Quarter Life Crisis

The world according to Sven-S. Porst

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Beautiful

284 words

Sometimes things are just a little too good. I was pointed to German publisher Hermann Schmidt in Mainz who are said to have a gorgeous catalogue which they’ll even send you. And, sure enough, the catalogue looks great with a lovely (but slightly self-opening) fabric cover with clever light reflection properties for its background and pattern.

Detail of the catalogue's cover

But that’s not all about it. The downright depressing thing is that the catalogue contains plenty of lovely looking books on typography and graphics. And it seems tempting to order non-trivial percentages of it right away. Which with the typical prices for graphics books would lead to personal bankruptcy fairly quickly. So I’ll have to take that step by step, perhaps skip the €100 volumes for the moment and look at what’s left. Still enough, it appears. Ranging from what looks like a cool card game to a book Fraktur Mon Amour which is chock-full of Fraktur. Actually I’m not really a Fraktur fan, but the way the book graphically plays with the letters just seems great. Breathes a whole new life into those typefaces.

Footnote on a headline in the catalogue marked by a floral heart

Apart from its outside and its contents, the catalogue is also full of nice details. For example a number of book titles are set in varying typefaces. Not just to show off that they know these can be varied but to match the title in question, but to match the book in question either in style or in content. Those headings come with a footnote - marked by the floral heart which also serves as the company’s logo - which then tells you the name of the typeface used in case you didn’t recognise it right away. Learning while browsing…

Footnote belonging to the mark above with text 'Rotis'

Bembo / Syntax

December 20, 2007, 0:40

Tagged as typography, verlag hermann schmidt.

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