Master
Type design

TYPE DESIGN

Wallace

with Kai Bernau

Wallace is a semester project by Gabriela Jaime and Pauline Heppeler, developed during the course “Tools Make Shapes”, led by Kai Bernau. “We worked with the metaphor of dancing and how our body behaves when it moves. This led to experimentation with two types of mechanisms; the first prototype followed the scissors logic, while the later one (and final) followed the compass logic. This typology of object allowed us to translate dance movements like spin and pivot, drag and drag across (sliding along the floor) onto an open typographical stroke and structure. It was important for us to show the coordination and movement of two that becomes one – hence we chose to maintain the final output as an open stroke typeface.”

TYPE DESIGN

Labour Tool Product

with Julia Born

“Labour, Tool, Product” is an editorial project, self-initiated by Samira Schneuwly. The book explores the universal profession of farming, its evolution and the technologies and possibilities associated with it through carefully curated images from ETH Zürich’s online image archive and excerpts from her great-grandfather’s and grandfather’s inventory books.

TYPE DESIGN

Typetitle, projet de semestre par Quentin Coulombier

with Kai Bernau

Typetitle is a condensed typeface designed for newspaper headlines which was inspired by American wooden type models.

TYPE DESIGN

Didot Vafflard semester project by Dávid Molnár

with François Rappo

TYPE DESIGN

Inside-Out semester project by Dávid Molnár

with Radim Peško

TYPE DESIGN

Modern Gothic, Semester Project by Malte Bentzen

with François Rappo

TYPE DESIGN

Gabriela Jaime – Fabrikaat

by Gabriela Jaime

Fabrikaat is a sans-serif typeface that breaks from the traditional Swiss neo-grotesk genre. Its curves, translated from steel to vector, vary in width from Condensed [0] to Regular [4] to Wide [8]. A monospace cut, incorporating features from its proportional siblings, serves as a text style for small sizes. Fabrikaat is inspired by manipulating rigid materials and analyzing the resulting curves, focusing on deformation and tension. Like the exploration of shaping stiff materials, Fabrikaat’s curves have a mechanical feel. Smooth transitions between flat and curved forms are achieved through a stylistic set designed to facilitate movement along the design space. This adds character and rhythm to a sturdy, mechanical typeface, allowing versatile application across media and font sizes.

TYPE DESIGN

Hólmfríður Benediktsdóttir – KRULLA.SANS

by Hólmfríður Benediktsdóttir

What is the difference between a curl, a swirl and a whirl? What about a whirl and a whorl? What about a swash, a flourish, a spiral, a twist and a twirl? Using the curl as an experiment in expression and disobedience in text, KRULLA.SANS is a sans serif typeface that comes in three weights with corresponding curls. Inspired by the original drawing of Antique No. 8 by Miller and Richard, KRULLA is an endeless exploration of contemporary curls taken to a curly extreme. With its condensed proportions and unexpected curves throughout the styles, KRULLA evolves from a Bold Confused and arrives at a disobedient Crazy Light that reimagines the relationship between curve, curl, spiral, twist and a twirl. Can a curly letter be repurposed and shown as a tool to signify resistance and disobedience?

TYPE DESIGN

Simon Memel – Itinérant

by Simon Memel

Itinérant takes Robert Granjon’s work as its starting point, producing a type family of four cuts: a text and display roman, each with a corresponding italic. The text cuts pare back some of the extravagance that Granjon was famous for, and lower the contrast in order to create type suitable for continuous setting, especially in smaller sizes. In part they draw on historical typefaces which themselves were influenced by Granjon- namely Plantin and Times New Roman. The display cuts reference the writing masters that preceded Granjon, and influenced the masters work. They restore the details that were removed in the rendering of the text cuts, and go further still, creating characters more calligraphic than Granjon, but rendered with a contemporary cleanness.

