ATypographyp. 012
Akzidenz Before Helvetica: The Grotesk That Refused to Die
Sixty years before the neutral typeface, Berlin shipped one with opinions. Ines Roth reads the specimen books nobody scanned.
Nº 14 — The Grid Issue · Summer MMXXVI · Zürich
The gridis themessage.
Fourteen issues in, we still believe a column can carry more feeling than a photograph. This quarter: Akzidenz before Helvetica, the twelve-column lie, and a stadium read as a paragraph of concrete.
96 pages · 120 gsm uncoated · no pictures, on principle
In this issue
02 / 05
BGrid & Systemp. 028
The 12-Column Lie: What Your Framework Got Wrong
Twelve columns were a means, never a creed. Bruno Achermann audits the CSS that mistook arithmetic for design.
CArchitecturep. 041
Concrete Is a Typeface: Reading the Hallenstadion
Zürich’s great oval, parsed beam by beam, as if it were a paragraph set in 1939.
DCriticismp. 056
The Tyranny of the Hero Image
Every site opens with a photograph apologising for its words. Salome Wirz files a complaint.
EArchivep. 064
Müller-Brockmann’s Beethoven, Measured to the Millimetre
We borrowed a ruler and an original 1955 print. The arcs are not where you think they are.
From the editorial, p. 003
White spaceis not empty.It is load-bearing.
A page that breathes is a page doing structural work. We do not fill silence; we set it.
Contents, Nº 14
04 / 05
- 003Editorial — The Case for Ruthlessness—
- 012Akzidenz Before HelveticaA
- 018Emil Ruder’s Last Lecture, ReconstructedA
- 022Kerning Is a Moral ActA
- 028The 12-Column LieB
- 034An A4 Obsession: Why √2 Refuses to RetireB
- 041Concrete Is a TypefaceC
- 052Vignelli’s Subway Map Was RightD
- 056The Tyranny of the Hero ImageD
- 064Beethoven, Measured to the MillimetreE
- 072Letters — Readers v. the Ragged Right—
- 080Colophon & Subscription Particulars—
Four issues a year.Never five.
Annual subscription, post-paid worldwide, CHF 88. Issue Nº 15, “The Margin Issue”, closes for press on 14 August.
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