Kolz Blog

You can’t design without type. However, yon can use only type (or mostly only type) to create breath-taking designs. In fact, many graphic designers and artists take exactly this route to communicate their ideas through their works. The results are sometimes crazy, sometimes artsy, sometimes beautiful, but often just different from things we’re used to. Thus designers explore new horizons and we explore new viewing perspectives which is what inspiration is all about. You can’t design without type: this is an argument for it. This post showcases over 50 breathtaking typographic posters designed by artists across the globe. We feature Oriental, Iranian, Hebrew, Japanese, Chinese and Russian typographic posters as well as a number of further references. This isn’t a “best of”, there is no ranking and the collection isn’t supposed to be complete; it’s rather subjective and quite random. All screenshots are clickable; however, links not always lead directly to the corresponding image (e.g. it’s impossible in Flash-based sites) — sometimes you’ll need to search for it. You may also want to take a look at the article Typography In Motion we’ve published few months ago. So what can be achieved out of simple letters and symbols? Please be patient, some screenshots are huge.

Breathtaking Typographic Posters

Christina Koehn / University of Washington, USA Alex Banks / United Kingdom Emiliano Lionel Suárez / Argentina Juanma Teixidó / Asunción, Paraguay Emil Kozak / Spain Pablo Alfieri / Buenos Aires, Argentina HeyHo / France Vincent Bousserez / Paris, France Drew Kora / Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA in the lab Aron Jancso / Budapest, Hungary Andre Bergamin / Brazil Oh Ishi / Siam, Thailand Alejandro Paul / Buenos Aires, Argentina mrgraphicsguy / Germany lee25 / United Kingdom Shaun Morrison / Brighton, England 25ah / Stockholm, Sweden Andy Cambiaso / Argentina Puerto Baires / Buenos Aires, Argentina Todd Roeth / USA Piotr Fedorczyk / Florence, Italy Noel Tanner / Minneapolis, USA Kate Andrews / London, United Kingdom Experimental Jetset / Amsterdam, The Netherlands Lennart Wolfert / Netherlands Farhad Fozuni / Iran Yaronimus Maximus / Israel Bunch / USA Playful applications for the 55DSL 2007 Christmas instore incentive. Tape and posters were designed and sent to each store where the staff were then encouraged to get creative with what they taped up to win 555 GBP worth of prizes. Alex Trochut / Spain Arjo Wiggins Poster Pixelgarten / Germany Apirat Infahsaeng / New York Poster announcing Brian Collins’ lecture Design Changes Everything. MAISON DE LA PHOTOGRAPHIE Création de la nouvelle identité visuelle. Projet non retenu. Purple Haze / Germany Rote Sonne Club (2007). Poster design for a clubnight. Think Experimental / France Aaron Pou / USA Maxime Delporte / France Job Wouters / Netherlands In collaboration with Roel Wouters. Printed by Knust. Folded A3 flyers for Jungstar (formaly known as Zeitgeist) a bimonthly party held at the sugarfactory organised by the MRKMLN-group. Zak Group There’s always work in progress / you’re always a work in progress. Sterk Water / Belgium Poster made for a expo of a local art school promoting the free grahics and the sculpturing department. C100 / Germany A Club Poster from Berlin Mark Andrew Webber / Falmouth, England Hanna Czapka / Germany

Bonus

Job Woulters 80 of 500 handdrawn typographic posters by Job Wouters are shown in a 3 minute filmclip by Roel Wouters. The posters promote the students final works at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam. The handwriting is… beautiful.

References and Resources

• Oriental Typography Posters By Malik Anas.
• Iranian Typography Now
• Chinese Typography Pool
• DailyType.ru A creative project run by several russian type designers. Day by day, they create original typefaces and post their results along with routine.
• Hebrew Typography Oded Ezer.
• Hebrew Type Flickr Pool The showcase of Hebrew Typography.
• Japanese Typography Flickr Pool
• Pingmag Typography section
• Best 100 Posters from 2006
• The Pleasures Of The Text Flickr Pool
• We Love Typography Behance Circle
• What is graphic design? Poster Competition: Winners of the competition
• Typotecture: Typography as Architectural Imagery
• In Love With Typography Deviant Reports Regularly collected by Stefano Picco.
• Helvetica Now Poster Contest
• 100 Best Posters
• hands on the poster - a photoset on Flickr