TYPE DESIGN

Lucrezia Noro – Plaxid

by Lucrezia Noro

Plaxid is a uniwidth typeface developed to enhance the typesetting of complex hierarchies and text-heavy layouts. Inspired by the mechanical structure of the Ionic genre, Plaxid is a practical font family with a solid feel and modest character. The specificity of duplex matrices used by Linotype during the hot metal typesetting era improved with the contemporary design possibilities of negative spacing and applied kerning. This complementary duality makes it possible to achieve a uniwidth design without compromising letterforms. Plaxid maintains consistent width measurements across its eight cuts, making it easy to change styles without affecting quality, copyfit and layout.

TYPE DESIGN

Mirela Belcheva – Astra

by Mirela Belcheva

Astra is a humanist serif type family designed to meet the demands of complex text environments, such as dictionaries and reference materials, particularly in the fields of language learning and translation. Its calm personality, and clear and functional presence, add to its versatility and allow it, nevertheless, to adapt to different types of text, both printed and on screen. Its neutrality ensures that it can be used in a variety of contexts and applications, without being limited by specific use cases. The family comes in two optical sizes: Display and Text, the latter with a range of weights from Light to Bold, one of which includes a Cyrillic extension.

TYPE DESIGN

Eran Ben Barak – Olivia Typeface

by Eran Ben Barak

Olivia is a font family supporting both Latin and Hebrew scripts. It explores the shapes and conventions of these scripts without blending or “Latinizing” Hebrew. The project rethinks Latin type design norms, leveraging my background and education. As a Hebrew type designer, I advocate for mutual learning between scripts. This typeface serves as a bridge, demonstrating how Hebrew and Latin can coexist and enrich each other.

TYPE DESIGN

Anna-Sophia Pohlmann – Eternity

by Anna-Sophia Pohlmann

From Rational to Functional: Eternity is a family of six styles inspired by the French typeface Romain du Roi in 1694. Its creation is one of the first examples of rational type design. Philippe Grandjean, who cut the punches for the metal type, took many liberties to moderate the original letterforms. Eternity raises the question of what makes a functional typeface contemporary. What criteria are important for a typeface to be usable in different contexts? The finished typeface continues to use characteristic elements of Romain du Roi and Philippe Grandjean, but questions the functionality of the typeface by breaking with mathematical and analytical principles. Eternity collects and creates the ideal parameters for each font style, applied on an axis between rational and function.

TYPE DESIGN

Yearbook

with Nejc Prah

In October 2021, the Master Type Design welcomed Nejc Prah for a one-week workshop. Being in a masters program is a special time, both personally and professionally. To keep a memory of it, the students were invited to create a Yearbook. First years and second years were assigned into pairs and asked to make a contribution about their partner. Drawings, collages, letterings, doodles, patterns, 3D-modelling, … Experimentations and explorations were encouraged. It resulted into a colourful and joyous publication, displaying a diversity of characters and approaches. After a collaborative effort for the production on the last day, each student got a copy, as a memory.

TYPE DESIGN

Böcklin Zoo

with Karl Nawrot

Workshop with Karl Nawrot. Handpainted compositions inspired by the typeface Arnold Böcklin from Schriftgiesserei Otto Weisert (1904).

TYPE DESIGN

All Over

with MATD, Job Wouters (Letman)

Workshop with Dutch designer Job Wouters.

TYPE DESIGN

Workshop with studio NORM

with Dimitri Bruni (NORM), Manuel Krebs (NORM)

Workshop with Zürich based studio NORM on the theory, the design and the use of stencil typefaces.

TYPE DESIGN

Workshop with Thibault Brevet

with Thibault Brevet

Workshop with Thibault Brevet.

TYPE DESIGN

Type Poster Workshop with Dafi Kühne

with Dafi Kühne, MATD

TYPE DESIGN

Atlas of Letterforms, workshop with Radim Peško

with MATD, Radim Peško

TYPE DESIGN

Sign Painting Workshop with Alaric Garner

with Alaric Garnier, MATD