Erik Spiekermann
Encyclopedia
Erik Spiekermann is a German
typographer
and designer. He is a professor at the University of the Arts Bremen
.
Spiekermann studied art history
at Berlin
's Free University
, funding himself by running a hot metal
printing press
in the basement of his house.
Between 1972 and 1979, he worked as a freelance graphic design
er in London
before returning to Berlin and founding MetaDesign
with two partners.
In 1989 he and his wife, Joan Spiekermann, started FontShop
, the first mail-order distributor for digital fonts. FSI FontShop International
followed and now publishes the FontFont range of typefaces. MetaDesign combined clean, teutonic-looking information design and complex corporate design systems for clients like BVG (Berlin Transit), Düsseldorf Airport, Audi, Volkswagen and Heidelberg Printing, amongst others.
In 2001 Spiekermann left MetaDesign over policy disagreements and started UDN | United Designers Networks with offices in Berlin, London and San Francisco.
In April 2006, the Art Center College of Design
in Pasadena awarded Spiekermann an Honorary Doctorship for his contribution to design. His family of typefaces for Deutsche Bahn (German Railways), designed with Christian Schwartz
, received a Gold Medal at the German Federal Design Prize in 2006, the highest such award in Germany.
As of January 2007, UDN has been renamed SpiekermannPartners, and as of January 2009 it has been renamed Edenspiekermann
.
s as well as typefaces as part of corporate design programmes.
Spiekermann co-authored Stop Stealing Sheep & Find Out How Type Works. He also participated in the creation of numerous corporate identities and other works, including redesigns of the publications The Economist
and Reason
.
Spiekermann also appeared in the documentary
Helvetica
.
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
typographer
Typography
Typography is the art and technique of arranging type in order to make language visible. The arrangement of type involves the selection of typefaces, point size, line length, leading , adjusting the spaces between groups of letters and adjusting the space between pairs of letters...
and designer. He is a professor at the University of the Arts Bremen
University of the Arts Bremen
The University of the Arts Bremen is a publicly funded university in Bremen, Germany and one of the most successful ones whose roots in music, arts and design date back to 1873...
.
Spiekermann studied art history
Art history
Art history has historically been understood as the academic study of objects of art in their historical development and stylistic contexts, i.e. genre, design, format, and style...
at Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
's Free University
Free University of Berlin
Freie Universität Berlin is one of the leading and most prestigious research universities in Germany and continental Europe. It distinguishes itself through its modern and international character. It is the largest of the four universities in Berlin. Research at the university is focused on the...
, funding himself by running a hot metal
Hot metal
Hot metal may refer to:*Hot Metal, a British television comedy series set in a newspaper office*Hot metal typesetting*Pig iron in a liquid state*HoTMetaL, a pioneering HTML editor for web pages...
printing press
Printing press
A printing press is a device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a print medium , thereby transferring the ink...
in the basement of his house.
Between 1972 and 1979, he worked as a freelance graphic design
Graphic design
Graphic design is a creative process – most often involving a client and a designer and usually completed in conjunction with producers of form – undertaken in order to convey a specific message to a targeted audience...
er in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
before returning to Berlin and founding MetaDesign
MetaDesign
MetaDesign is an influential global design consultancy founded by Erik Spiekermann, Uli Mayer-Johanssen and Hans Ch. Krüger. The business has offices in Berlin, Beijing, Hamburg, Düsseldorf, Zurich and San Francisco and more than 330 employees....
with two partners.
In 1989 he and his wife, Joan Spiekermann, started FontShop
FontShop
FontShop was founded in Berlin in 1989 by Erik Spiekermann and Joan Spiekermann, who were then husband and wife, and Neville Brody. FontShop was the first font reseller in digital type history. There are four independent FontShops in Austria, Benelux, Germany, and the USA.FSI FontShop International...
, the first mail-order distributor for digital fonts. FSI FontShop International
FSI FontShop International
FSI FontShop International is an international manufacturer of digital typefaces , based in Berlin and one of the large type foundries that exist today.All the typefaces are published as part of the FontFont library...
followed and now publishes the FontFont range of typefaces. MetaDesign combined clean, teutonic-looking information design and complex corporate design systems for clients like BVG (Berlin Transit), Düsseldorf Airport, Audi, Volkswagen and Heidelberg Printing, amongst others.
In 2001 Spiekermann left MetaDesign over policy disagreements and started UDN | United Designers Networks with offices in Berlin, London and San Francisco.
In April 2006, the Art Center College of Design
Art Center College of Design
Art Center College of Design is a private college located in Pasadena, California, and was cited by BusinessWeek as one of the 60 best design schools in the world. The college’s industrial design program is consistently ranked number one by both DesignIntelligence and U.S...
in Pasadena awarded Spiekermann an Honorary Doctorship for his contribution to design. His family of typefaces for Deutsche Bahn (German Railways), designed with Christian Schwartz
Christian Schwartz
Christian Schwartz is an American type designer. He has been awarded the German Design Award and the Prix Charles Peignot.-Life :...
, received a Gold Medal at the German Federal Design Prize in 2006, the highest such award in Germany.
As of January 2007, UDN has been renamed SpiekermannPartners, and as of January 2009 it has been renamed Edenspiekermann
Edenspiekermann
Edenspiekermann is an agency for strategy, design and communication with offices in Amsterdam, Berlin, Stuttgart. The design agency is the result of a merger in 2009 between Eden design & communication Amsterdam and SpiekermannPartners Berlin, founded by German typographer Erik...
