New Ornamental Type: Decorative Lettering in the Digital Age

by Steven Heller, Gail Anderson

Words becoming a rich typographical resource of images and inspiration for designers. Expressive lettering and illustrated here is a kaleidoscope of highly animated text and type from a broad spectrum of styles and effects. Psychedelia, Hip-Hop, Gothic, flowers, smoke, hair, electricity, and monuments are just a few of the creative allusions for the dramatic and intricate examples inspired by nature, history, and just about anything that is visually provocative.

Beginning with an historical overview of ornamental type and how it has evolved through the major creative periods from the beginning of the twentieth century to the present, the book includes hundreds of contemporary examples from around the world, organized into three History Lesson, Au Naturel, and Eclectic. Each includes a brief essay introducing the background, influences, and outstanding aspects of the graphic work so beautifully displayed.

New Ornamental Type is an essential reference for practitioners and students, and for anyone who appreciates the sheer delight of type as illustration. 272 color and 88 black-and-white illustrations

Genres: Design, Nonfiction, Art

192 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 2010

About the author

Steven Heller writes a monthly column on graphic design books for The New York Times Book Review and is co-chair of MFA Design at the School of Visual Arts. He has written more than 100 books on graphic design, illustration and political art, including Paul Rand, Merz to Emigre and Beyond: Avant Garde Magazine Design of the Twentieth Century, Design Literacy: Understanding Graphic Design Second Edition, Handwritten: Expressive Lettering in the Digital Age, Graphic Design History, Citizen Designer, Seymour Chwast: The Left Handed Designer, The Push Pin Graphic: Twenty Five Years of Design and Illustration, Stylepedia: A Guide to Graphic Design Mannerisms, Quirks, and Conceits, The Anatomy of Design: Uncovering the Influences and Inspirations in Modern Graphic Design. He edits VOICE: The AIGA Online Journal of Graphic Design, and writes for Baseline, Design Observer, Eye, Grafik, I.D., Metropolis, Print, and Step. Steven is the recipient of the Art Directors Club Special Educators Award, the AIGA Medal for Lifetime Achievement, and the School of Visual Arts' Masters Series Award.

Reviews

[Reed · Rating 4 out of 5]

File within the “Inspiration” bookshelf. Great resource for artists, designers, & creatives of any type. Enjoyable for others as a visually pleasing coffee table book

[Cassidy · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting visual resource for strange and innovative typography.

[Ben · Rating 3 out of 5]

A nice overview of current lettering styles. I read it for the pictures and they were swell.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

The text was pretty pretentious and off-putting, not my kind of analysis. But the illustrations of type, themselves, were fantastically interesting.

[Elizabeth Gilliam · Rating 5 out of 5]

A nice overview of decorative lettering styles. I really liked the styles and found a lot of inspiration from reading this book.