Crimes Against Typography

“Bad Typography is Everywhere, Good Typography is invisible.” —Craig Ward

As designers, we live this quote daily. Whether it’s a horribly kerned sign on the train, or a flyer in the local paper completely set in Impact. It makes us cringe, wince, and gasp. All of us “type snobs” have been there:

“Why on earth would you think typesetting your resumé in Brush Script would make it seem more personal?”

“Really, real estate agent? You thought Chalkboard would make your boring paperwork more fun for me to read?!”

We all have our own personal tragedies, but sometimes there comes one so horrible that the masses turn their heads. It’s not that these typefaces are terrible; it’s more that their applications were so out of place that it made us take notice. So take a walk down memory lane with us and read about our favorite typographic controversies of the last few years after the jump.

#5 – Apple forces iPhone owners to write with digital Sharpies, a la Marker Felt.

When I got my iPhone back in late 2008 I couldn’t have been more excited. Apple is the epitome of sleek, sophisticated technology and design, but as I soon learned, even the masters make mistakes. I went to type a grocery list and opened up the Notes app. Yes, it looked like a classic ledger (cute). Then I began typing and saw that Marker Felt was taking over the screen. Not only are the font proportions incredibly tall, its characters’ odd shapes make it difficult to read. Users complained so much that people eventually hacked the program to utilize Helvetica… we don’t necessarily condone it, but sometimes desperate times call for crafty measures.

#4 – The New York Times cuts back on diversity.

In the early 2000’s one of the world’s most notable newspapers cut back its typographic palette and switched over to Cheltenham. The change was made to enhance overall legibility and create a greater sense of hierarchy, but readers complained about the cut back. One letter to the editor was published days later claiming the change was “the typeface equivalent to New Coke.” Harsh? Yeah, probably a little — we’re guessing the author was a Bookman fan — but it just proves how even the slightest modification can cause an uproar. In hindsight, the decision to cut back from six headline fonts to one was probably best. After all, using more than three typefaces in a single piece is usually a design faux-paus.

#3 – Dan Gilbert’s “comical” letter to Cleveland Cavaliers fans.

More shocking than LeBron’s move to Miami was this laughable address to the people of Cleveland using Comic Sans (pun could not have been more intended). It’s unknown why in early July 2010 the saddened, and noticeably bitter, Gilbert made this particular typographic decision — maybe he was trying to have a sense of humor about the situation? Alas, as the manager of a professional basketball team Gilbert is far from a designer, but that didn’t stop us from criticizing his choice to use one of, if not the most publicly hated font in history.

#2 – IKEA ditches Futura for Verdana (aka Verdanagate).

This modern and affordable Swedish furniture giant has been targeted for years — most often put down for its DIY approach to assembly — but more recently (June 2009) for taking a common Internet typeface and putting it on EVERYTHING.

Verdana, designed for Microsoft by Matthew Carter, was created originally to be have a high onscreen legibility. In order to maximize their brand consistency, IKEA decided to replace their Futura-based typeface, IKEA Sans, for the web font. Usually, unification across a single brand is crucial, but not to this extreme. Across the globe people were outraged that the beautiful Futura characters were replaced with generic ones in signage, advertising, and the always anticipated and cherished catalogs. For a company that is so design-focused, this decision caused a massive uproar in the creative community.

#1 – Papyrus causes a subtitle uproar.

The designer who tried to find cultural similarities between giant blue creatures and the Ancient Egyptians could potentially be blamed for Avatar’s Best Picture loss. Just kidding, but despite its lack of cultural ties, the fact that Papyrus has legibility issues makes it a horrible choice for subtitles. I actually know people that have refused to see this movie based on this design choice, so to say this was a typographic controversy seems more than appropriate. It’s also quite impressive that a font was almost able to overshadow an entire technological feat of a film (no comment on story, here — that’s another blog post).

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We only included five, but there are countless other typographical blunders throughout history. What typeface crime gives you bad dreams at night, or makes you so angry that you had to remove the font from your library? Share in the comments.