Is Your Font Conservative or Liberal?

Is that font you’re about to use conservative? Is it liberal? What does it tell others about you, your business, your political affiliation? It’s a lot to consider.

True, fonts are not conservative or liberal but people are and bring their proclivities into any dialog. People tend to associate serif fonts with conservative values and candidates. They tend to associate sans serif fonts with liberalism. Conversely, if fonts that are liked by someone who is politically conservative will be viewed as communicating more conservative values and fonts that are liked by those who are more liberal will be viewed as conveying a more liberal aesthetic. This is not an absolute rule, however. Bernie Sanders uses a bold serif font (Jubilat) in his campaign materials and, by exposure, it is now associated with being a more liberal font. The fonts that convey the most conservative aesthetic? Blackletter fonts since those were the earliest styles developed when the movable type printing press was invented (and why newspaper headlines often use that style today.)

If something as neutral as a typeface can convey a political agenda, what of other elements? Is it any wonder that male Democratic candidates wear blue ties and Republicans wear red ones? Because we have divided the country into red states and blue states, those colors have now taken on an outsize role in communicating political affiliation. But because liberal candidates will tend to stray from the typical red, white, and blue themes more than conservatives, other colors tend to be associated with democrats and particularly independents. And which blue or red is chosen also conveys a message. Bernie Sanders uses a relatively light blue which conveys a more gentle, friendly message. But a deep, dark blue would convey a more conservative message. Deep reds with hints of blue tend to read more conservative while bright warm reds tend to read more liberal.

Even shapes tend to be assigned political meaning. Stars tend to be perceived as conservative, particularly those that connect the upper left and right points with a straight line. Stars with softer angles tend to communicate a less conservative message. Flat stripes tend to read as neutral though may now be assigned more of a democratic bent by  Joe Biden’s campaign which uses them liberally. Swashes, too, are relatively neutral though they tend to be used on more democratic campaigns.

What does this all mean? If you’re a Republican candidate must you use a dark red sign with serif font and stars? If you’re a Democrat, do you use only a bright red sign with a sans serif font and swashes? No. No candidate would ever be elected solely on his or her branding. But it does allow the brand of any particular campaign to flex to fit an audience. A more liberal candidate may opt for more conservative branding in a Republican area just as a more conservative candidate may opt for less conservative branding in Democratic areas. Candidates already modify their language when speaking to different audiences, it stands to reason that their visual language should vary too.

In the end, the candidate with the message (verbal and visual) that resonates with voters will win.

Watch Out!

Studio 23 has taken a turn inward and created a set of watch faces for ourselves to test our design skills at a minimalist format. We chose the Amazfit Bip as a platform which is an inexpensive watch that allows for a fair amount of customization and has features for tracking pulse, weather, steps, mileage, and day, date, and of course, time. Working in the small space of a watch face presents many design issues. While the watch can display a lot of data, it became clear early on that as more information is displayed, it became more difficult to read. Unimportant numbers competed with more critical information and, ultimately, we found ourselves gravitating toward simpler, more visual faces. Other metrics are still available via swiping on the watch, but the primary messaging we’ve chosen to display is the time.

We also gravitated to analog faces for their intrinsic simplicity though the we are fond of the digital face with analog second hand. in the middle design. One interesting design note is that since the analog hands are virtual, in some cases we’ve reduced those to a simple marker that travels around the outside of the face rather than a true second hand. This allows us to keep the appearance of an analog watch while introducing something a bit unexpected. We’ve also included our signature orange 23 on several of the faces right where it belongs—between the 2 and the 3. Above are our favorites from the design exercise and if you’d like to download and install any of these faces on your Amazfit Bip, contact us. If you want to see more of our designs, you’ll just have to watch out.

