Poring over some photo-lettering specimens—one of my preferred pastimes—I stumbled upon an advertising postcard that had been mailed to the original owner of my Lettering Inc. book back in November of 1960. The postcard was exciting enough to me on its own; I presume very few examples of this kind of ephemera have survived, and it is always fascinating to see how new type and lettering fonts were advertised contemporaneously with their original publication. The postcard came from the Los Angeles offices of The Headliners (“The Finest in Hand and Photoprocess Lettering”), so it was not directly related to the Lettering Inc. specimen in which it served as a bookmark for so many decades. Mid-century art directors in the United States had a number of options for phototype services to work with, and although some of their offerings overlapped, there were some unique faces that were exclusive to particular foundries.

Safari, the font from The Headliners featured on the postcard, is an “interlock” example of a “casual gothic” or “naïve gothic” style, popularized in mid-century America in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Interlock faces evolved from the graphic design practice common in the 1950s of alternating letters up and down from the baseline, setting every letter higher or lower than the one before. Often associated with Googie architecture (see the Dinah’s Family Restaurant wordmark in particular), jazz music, beatniks, or Tiki culture, interlock fonts or lettering are easily distinguished from other styles due to how some letters are drawn on top of, underneath, or tucked in-between others for a jaunty, playful effect. The “tails” of capital Rs, Ls, or Ks often serve to underline smaller superscript characters. Nowadays, with OpenType fonts, this kind of trickery is accomplished automatically for typographers, as type designers can create seemingly infinite permutations of ligatures and program them to substitute in when specific combinations of letters are typed. But back in the ’50s and ’60s, this style would have been accomplished either by hand-lettering the entire design, or by photo-lettering. Metal type was impractical for this style since the number of ligature sorts required would overflow well beyond the capacity of a California job case. But photographic typesetting, which was becoming widely adopted for display lettering in the printing industry, was particularly well-suited to tightly-kerned interlock forms (as well as ornate scripts and cursives, which had been quite constricted by the limitations metal type technology). Still, for casual interlock styles, a font designer would need to create many versions of each letter (or combinations of letters) to suit every conceivable usage. And skilled typesetters would need to use their discretion to determine how to best employ the font for a customer. After all, the goal for photo-lettering was to look as attractive as hand-lettered artwork, and repeated use of the same glyphs would give away its mechanized nature. And interlock lettering shines most when bespoke letter pairs are used to maximum effect.

After I discovered the postcard, I pulled my three-ring specimen binder from The Headliners off the shelf and began to look for Safari. Fortunately seven full pages are devoted to specimens of all of Safari’s variations (weights, widths, italics, outlines, all-caps, U&lc, etc.). The “DESIGN HEADLINES” line of text set in Safari Medium Semi-Condensed looked very familiar, but at first I could not put my finger on exactly where I had specifically seen it used before. This aesthetic was almost ubiquitous for several years when it first emerged, and I especially associate it with fonts from House Industries like Ed [Benguiat] Interlock and Shag Lounge. When I sat back down at the computer, I was staring right at it: the home page of AbeBooks.com featured the cover of the legendary Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are. And it was set in Safari—at least it seemed to be. I had to do some tests. So I scanned some bits of the lettering from my own 1980s paperback copy of Where the Wild Things Are and compared them in Photoshop to scans of Safari from The Headliners. The Medium Semi-Condensed weight/width is an exact match. Unfortunately I do not have the entire character set to compare, as foundries back then typically knew better than to make their entire fonts available for instant piracy, which was rampant enough as it was. But perhaps one day I will be able to track down additional samples or source material from The Headliners.

I find it odd that as of late 2023, this particular typeface has not yet been digitized, considering the well-deserved fame of Sendak’s book. That remains the case even after renewed interest in the original book sparked by the 2009 novelization The Wild Things by Dave Eggers and the Spike Jonze film (whose hand-drawn Dr. Strangelove-esque titles à la Pablo Ferro sparked their own aesthetic trend in typography at the time). There are plenty of other interlock faces revived faithfully from that era, as well as new designs that reference and amalgamate the swingin’ ’60s aesthetic. To me, though, Safari stands out as one of the best, and long overdue for revival.

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In addition to writing one heck of a worthwhile read, Vanessa Hua, author of Deceit and Other Possibilities, was a pleasure to work with in designing the cover for her first short story collection. She was interviewed by Bloom, and had this to say about the experience of working together on the design:

“I love the cover so much—I even ordered custom tattoos with the bird insignia for my launch parties! Oscar Villalon, the managing editor at ZYZZYVA, recommended Josh’s work; he’d designed covers for the literary magazine, among his other clients. The process wasn’t what I expected, but then again, I’ve never had a book published! First Josh asked me to create a Pinterest board of what I liked and didn’t like in book covers, while he read the book. Then we talked for an hour not about colors or imagery, but about what it meant to be an immigrant. He got deep inside the book, and that informed the aesthetic. He then showed me several options with different motifs, including a lucky fish and a school of fish, but the cranes jumped out to me, with that color scheme. Cranes figure into the last scene of the last story in the book—and cranes are also present in Asian art. It was an artful but subtle reference to the book, without being overly Orientalized (no cone hats, fans, etc). Cranes also migrate, playing upon the theme of the book. It was an interesting process, to think about what exactly the book was saying as a whole, and how to convey it in an arresting image. I feel so fortunate to have worked with Josh.”

