Do as I say, not as I do
link Friday 17th of October, 2008
I've been following an interesting thread on Typophile recently, started when Olivier Deneef asked for some suggestions for his Masters project:
“ I want to work for this thesis around the book — Twenty-two things you should never do with typefaces — by Enric Jardi. For every rule he tels not to do, i want to prove that it can be done, because type is more than rules, it's about a feeling, you cant just say how to become good type... ”
The 22 rules in question can be found on Jardi's site, along with a short preface explaining what the list is intended to acheive. Unfortunately, this text is presented in a manner which seems specifically designed to invite criticism — the preface has default linespacing and no paragraph spacing or indentation. Rules such as 'Don't get the medium wrong' and 'Make sure that the typeface does not communicate something you do not want to communicate' are particularly galling in a situation like this. Despite the wisdom of most of the items, criticism is practically assured when the text is presented with such apparent disregard for basic readability.
However, there is all kinds of cool stuff on Jardi's site. You have to work for it (the site's navigation is the ten kinds of horrible usually reserved for Flash-only sites) but it's definitely worth it. My particular favourite is this proposed branding for Montjuic Park in Barcelona. The concept — the leaf shape of the park itself and dividing it into coloured areas according to the type of facility in that area — creates a brand which could easily be scaled into the variety of usable signage required for a public space. I assume that the branding was never taken through to completion, as the logo is only described as 'proposed' — which is a shame, in my view.
My one initial criticism (that the branding would require updating whenever facilities were added or moved) soon gave way to admiration for that same idea. A brand mark which is a direct 'snapshot' of the park at any given time actually seems like a wonderful thing.
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