole.

McSweeneys featured Comic Sans in their Short Imagined Monologues series. Let me whet your appetite with a quote and then feel free to amuse yourself with the full piece.

You think I'm pedestrian and tacky? Guess the fuck what, Picasso. We don't all have seventy-three weights of stick-up-my-ass Helvetica sitting on our seventeen-inch MacBook Pros. Sorry the entire world can't all be done in stark Eurotrash Swiss type.

I think Comic Sans sounds bitter. You?

IAMPETH Healey Collection Exhibit: The recap

A couple weeks ago, I posted about the Healey Exhibit that was brought to Kansas City by IAMPETH (The International Association of Penmen Engrossers Teachers of Penmanship). The show was amazing! The sheer volume of work featured was overwhelming, from decorative lettering samples and ornate certificates to teaching examples of business penmanship. Each piece was the original art so all the retouching was evident as well as stunningly delicate pen strokes. Many pieces were created at double size and then reduced for publication make the work even cleaner and more precise.

I took so many photos of the exhibition, that I am storing all the images on a separate site. I hope you enjoy the images. If anyone is interested in higher rez versions of any of the files, drop me an email and I will post them.

Healey Collection: Vintage Pen Lettering, Hand-drawn Calligraph and more

IAMPETH (The International Association of Penmen Engrossers Teachers of Penmanship) are hosting an exhibition of The Healey Collection Exhibit Saturday and Sunday, May 29 – 30, 2010 from 9am-9pm at the Hilton at the Kansas City Airport (MCI). Tickets are $15 per person.

Horace G. Healey was penman during America’s Golden Age of Penmanship. In 1909 he became the managing editor of the Penman's Art Journal. In his years with the Journal, he acquired a large collection of pen art. Upon his death, half of his collection was donated to the New York City Public Library and the remainder of the collection remained with the Zaner-Bloser Company where it remained stored until it was acquired by Mike Sull on behalf of IAMPETH. The exhibition will include phenomenal Penman’s Art Journal cover art, engrossing art, flourishing, penmanship, broad-pen as well as drawn alphabets, lessons in business writing, Engrosser’s script, Old English, line art illustration and much more.

Font-of-the-Week: Tangier

Tangier is a font by Richard Lipton which was use in the Glamour magazine redesign. Read more about Tangier and Richard Lipton's creative process in an interview on My Fonts.

Brownstone by Alejandro Paul

Alejandro Paul has just released Brownstone, a new monoweight font family complete with a set of luscious interconnected border options.Decorative yet simple.



Purchase individual weights from Veer or the whole font family from Paul's foundry, Sudtipos.



More images can be seen on Typography Served.

Eames Modernist Catalog awaits your lustful eyes

If 90+ pages of colorful, typographic experiments on newsprint delivered directly to your mailbox sounds as thrilling to you as it does to me, make sure you have updated your address information with the fine folks at House Industries. Not on their mailing list? Sign up here.

[For more info on the process to create this catalog, visit House Industries Show and Tell. There's a video of the presses rolling! Fun!!!]

& and &

Show your love for the ampersand by getting either one of these niffy fashion statements: a brooch or cufflinks. Two of the fun products in the Veer store.