The feeling is mutual, Vanessa!

Here are a few of the early concepts I proposed alongside the version that would eventually become the book’s cover.

Vanessa even had some promotional temporary tattoos created inspired by the cover design!

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Ain’t nothing like seeing a design come to life.

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I have been very fortunate to be a part of the team at ZYZZYVA since taking on the redesign of the print journal and website a few years ago. Despite ZYZZYVA’s three-decades-long run, since I’m relatively late to the party, I luckily did not have to wait very long for a special milestone to come along—the 100th issue.

Laura Cogan (editor), Oscar Villalon (managing editor), and I had been talking about ZYZZYVA No. 100 ever since the beginning of our working relationship, but in the latter half of 2013, we began our work in earnest to weave together a creative direction for the issue’s special design.

We have always put a great deal of effort into every issue of ZYZZYVA. The 100th issue was no different in that sense, but we knew we needed to differentiate it from all of the others somehow. Since our redesign—which debuted in issue No. 92 (Fall 2011)—every cover of ZYZZYVA has featured selected artists’ work, surrounded by a context in which that work would conceivably be seen (at least in our imaginations). An infinite gallery, of sorts. As the designer, my goal has always been to honor and support the artwork that graces ZYZZYVA’s cover. No. 100 presented me with a unique challenge and a fantastic honor, in that the cover design is the artwork.

San Francisco is ZYZZYVA’s home base, and serves as nothing short of the journal’s muse. Our goal was to depict San Francisco on the cover in a very ZYZZYVA way. The illustration draws influence from the Art Deco period of the 1939 Golden Gate Exposition through the present day, spanning milestones in Bay Area and ZYZZYVA history, while maintaining the overall composition of ZYZZYVA’s covers since the redesign.

To emphasize and celebrate our love of print as a medium, we wanted ZYZZYVA No. 100 to be printed in a unique way. After months of developing our concept, we decided upon a metallic paper (Curious Metallics Gold Leaf), printed offset with two spot colors (opaque white paired with a mixture of black and metallic gold). The cover was masterfully printed by “the oldest print shop in the Pearl,” Gann Bros. Printing, in Three Steps Ahead’s new home base of Portland, Oregon.

The hundredth-issue milestone is getting ZYZZYVA some very deserved attention, including impressive interviews with The Washington Post and The Millions.

The way that the issue looks and feels can only be truly experienced in person. The paper and printing, just like the writing and art within, has an iridescent quality that can be appreciated when viewed from different angles. I strongly encourage everyone to give themselves and their friends the gift of ZYZZYVA. You can purchase ZYZZYVA No. 100, as well as subscriptions, bundles, t-shirts, and other back issues online at www.zyzzyva.org/subscribe.

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Do you lack graphics on your t-shirts? Do you lack shirts in general? Do you want to dance? If you answered yes—or no—to any of these questions, don’t despair! Our new line of graphic t-shirts is now available on Etsy.

Shown above, left to right, are The Maker Tee, Go Beyond, and Science! More designs on our Etsy shop, and more to come, especially if you buy these!

All shirts are made to order and can be printed with custom colors and styles. Compatible with both male and female human beings. Fans of this site get 15% off their order with coupon code STEPAHEAD.

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Just had a chance to watch the beautiful 3 Union Shop, a short documentary about the Colby Poster Printing Company, written and co-directed by C. R. Stecyk III of Dogtown fame:

I’ve been collecting Colby posters for a few years (they even had a role in inspiring some of my wedding collateral), and I had the privilege of taking a tour of the facility shortly after it closed:

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[flickr-gallery mode=”photoset” photoset=”72157633142030146″]

Their absence has been awfully apparent around LA in the past few months. There are still posters haphazardly slapped all over telephone poles, as other printers have filled in the gap left in the market. But the colors and the type just aren’t the same without Colby.

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Thrilled to be featured on Trish Witkowski’s FOLD of the WEEK with our design for the I AM STERN laser-cut folding mailer.

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We came up with the idea of doing a folding banner that could be easily mailed, but would unfold to a large size for display, like a pennant. We had already designed the branding for the “I AM STERN” campaign in 2012, and the mirrored stickers that we created were a huge hit.

This time, we pushed the envelope even further by designing a very intricate skyline (based almost entirely in fact) that was laser-cut off of the top edge of the banner. The best part is the sloped design that allows the skyline to zig-zag back and forth when folded, mirroring the depth and density of the real Manhattan skyline.

As part of the ongoing campaign, students and faculty were asked to post photos of themselves with the banner with the hashtag #IAmStern. Here are some of the recent highlights:

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