Linking Cultures Through Visual Iconography

Visual Identity for a Cultural Institution

Connecticuti Eesti Kool, the Connecticut Estonian School, a learning institution primarily devoted to passing on Estonian cultural traditions to school-aged children throughout Connecticut, wanted to build a brand that was professional but not stuffy, traditional but playful. Though the school had been founded in 1951 several years after the second world war as a place to share and promote Estonian culture among recent emigrants and their children, there had never been a formal identity developed, no previously-conceived iconography to work with.

So, our first task was to research commonalities between Estonia and Connecticut—iconography, colors, visual forms, plants, and animals. Early on, we saw that the white oak was an important icon in Estonian culture and the state tree of Connecticut and this gave us our start. We developed a number of sketches including whole trees, acorns, and leaves and, ultimately, arrived at a solution that combined a series of leaves of various sizes to represent the growth of the students in the program. Colors were chosen to mirror the Estonian flag and a shield icon was used as a way to communicate tradition and education. A number of lockups were created that could be used in horizontal formats, vertical formats, on shirts and other promotional items, and an official seal that would be reserved for ceremonial and institutional purposes only. In addition, social media badges and email graphics were rolled out for the school to use on all of its accounts and emails.

While the school is just implementing the system now, they’ve been pleased with the reaction they’ve received from their audience. We here at Studio 23 think that’s very Kool.

Contextual Typography and the (Sorta) Fake History of Real News

The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, and Chicago Tribune, aside from being trusted news sources, share a common design element—the mastheads use a similar type style. Why?

A little typographic history

Johannes Gutenburg is credited with the creation of the movable type printing press in Europe around 1438. While wood block printing was common in the 1300s, the innovations that Gutenburg made—oil-based inks, movable and reusable type, a matrix to enable the moulding of new type blocks—allowed for the mass production of books and would lead to the proliferation and democratization of information on a scale never seen before.

His printing types were based on the handwritten texts of Western Europe and particularly of his native Germany at the time so that his books would be indistinguishable from the more labor-intensive, hand-copied manuscripts. At the time, Europe was in the middle of the Gothic architectural style with its pointed arches and flying buttress colonnades and these designs influenced the handwriting style. Text became more condensed, more stylized, and the result was Blackletter, also known as  Textura (and the reason we call written passages of words “text” today).

The earliest newspapers date to 1605 in Germany and used that same traditional texture font, though, as the printing technology spread and Gothic styles gave way to the Renaissance, other regions developed fonts that bore resemblance to their local handwriting. In Italy and France, for example, their early typefaces were based on humanistic scripts, and to our eyes, look very familiar.

But why would a German publication from 1605 affect the mastheads of today’s newspapers?

In a word—tradition. By the time the first printing presses were running in the colonies, the style of Gothic revival had spread in architecture. Initial caps in publications and manuscripts drew on that style as inspiration. The Declaration of Independence begins with Gothic-inspired calligraphy before transitioning to a humanistic script. The famous “We the People” from the constitution is also a form of Gothic-inspired calligraphy.

When modern newspapers began publication (the New York Times was first published in 1851), they adopted mastheads that conveyed a sense of historical significance, tradition, importance, and trust to their readers. Though Gothic Blackletter writing hadn’t been popular on a large scale in 300 years, they adopted the forms in their mastheads as a means of conveying these qualities. We still associate the Blackletter style with ideas of tradition, trust, and importance today and, after all, isn’t that what we want from our news sources?

One dark note to the Gothic letter forms—because of their German heritage, they were a favorite of the Nazis and, today, are often seen in neo-Nazi and white supremacist literature, symbology, and tattoos. Clearly, these Gothic forms convey a lot of meaning with regard to their historical context and, viewed through the lens of history, may signify very different things to different groups. A sense of history and tradition, yes, but who’s history and which traditions the reader will have to decide.

More Thoughts on Education

How do you promote a school? How do you attract prospects? And how do you turn prospects into applicants?

