The Weekly Typographic

This week we’re wrapping up for the year by looking back at our favorite free fonts that we’ve found this year. We’ve dived back into the shares from the last 12 months and have enjoyed revisiting some of the ones we still can’t get enough of. We’ve got everything from workhorses to fancier scripts, and something pretty creative too.

So scroll down and listen in to find out what freebies we loved this year. We hope they fit nicely into your own catalogue (or gazillion open tabs, if you’re like us) of great type for future projects.

This is our last podcast episode for 2021 as we enjoy a break over the holidays. But don’t worry! The newsletter will still drop into your inbox every Friday to keep you up to date on the latest in type and design news.

It’s been a wild year, we’ve hosted seven workshops alongside our amazing guest teachers, shared five interviews with other type and design creatives, collaborated with the team at TypeWknd for their daily wraps, released a new open-source font with Tré Seals, and (as Spotify told us) put out over 1,500 minutes of podcast content

It’s (somehow?!) December and we’re wrapping up for the year by looking back on some of our most share-worthy type related reads of the year. We’ve trawled through our newsletter archive (ok, Micah wrote some code that pulled out the most popular articles) and revisited some of those topics and ideas that stuck with us.

So scroll down and listen in to find out what topped the links this year. There’s everything from evaluating type, awesome custom type projects, wingding history, logo design tips, and watches. We hope you enjoy them all over again!

Weekly Typographic Newsletter Links

Find out more at http://podcast.theleagueofmoveabletype.com

We’re back chattin’ type and design this week, and there’s a lot to cover! There’s another rebrand to add to the ever-growing fast-food rebrand list of 2021, Jony Ive has created something unexpected, WeTransfer have done a fascinating research piece on the state of creativity in 2021, and Monotype have gobbled up some more fonts

It’s interview time this week as we fully nerd out with Sarah Hyndman. Sarah is the founder of Type Tasting and use typography to create unique experiences that transform what people think, feel and do. We loved our conversation about type trends, semiotics, the emotions of type, and why sometimes a game of ’snog, marry, avoid’ is all it takes to help non-designers understand the emotion of type.

We hope you enjoy the conversation (we could have talked for hours). If it left you wanting more, check out Sarah’s latest Adobe Max talk (there’s a link in the articles to make it easy for you).

Whilst we’re not talking about articles this week, we are still looking at and thinking about type and design news to share with you. This week we’ve got an AMAZING piece of work by our friend Tré Seals, some ideas on the relationship between design and writing, a look at the way Adobe is so intertwined with design work, and a thought provoker on perfectionism.

Weekly Typographic Newsletter Links

Find out more at http://podcast.theleagueofmoveabletype.com

We’re super excited about this weekend’s workshop, Bettering Your Lettering with Alanna Flowers. We’ll be nerding out on getting started in lettering, and how to use these skills in your own lettering, type design, or even graphic design practice. It's totally beginner friendly and you'll be able to create a complete lettering piece over the two days. We love having something to show from a learning experience.

This week we’re getting into some deep type design news, there’s an interview about launching a foundry, a quirky article about digital fonts, and a cool typeface project including everyone’s favorite toy; LEGO.

Over in nerd alert we’re talking about luxury (dahhhhhling). It’s a fun extension of the conversation we touched on a few weeks ago when discussing the branding (or blanding) of so many luxury fashion houses. So we thought it deserved a whole nerd alert of its own. We’re talking why certain products or brands have developed the luxury tag, how that drives consumer behavior, and what that can mean for brand designers.

Weekly Typographic Newsletter Links

Find out more at http://podcast.theleagueofmoveabletype.com

New workshop! We’re delighted that the ever-so-skilled lettering artist Alanna Flowers is joining us for our next workshop (20-21 Nov). Wittily titled Bettering Your Lettering, you'll learn type & lettering basics that will give your work a strong foundation. It's totally beginner friendly and you'll be able to create a complete lettering piece over the two days. Perfect timing for your holiday cards!

This week we’re going behind the scenes on a cheesy, gooey piece of brand and packaging work that Olivia has been working on at JKR, getting into a fresh approach to font licensing (that we are definitely here for), and taking a cheeky look at some of the unhelpful turns of phrase that are pervasive in the design world. It’s a fun one.

After Olivia’s grilling on lettering vs type design in last week’s nerd alert, it’s time for Micah to go into the hot seat and explain the mysteries of mastering; or finally finishing that pesky font...

Weekly Typographic Newsletter Links

Find out more at http://podcast.theleagueofmoveabletype.com

Look, we couldn’t cover this week’s type and design news without mentioning the big one… the meta-verse. What does it mean for designers? How will the future of a virtual universe change And what about that new logo??

Away from that and back into the real world(!), we’re talking about a great behind the scenes interview with the Sharp Type co-founders, the news about PostScript Type 1 support being dropped by Adobe, and a super cool piece of design / visual communication by the clever folks at The Pudding.

We’re having more of a conversation in this week’s nerd alert, where Micah and Steph grill Olivia on her experiences practicing both type design and lettering, the lessons she takes from one to the other, and how those skills help her more generally as a designer. We had fun, we hope you enjoy the conversation too. If you have more questions on the topic that we didn’t cover, drop us a note on Twitter or Instagram @theleagueof.

PS. If you want to hear our previous conversation about why you would using custom lettering versus typography in your designs, scroll back to episode #33 from August 2020.

Weekly Typographic Newsletter Links

Find out more at http://podcast.theleagueofmoveabletype.com

Wow, what a weekend of learning with Dan Cederholm last week. Dan was so generous with his font design knowledge and we loved the snippets of wisdom he shared. We also loved seeing everyone's work produced across the two workshops and the blossoming enthusiasm for type design

Don’t forget! This weekend we’re joined by Dan Cederholm, one of the OG founders of Dribbble, who will be sharing his empowering, positive, and practical insights into making your first font. Even though he’s a super experienced designer, he only made his first font in 2020, when a pesky pandemic gave him the gift of time and local inspiration.

This week’s articles and podcast conversation have a bit of a theme; in preparation for a special interview episode next week

We’re fresh off of a great workshop last weekend with our friends at Spline. Big thanks to the many, many people who showed up to learn more about 3D type; we can’t wait to see what you create (make sure you tag us on Instagram and Twitter with what you learnt).