Overview
Founded in London in 1992, the Type Archive brought together some eight million artefacts that tell the story of typography and printing. Highlights of the collection, which sadly closed in 2023, included the ancient materials of typefounders Stephenson Blake, the hot-metal technology of The Monotype Corporation and the innovative wood-letter produced by the factory of Robert DeLittle. Now, for the first time, a new book by long-serving Type Archive volunteer Richard Ardagh sheds light on these extraordinary materials, celebrating their significance and importance to both the history of art and engineering.
For over five hundred years the printed word was the primary conveyor of information and revolutionised the way we communicate. Type Archived presents the typographic treasures that made this possible, from the engraved punches (master letters) and matrices (dies for casting), to the letterpress type and printing presses that put ink to paper. Inside the book, these items have been arranged into chapters by material: iron, steel, copper, brass, bronze, lead, wood, and paper.
As Type Archive chairman Nicolas Barker OBE has written, these artefacts ‘are akin to industrial jewels, letterforms demonstrating the role that supreme mechanical engineering and type design have played, over six centuries, in the development of human communication throughout the Western World.’ Alongside specially commissioned photography, Type Archived features a detailed summary of the trials and achievements of the Archive, an essay on the techniques of typefounding, a glossary of terms and detailed image captions describing the objects, their designers and uses.
A range of esteemed practitioners affiliated with the Type Archive also contribute to the wider impact of the organisation’s mission, including Berthold Wolpe, Quentin Blake, Toshi Omagari and MinaLima, the designers who worked on the Harry Potter film franchise.
Specification
300 x 240mm176 pages
Hardcover
3/4-height dust jacket
