Jul 21, 2011
The Daam mark is based on Fregio Mecano, an anonymous modular typeface designed in Italy in the 1920′s whereby all of it’s letters and numerals can be made using combinations of 20 segments. Because of its segmentation and architectural nature (you have to “build” each letter), NB: Studio felt it provided a perfect base for a typeface for the Daam identity.
The resulting design, entitled Walker, is a variable typeface whose ultimate look and feel is determined by the designer. Walker is intended for headline purposes and thus exists as an all caps alphabet. In its base form it is a bold sans serif, a style that provides an important link to the institution’s previous typographic palettes. Describing its basic structure, Carter states, “I think of [it] rather like store window mannequins with good bone structure on which to hang many different kinds of clothing.” What distinguishes Walker from any other font are its “snap-on” serifs. By using various computer keystroke commands, the designer can choose among five different types of serifs to attach to any character. In addition, horizontal rules can be placed above and below letters to underline and/or “overline” text—a feature, like a clothesline, from which letters can be hung. To realize the technical innovation of the snap-on serifs, Carter employed a strategy similar to one he developed for Devanagari, a typeface used for Hindi text that allows dependent vowels to be typeset in the correct location of a letterform with simple keystrokes.
The Walker typeface provides a distinctive look that affords great variability in its composition. Conceptually, it represents a revision of modernist typography insofar as it focuses attention on the space between letters, words, and lines of text. The result, however, is not so much about voids as it is about spanning them, as designer Moira Cullen notes: “In Walker the serifs are the ultimate connectors, the antithesis in type of a modernist apartheid. Each character holds its own frame, but an inspired or decisive stroke can will the letterform to nuzzle its neighbour or extend an arm or leg across the white divide.”
Andrew Blauvelt, Design Director and Curator
SuperTipo Veloz was orginally created by the Catalan designer Joan Trochut Blanchard and produced at José Iranzo foundry in Barcelona 1942. The "system" consisted of several series or modules of building blocks from which one could construct any number of alphabetic variations. Additional complementary forms like swashes, tails, flourishes were also available. It was digitalized and revived by Andreu Balius and Àlex Trochut in 2004. This work has been awarded an Certificate of Excellence in Type Design from the Type Directors Club (New York, 2005)
Family made from original collections: primera, segunda, tercera, rasgos veloz, complementos uno, complementos dos y complementos tres (colección universal + serie cuerpo 36).
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