Stephen Coles (Letterform Archive), Warmth & Snap: What New Type Owes W.A. Dwiggins (The Society of Printers' 50th Annual Dwiggins Lecture)

Nearly a century ago, as W. A. Dwiggins was nearing 50 years of age, he partnered with the Mergenthaler Linotype company to do something he’d never done in his long career: create new typefaces. The resulting designs—such as Metro, Electra, and Caledonia—were instant hits and are still in use today. They have generated revivals, reinterpretations, and reprises. And the principles of humanism and liveliness that compelled Dwiggins to alter the course of his career continue to guide new type designers. We’ll look at fresh faces steeped in Dwiggins’s legacy (intentional or not) and consider recent trends in a newly burgeoning craft.

Stephen Coles is Editorial Director & Associate Curator at Letterform Archive, a nonprofit library and educational center in San Francisco, where he co-curated the exhibition Strikethrough: Typographic Messages of Protest. As an editor and community builder who seeks to connect font makers with font users, Stephen co-founded the websites Fonts In Use and Typographica, and wrote the book The Anatomy of Type. Previously, he was a creative director at FontShop, and a member of the FontFont TypeBoard. 

The lecture begins at 6:00 p.m. on Tuesday, April 1, 2025 at the Rabb Lecture Hall, Boston Public Library. Registration is appreciated, but not required. The link to the Library’s events page is: https://bpl.bibliocommons.com/events/65f27b0802859793719c6ae1

A companion event in honor of the 50th anniversary of the Dwiggins Lecture
Please join Special Collections at the Boston Public Library for a special open house on April 1 from 3:30-5:30 p.m. in the Commonwealth Salon, where items from Special Collections will be featured that provide an overview of the life and work of W. A. Dwiggins. This open house will be curated by Bruce Kennett, author of W. A. Dwiggins: A Life in Design. Registration is not required for the open house.