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58 Buttericks Practical Typography

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Good ty pog ra phy re in forces the mean -
ing of the text.
Al most all texts com mu ni cate a set of
points (The pe ti tion should be de nied
for three rea sons). Some times a text
also needs to in struct the reader (Add
lines 7 through 21 and en ter the to tal
here). Other texts of fer warn ings or
ad mo ni tions (You must be 48 inches
tall to ride; Speed limit 75). In every
case, good ty pog ra phy sup ports and
re in forces the mes sage. Good ty pog -
ra phy makes the text more e!ective.
Three sub sidiary propo si tions ow
from this:
1 Good ty pog ra phy is mea sured
by how well it re in forces the
mean ing of the text, not by
some ab stract scale of merit.
Ty po graphic choices that work
for one text wont nec es sar ily
work for an other. (Corol lary:
good ty pog ra phers dont rely
on rote so lu tions. One size
what is good
typography?
Reinforces the
meaning of the
text
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never ts all.)
2 For a given text, there are
many ty po graphic so lu tions
that would be equally good. Ty -
pog ra phy is not a math prob -
lem with one cor rect answer.
3 Your abil ity to pro duce good
ty pog ra phy de pends on how
well you un der stand the goals
of your text, not on taste or vi -
sual train ing. (Corol lary: if you
mis un der stand the mean ing of
your text, good ty pog ra phy be -
comes purely a mat ter of luck.)
Pause to ab sorb the ram i ca tions of
propo si tion #3. Ty pog ra phy is vi sual,
so its easy to con clude that its pri -
mar ily an artis tic or aes thetic pur suit.
Not so. Ty pog ra phy is pri mar ily
utilitarian.
There fore, good ty pog ra phy is mea -
sured on a util i tar ian yard stick. Ty -
pog ra phy that is aes thet i cally pleas -
ant, but that doesnt re in force the
mean ing of the text, is a fail ure. Ty -
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pog ra phy that re in forces the mean ing
of the text, even if aes thet i cally un -
pleas ant, is a success.
Does that mean that ef fec tive ty pog -
ra phy can be ugly? Sure. Some times
ugly is bet ter than pretty.
Look at the high way signs again.
The script font used on the sec ond
sign could be called pret tier than
the stan dard high way-sig nage font.
But a high way sign has a spe cial pur -
pose: its meant to be read quickly,
from long dis tances, at odd an gles,
and un der vari able light ing and
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weather con di tions. The high way-sig -
nage font stays leg i ble un der all these
con di tions. It con sti tutes good ty pog -
ra phy be cause it sup ports the signs
message.
The script font may be pret tier, but in
this con text, its bad ty pog ra phy, be -
cause its not suited to the task. Con -
versely, the high way-sig nage font
would look ter ri ble on a wed ding in vi -
ta tion, where the script font would be
appropriate.
A re lated example:
Here, the same font is used in all
three ver sions of this sign. But the
rst two signs fail to de liver the mes -
sagethe speed limit is 75be cause
the ty pog ra phy un der mines the text.
The most im por tant el e ment is the
num ber 75. Also im por tant is the cap -
tion speed limit. Only the third ver sion
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gets the bal ance right. Its the only

ex am ple of good ty pog ra phy among
the three.
Use this prin ci ple to test the qual ity
of your own ty po graphic work. The
ad van tage of ap ply ing a util i tar ian
bench mark in stead of an aes thetic
one is that it doesnt re quire aes thetic
judg ment. Be lieve me, if youre just
start ing out in ty pog ra phy, you will
pro duce some ugly work. Dont
worry. If its ugly and ef fec tive,
youre mak ing progress.
BY THE WAY
A pop u lar but awed line of rea -
son ing holds that the best ty pog -
ra phy is in vis i ble. This idea
dates back at least to Beat rice
Wardes 1932 es say ! The
Crys tal Gob let, and has en -
joyed a re cent vogue among de -
sign ers ea ger to sound trendy.
The aw? It doesnt with stand
the tini est scrutiny. As we saw in
what is ty pog ra phy, the
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writ ten word cant ex ist with out

ty pog ra phy. And as we saw in
why does ty pog ra phy
mat ter, ty pog ra phy al ways in -
u ences how we in ter pret a
document.
When peo ple say that good ty -
pog ra phy is in vis i ble, what
they usu ally mean is that it
should be suit able, ap pro pri ate
in other words, it should re in -
force the mean ing of the text.
That much I agree with. But
in vis i ble is a mis lead ing word,
be cause it im plies that ty pog ra -
phy works by get ting out of the
way, or dis ap pear ing. Quite the
opposite.
Cant leg i bil ity be re solved by
re search? Re search can help if
the de sign con text is spe cic
enough to per mit testable propo -
si tions. For in stance, the new
fed eral-high way font, Clearview,
was in formed by ! de tailed stud -
ies about how dri vers read sig -
nage. But in gen eral, leg i bil ity is
largely a mat ter of ac cli ma tion,
I talk more about how
ty pog ra phy works in
! Re build ing the Ty -
po graphic So ci ety.
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not em pir icsas proof, con sider
the huge range of writ ing sys -
tems that hu man civ i liza tions
have suc cess fully used.
" why does
typography
matter?
top chapter where do the
rules come
from? #