Adrian Frutiger and Univers font

Adrian Frutiger was born in 1928 in Unterseen, Canton of Bern and during his lifetime became a very influential typeface designer. His fonts come from linotype. He was one of the first designers who came up with the idea to have one font, but to have variations within that font such as bold, black, thin. Frutiger designed the font Univers and Frutiger, along with many others. He came up with the Univers Grid which lays out the complete variations within the Univers font in an organized way; showing changes in character stance, stroke width, size, and italic. He apprenticed in different mediums for four years from age 16 to 20, under several different printers and artists. His first commercial typeface was called President, and was released in 1954. He continued to release different fonts and in his Méridien type, Frutiger's ideas of letter construction, unity, and organic form, are first expressed together. Univers was the first of it’s kind in that it used numbers to classify different weights. Adrian was a big advocate of linotype and used it to expand his various fonts. 


Univers was the first family to use numbers as a naming system for its various weights- 21 variations when first released- built around its roman version, suited for long bodies of text, Univers 55. It uses optically even strokes as well as a large x-height that increases legibility when used very small or as large billboards and buildings can handle. 


The Univers Grid is a way to organize the many variations of the font. 

·      Even numbers are italic

·      Odds are roman (normal)

·      As you move from left to right they move from extended to condensed

·      From top to bottom they go from light to heavy

·      Rows have the same stroke width

·      Columns have the same character stance

More Typography Definitions

WEIGHT is the relative darkness of the characters of a type font resulting from the relative thickness of the strokes, expressed aslight, bold, extrabold, etc.

WIDTH is the distance from one side of a character to the other. In typography, width can also be measured in "ems", which defines the proportion of a given letter's width and height with respect to the point size of a given font.

STYLE is A distinctive appearance, typically determined by the principles according to which something is designed.

FONT is a set of type of one particular face and size.

TYPEFACE is the artistic representation or interpretation of characters; it is the way the type looks.

X-HEIGHT is the height of a lowercase “x” in a typeface.  

CAP HEIGHT is the height of a capital letter above the baseline for a particular typeface.

LEADING is the vertical spacing between baselines.

LETTERSPACING is the spacing between letters in a line of text.

How is type measured in inches, mm, points or picas?

Type is measured in points and picas which measure type size, line spacing, and column width.

POINT is a unit of measurement for type sizes and spacing, which in the US and UK is one twelfth of a pica, or 0.013835 inch (0.351 mm), and in Europe is 0.015 inch (0.376 mm)

PICA is a size of letter in typewriting, containing 10 characters to one inch 

How many points in an inch?

72 points in 1 inch

If a letter is set in 36 pts about how many inches tall is it?

0.4999 inches= ½ inch

How many picas in an inch?

1 inch = 6 picas

How many points in a pica?

1 Pica = 12 points

Basics of a Grid

Grid- a basic system of reference lines for a region,consisting of straight lines intersecting at right angles.


This article is specifically about using grids when creating web designs, but it was really insightful and I think it can be applied to design in general. http://www.lilo.co.uk/about-lilo/articles/grid.aspx


Designers use grids in order to make sense of a group of things; give them a hierarchy, create reference points, and overall organize parts of a whole. 


A modular grid is composed of multiple columns and rows, creating a pattern of squares or rectangles across a given medium. Each module can be filled singularly or multiple can be combined and used together, providing endless variations and possibilities in the design. 


*Margins- the space around the printed or written matter on a page.


*Columns- a vertical arrangement on a page of horizontal lines of type,usually typographically justified


*Grid Modules- An independent self-contained unit of a space


*Flowline- The connecting line or arrow between symbols on a flow chart or block diagram.


*Gutter- the space between two columns of type

*Hierarchy- any system of persons or things ranked one above another.
      -can be achieved by placing certain objects in more desirable or more greatly viewed locations, or by simply increasing the size or color intensity based on the importance. 


*Typographic Color- The optical "grayness" of text type, particularly visible while squinting when viewing a block of text. The overall typographic color of a block of type is effected by the weight or boldness of the typeface, as well as the x-height and the contrast of the typeface used


*White Space- area deliberately not used in a design. It can bring flow and balance to the layout. 


*Contrast- opposition or juxtaposition of different forms, lines, orcolors in a work of art to intensify each element's properties and produce a more dynamic expressiveness