Counterpunch: making type in the sixteenth century, designing typefaces now
Hyphen Press / 2022.08.16
Counterpunch is packed with ideas. It is both an investigation into the technics of making metal type by hand, and a consideration of present questions in type design. The discussion takes in the fundamentals of designing and making letters, so that the book can be read as a guide to type and font construction in any medium. Lively, pointed drawings and photographs complement an equally fresh text.
Punchcutting at ATypI, San Francisco, 1994
Hyphen Press / 2018.10.08
In the 1990s the annual meetings of ATypI (Association Typographique Internationale) were often fascinating events. The organization was in transition. Formed in 1957, as a grouping of type manufacturers, it represented the industry’s attempt to regulate itself, and especially to prevent – without recourse to the courts of law – one company from copying the designs of another.
Karel Martens at the KABK
Hyphen Press / 2015.03.12
The Gerrit Noordzij Prize, organized by the Type and Media postgraduate course at the Koninklijke Academie van Beeldende Kunsten (Royal Academy of Art) in The Hague, is awarded every three years. Last week it was presented to the type designer Cyrus Highsmith, and the previous winner, Karel Martens, was celebrated in a seminar, an exhibition, and a book.
The work of Matthew Carter
Hyphen Press / 2011.11.01
On 13 October in Antwerp Fred Smeijers spoke some words of introduction at the opening of the exhibition ‘The Most Widely Read Man in the World: Matthew Carter’, on show until the end of the year at the Catapult gallery.
‘Counterpunch’: second edition at the printer
Hyphen Press / 2011.09.06
The long-delayed and much-anticipated second edition of this book is now in the last stages of production: it was printed yesterday and now goes to the binder. We expect that copies will go on sale in Europe at the end of this month.
Smeijers interviewed
Hyphen Press / 2011.06.07
Fred Smeijers interviewed, as OurType makes a deal with WebInk.
Antwerp talk
Hyphen Press / 2010.09.28
On the occasion of an exhibition about Jan I Moretus – the Moretus in ‘Plantin-Moretus’ – Fred Smeijers is giving a public lecture on ‘present-day typography’ at the Plantin-Moretus Museum in Antwerp on 28 October.
Price changes: good news
Hyphen Press / 2010.01.03
As from today we are reducing the price of Fred Smeijers’s Type now, from £17.50 to £10. The book was made on the occasion of the award of the Gerrit Noordzij prize to Smeijers and surveys his work up to then (November 2003).
Alexander Verberne
Hyphen Press / 2009.09.15
The typographer Alexander Verberne died on 27 May 2009. After a stroke in 1997, which was followed by further strokes, he had been seriously impaired and was living in a care-home in The Hague. He was born on 18 August 1924 in Den Helder.
Ludwig
Hyphen Press / 2009.03.25
This new typeface designed by Fred Smeijers has just been released by OurType. As its name promises, it is an echt-German production: recalling the early-nineteenth-century Grotesk letter.
‘Counterpunch’ discovery
Hyphen Press / 2008.06.12
Not for the first time in the history of publishing, a book that had been declared ‘out of print’ makes a return to availability.
‘Counterpunch’: the second edition
Hyphen Press / 2008.01.03
Prompted by this nice review, we can confirm that a second edition of the book is in preparation.
Is it possible to determine what typeface of the 1990s will become a classic in the future
Hyphen Press / 2006.09.27
With its issue of April–May 2006 (no. 70), the magazine Tipográfica entered its twentieth year of publication. Published from Buenos Aires since its first issue of May 1987, the magazine is now established as one of the liveliest and most internationally minded design magazine.
Die S-Klasse
Hyphen Press / 2005.06.06
A pleasant report on Fred Smeijers’s class at the HGB Leipzig has been published in the heavy-duty weekly Die Zeit.
Smeijers further
Hyphen Press / 2004.04.09
Last month Fred Smeijers spoke about his work to an enthusiastic and packed audience.
Smeijers in London
Hyphen Press / 2004.02.17
On Tuesday 16 March at the St Bride Institute, London, Fred Smeijers will give a public lecture on the theme of ‘type now’.
OurType
Hyphen Press / 2003.12.18
Fred Smeijers’s dream of his own font label is now a reality. OurType will publish all his new typefaces, together with work by others, chosen by Fred and co-director Rudy Geeraerts.
Smeijers so far
Hyphen Press / 2003.10.15
Type now, made at top speed, was finished just in time for its presentation on 17 October at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague.
Smeijers: exhibition and book
Hyphen Press / 2003.08.14
We are spending the hot summer indoors, working hard on new titles. The latest to be announced is Type now by Fred Smeijers. This will consist of an essay on the present situation in type design, fifteen or so years into the ‘PostScript revolution’, together with a colour section showing Fred’s own work as a designer.
‘Type spaces’ reviewed (2)
Hyphen Press / 2003.03.02
An appreciation of the book by Jacques André is published in La Lettre Gutenberg (number 29), with some lamentations about how such a work could not possibly be published in France.
ATypI, Rome
Hyphen Press / 2002.09.29
At the ATypI conference in Rome last week, three Hyphen authors spoke.
New Series
Hyphen Press / 2002.08.02
Andy Crewdson’s ‘New Series’ is now launched. This is a natural successor to his weblog Lines & Splines, which in its later entries had begun to move towards more extended discussions.
New typeface
Hyphen Press / 2002.02.13
The new edition of Norman Potter’s What is a designer is set in the typeface Arnhem, designed by Fred Smeijers. Arnhem was designed and developed from 1998 onwards for a redesign of the Nederlandse Staatscourant that was undertaken by the Werkplaats Typografie in Arnhem (thus the name).
Smeijers prized / Noordzij presented
Hyphen Press / 2001.02.16
The Gerrit Noordzij Prize 2001 was awarded to Fred Smeijers in a meeting at the Konklijke Academie van Beeldende Kunsten in The Hague. The prize was first given in 1996, to Noordzij himself, during the ATypI meeting there.
The nice and the good
Hyphen Press / 1998.12.30
Counterpunch is included in the exhibition ‘Mooi maar goed: graphic design in the Netherlands 1987–1998’ at the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam.
New traditionalism
Hyphen Press / 1998.10.21
The October issue of Items, the Dutch design magazine for Dutch designers, carries an article by Jan Middendorp on the work of Fred Smeijers, complete with a designer-stubble photo of the subject.
‘Counterpunch’: how the book was made
Hyphen Press / 1998.07.26
This article was written in October 1996 for the ‘Typelab Krant’. This was a laser-printed and stapled publication circulated at the ATypI meeting in The Hague in that year: it was published in the issue of 25 October 1996. We resurrect the piece now, because it gives some picture of the way in which Hyphen Press books come into existence.
Digital ‘Counterpunch’
Hyphen Press / 1998.07.23
Word is getting out that this book is for digital people too (or maybe it is mainly for them?).