.
Notable works
Spiekermann has designed many commercial typefaceTypeface
In typography, a typeface is the artistic representation or interpretation of characters; it is the way the type looks. Each type is designed and there are thousands of different typefaces in existence, with new ones being developed constantly....
s as well as typefaces as part of corporate design programmes.
- Berliner Grotesk (original is from 1913, digitization is from 1979)
- Lo-TypeLo-TypeLo-Type is a display typeface originally designed by Louis Oppenheim. Oppenheim named the font using his own initials which he also used to sign his work. Oppenheim designed the avant-garde Lo-Type for Berthold during 1911–1914 under the influence of the emerging modernist era, thus participating...
(original is from 1911/14, digitization is from 1980) - ITC Officina Sans (1990)
- ITC Officina Serif (1990)
- FF MetaFF MetaFF Meta is a humanist sans-serif typeface family designed by Erik Spiekermann originally as a commission for the Deutsche Bundespost , but later released by Spiekermann himself in 1991 through his FontFont library...
(1991–1998) - FF Govan (2001)
- FF Info (2000)
- FF Unit (2003)
- FF Meta Serif (with Christian SchwartzChristian SchwartzChristian Schwartz is an American type designer. He has been awarded the German Design Award and the Prix Charles Peignot.-Life :...
and Kris Sowersby, 2007)
Spiekermann co-authored Stop Stealing Sheep & Find Out How Type Works. He also participated in the creation of numerous corporate identities and other works, including redesigns of the publications The Economist
The Economist
The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
and Reason
Reason (magazine)
Reason is a libertarian monthly magazine published by the Reason Foundation. The magazine has a circulation of around 60,000 and was named one of the 50 best magazines in 2003 and 2004 by the Chicago Tribune.- History :...
.
Spiekermann also appeared in the documentary
Documentary
A documentary is a creative work of non-fiction, including:* Documentary film, including television* Radio documentary* Documentary photographyRelated terms include:...
Helvetica
Helvetica (film)
Helvetica is an independent feature-length documentary film about typography and graphic design, centered on the typeface of the same name. Directed by Gary Hustwit, it was released in 2007 to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the typeface's introduction in 1957 and is considered the first of...
.
Awards
- 2003 – Gerrit Noordzij PrizeGerrit Noordzij PrizeThe Gerrit Noordzij Prize is given to type designers and typographers for extraordinary contributions to the fields of type design, typography and type education. The prize is awarded every three years by the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague together with the Museum Meermanno, under the auspices...
- 2006 – German Design AwardGerman Design AwardThe Design Award of the Federal Republic of Germany is the nation's official design award and is presented by the German Ministry for Economics and Technology. The award was given for the first time under the name 'Federal Award for Good Design' in 1969 and thereafter every two years. Moreover,...
- 2007 – European Designers Hall of Fame
- 2007 – Honorary Royal Designer for Industry, Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures & Commerce, London
- 2011 - Lifetime achievement award from German Design Prize
See also
- First Things First 2000 manifestoFirst things first 2000 ManifestoThe First Things First 2000 manifesto, launched by Adbusters magazine in 1999, was an updated version of the earlier First Things First manifesto written and published in 1964 by Ken Garland, a British designer....
- EmigreEmigre magazineEmigre was a graphic design magazine published by Emigre Graphics between 1984 and 2005; it was first published in 1984 in San Francisco, California, USA...
51: First Things First, 1999. Issue 51
Further reading
- Erik Spiekermann, E. M. Ginger: Stop Stealing Sheep & Find Out How Type Works, Adobe Press, 2002. ISBN 0-201-70339-4
- Erik Spiekermann: ÜberSchrift, Hermann Schmidt Mainz, 2004, ISBN 3-87439-661-4
- Erik Spiekermann, Jan Middendorp, Made with FontFont, BIS Publishers, 2006, ISBN 90-6369-129-7
- Erik Spiekermann et al., FontBook, FSI Berlin, 2006
- Fay Sweet: MetaDesign: Design from the Word Up, Thames and Hudson, 1999. ISBN 0-500-01963-0
- Erik Spiekermann, M. Klein, Y. Schwemmer-Scheddin: Type and Typographers, Phaidon Press, 1991. ISBN 1-85454-848-4
External links
- Erik Spiekermann’s blog
- EdenSpiekermann
- Biography and list of Spiekermann’s typefaces on FontFont.com
- Short autobiography/CV - PDF, written in his typeface FF MetaFF MetaFF Meta is a humanist sans-serif typeface family designed by Erik Spiekermann originally as a commission for the Deutsche Bundespost , but later released by Spiekermann himself in 1991 through his FontFont library...
Serif - Erik Spiekermann appears in the documentary http://helveticafilm.com/HelveticaHelveticaHelvetica is a widely used sans-serif typeface developed in 1957 by Swiss typeface designer Max Miedinger with Eduard Hoffmann.-Visual distinctive characteristics:Characteristics of this typeface are:lower case:square dot over the letter i....
] - Postage stamps designed by Erik Spiekermann
- Erik Spiekermann on the founding of FontShop - video interview
- Erik Spiekermann on DesignChat - video interview