“The City of a Thousand Trades” – City of Birmingham information booklet, c1935, originally uploaded by mikeyashworth. This booklet was issued by the ‘City of Birmingham Information Office’ sometime in the 30′s. “Made in Birmingham – the hub of industrial England”.
Ben has a wonderful knack of these tours, mixing history, design and a hint of psychogeography. There are a few types (sorry) of tours: "Digbeth Type Tour: Exploring use of typography and handwritten letterforms in industrial Digbeth side streets. The area's history revealed through its use of type. Baskerville's Birmingham: the history of Birmingham's most famous typographer, John Baskerville (1706 – 1775). Artifacts, locations and type specimens associated with Baskerville will be visited, around Birmingham City Centre. Blue Plaques tour: The history of Birmingham and of the Blue Plaque itself: changing and improving designs, layouts, type use &c. The tour also covers plaques other than Blue; many forms of wall mounted commemorative texts around the City Centre. City Type Tour: Birmingham history as shown through its typography. Civil, monumental and commercial use of typeforms will be explored in Birmingham City Centre."
So today I read a paper version of the Birmingham Post for the second time in a week. Last Wednesday I picked up a copy before going on a plane and it was almost impossible to read, I couldn’t fold it into a readable shape without punching the bloke next to me (it was Ryanair and there’s about an inch between your nose and the seat in front). Today saw the paper relaunch at half the size — tabloid you’d call it, but there are connotations to that word that the people behind the paper wouldn’t like. It’s a sirius paper. And it now looks like this: And it looks nice, clean and spacious despite the drop in size. I’ve not tried reading it on a plane, but I did get the other half to drive me round and around the Robin Hood Island while I sat in her corsa — seat pulled right forward — and it was easy enough. I’m not taken with the lighter blue for the masthead (than has previously been used on the website) — it works better online, but is a little dull on paper. Any darker and it might have looked like...
In 1990, several architectural designers came up with some alternative design ideas for the area over and under Spaghetti Junction. Robert Adam, the classicist English architect, came up with this Tower Bridge-esque design, but there were plans for offices on top and nightclubs underneath. More details, drawings and links on David Barrie’s blog, and a tip of the cap to D’log.
Stef, creative dynamo behind 3Form is one of the people invited to be part of ‘City Team’- which is he says “basically about twenty people who they see as being good ‘ideas people’ to come up with good thinking about how Birmingham should change, grow and improve over the coming ten to twenty years” – as part of the consultation process for the much vaunted ‘Birmingham Masterplan’. The nice thing is tho, that if you pop off and read his blog post about the whole thing, he wants to hear everybody’s thoughts – get off and comment.
As part of the Plus International Design Festival, Central Library font geek extraordinare and local history expert Ben Waddington will be running a series of design walks around the city centre focusing on different aspects of type and fontage. One is his tour of places related to John Baskerville, which I went on in March, and is fascinating for those interested in either local history or font design. Unfortunately much of Baskerville’s Brum exists only in the past, but that doesn’t stop Ben painting a vivid picture. Another is a Type Tour of Digbeth, highlighting the varied letter forms in the side streets, Birmingham’s industrial heritage and to demonstrate that a walk through the humblest back street can yield fascinating examples of type forms. The third tour is a city centre type tour and will continue to run after the festival and we’re promised Ben will use letterforms to pull out stories of the buildings and the history of Birmingham. Should be brilliant, and apparently Ben also has a tour called “The Hidden Pubs of Digbeth” so he might even take you for a pint afterwards. Dates announced: Type Tour of Digbeth – 17, 18, 19 October, 12.30 –...
