Customer Reviews

How Typography Works: (And Why It Is Important

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Baudin's classic is a concise introduction to typography. It's interesting partly because it was published at the start of the desktop publishing revolution, and thus, doesn't focus on DTP. Instead, you get an overview that touches on typsetting, page layout, design, and history. It's intended for novices, but, it's not a "how to" book. Rather, the book strives to educate and help the student develop a better critical eye for type and layout. The overall style is a concise and efficient, and the examples presented are very good. In particular, his comparison of Futura and Gill Sans is instructive.

I think his classification of type is superior to most systems. Specifically, he distinguishes between types with high contrast between thicks and thins (like Didot), and those with low contrast (like Platin). This is often ignored by font websites, but in practice, is more important than, say, classifications between different novelty display faces.