About 4type

There is a point in anyone’s career as a typo­grapher when the ques­tion of type design has to be answered dir­ectly. To do this, there’s no other way than to research, study, draw and re-draw let­ters – and gen­er­ally ‘get your hands dirty’ in the pro­cess of learn­ing by doing, both digit­ally and manu­ally. Inevitably, I wish I had more time to devote to these posts and updates, but for whatever it’s worth, the devel­op­ment of the typeface Ariella will be doc­u­mented and dis­cussed on this site. Along with this, two related texts, titled ‘On tran­si­ent type’ and ‘Type & cul­tural sig­nals’ will be offered as excepts along­side related blog posts, Flickr gal­ler­ies and short features.

As I’ve noted pre­vi­ously, this site was recently moved from one server to another – and its data­base became very scrambled in the pro­cess. Apologies for this; I’m hav­ing to re-post all entries manu­ally at this point. Some posts will be pass­word pro­tec­ted until col­lab­or­at­ors and those quoted have given their approval for pub­lic release. The main use for this site will be to share a few key texts and notes about type design and typo­graphy that I’ve found to be invaluable.

In this effort (cur­rently under­way as of this writ­ing, 25.08.10), 4type will once again be a grow­ing col­lec­tion of art­icles, pro­jects, cri­tiques and info about type design and type his­tory, primar­ily pos­ted by Jim Jackson, MA (CSM) in London. Like many of you, I’m intrigued by beau­ti­ful type and let­ter­ing forms and will­ing to ‘dig deeper’ to determ­ine how these are best con­struc­ted. Learning and teach­ing typo­graphy is a focused pri­or­ity. I’m fas­cin­ated by type’s subtle vari­ations of applied use, and will­ing to dis­cuss chal­lenges and oppor­tun­it­ies within typo­graphic edu­ca­tion and its practice.

When it’s appro­pri­ate, dir­ect web links to other sites and ref­er­ence resources are also offered; com­ments for blog posts or art­icles will be mon­itored to pre­vent spam and abuse, but please feel free to com­ment about any­thing that’s here, for the most part.

Thanks for vis­it­ing 4type. Please note that any errors or over­sights, if they exist, are purely unin­ten­tional. All enquir­ies or com­ments can be emailed to jim[at]4type[dot]org. Credits for the three images shown in the column at right are lis­ted below the last one.

All the best to fel­low typers and typo­graph­ers, – Jim