Although my husband and I are not in any design field, we’ve enjoyed watching videos like Gary Hustwit’s Helvetica (the history of a typeface) and his Objectified (on industrial design). It’s interesting to see how designers think about things like a new font or machine.
Recently at National Public Radio’s Weekend Edition, Ari Shapiro talked about a new typeface meant to represent Sweden.
He reports, “Nearly every country has a national flag, a national anthem, a national bird. Not many countries have a national typeface. Sweden recently commissioned a team of designers to come up with a font to represent the country on its websites, press releases, tourism brochures and more. …
“The typeface that [Soderhavet] designers created looks pretty much the way you would expect a Scandinavian typeface to look, too.
” ‘The Scandinavian tradition is pretty humble, easygoing and clean,’ says Stefan Hattenbach, one of the designers of the new Sweden Sans. Less is more, you could say.’
“He started by collecting images of old Swedish street signs and company logos. He pulled images of Swedish wallpaper, cars and furniture, and looked for what he calls the red thread running through it all.
” ‘There’s an expression in Sweden, too,’ Hattenbach says. ‘We say lagom, which is not too much and not too little.’ ”
The ancient Greeks had a similar expression: “Nothing in excess.” The only letter with a flourish is q. Says Hattenback, “Q is not used that much, so you can often be a little more playful with that.”
See what you think of Swedish Sans, below, and read the rest of the NPR story here.
Swedish Sans, by Soderhavet
A typeface to represent official Sweden
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