Since many educational institutions are tuition-driven, attracting prospects is typically the goal of most communication strategies. But how? And what should your message be? There are a few key attributes that every school has in varying degrees that prospects use to decide where they’d like to apply. To find out what these are, often a simple, informal focus group of incoming students can help the institution understand what attracted them, and help focus future messaging. Brand attributes that a school should review are:

  • Campus
    Is your school a sprawling parkland or part of the urban jungle? Do you have acres of open space or are you a cluster of buildings in an urban setting? Are there natural or historical features that distinguish your campus from others?
  • Alumni
    Who are your alumni? Are some well-known? Successful? Have they gone on to do interesting things? What do they earn on graduation? What rate do they graduate? And how strong and wide of a network do they form?
  • Faculty
    Who are your faculty today? In the past? Are any well-known? Are they mostly seasoned professionals that teach part-time, a course a week? Are they mostly full-time faculty committed to teaching and research?
  • Resources
    What special resources do you offer students? Are you a tech center endowed with the latest technology? Do you have athletic facilities that can train Olympic athletes? Do you have a world-class museum down the street? Do you have industry professionals working cooperatively with your programs?
  • Location
    What is unique about your location? Do you have snow-covered mountains? A sunny climate? A sandy beach? Access to cultural institutions? Are you able to attract prospects internationally or are you a regional draw because of convenience?
  • Academics
    What programs do you offer? Do you have a broad scope or an educational speciality? Is your strength in academic rigor? Vocational training? Are there programs you want to fill or grow?
  • Social
    What do you offer students socially? Do you have a well-respected football team with games every weekend? Is your school’s sports programs important to attracting students? Is the Greek system a large part of campus life? Is your campus in a rural setting where students make their own fun? Are you in an urban center where there’s a party every night? Are there special events that your school is known for?
  • Reputation/Mission
    Are you Ivy League? A local choice? Big Ten school with strong athletic programs? A party school with a laid-back attitude? A liberal arts powerhouse full of free-thinkers? A college that was historically a choice for minorities or women? Are you religiously affiliated?
  • Cost
    Are you a top-tier college worth every penny? Are you a good value for local students? Are you the best mix of tuition and income—the best value for your prospects?

Every school is evaluated by prospects based on these criteria and the criteria vary in importance by student. For some, a park-like campus of a liberal arts school in Southern California that offers a variety of interesting courses is the way to go. For others, the big city excitement of a New York school with its access to professionals in a creative field is a better choice. Or for some, a grassy campus outside of an urban center at a school that’s less expensive but well-respected fills the need. No school can be everything to every student and knowing your strengths is crucial to establishing your message. Understanding how to adapt your promotional materials for the greatest impact is what Studio 23 does best.

We create communication strategies and implement designs that attract prospects but we don’t stop there. We create designs—whether online or off—that make it easy for prospects to connect to clients. Our single-minded goal is always to focus the prospects on becoming applicants, and applicants becoming students.

A Lifetime of Education

It’s no surprise that many of our clients are schools, colleges, and educational institutions. As a former director of publications and teacher at two different schools, I’ve seen first-hand the special needs that schools have and know the challenges involved.

Schools and colleges have to address the needs of very different audiences, for example. They need to appeal to 16-year-old high school students applying to colleges, to alumni that may not have stepped foot on campus in 50 years, to professionals and businesses that may hire graduates, to potential educators and staff, and to funding sources for projects, research grants, and scholarships. Then there are the internal brand conflicts that can arise between different divisions with wildly different needs—athletics, academics, financial, to name a few. How can you address the needs of these different audiences while maintaining a consistent brand? How can you speak with a consistent voice while maintaining uniqueness within subdivisions?

Too much variation from a core brand and an institution appears disconnected, losing brand identity. Too little variation compromises the messaging for target groups. An email targeting high school students should share the core DNA with a planned giving brochure for alumni, but the two have very different parameters. Promotional material for the athletics department should share the same DNA as a brochure attracting potential graduate students, but, again, the two target very different audiences.

One of the first goals in designing for education is understanding what the core brand is and what core elements form the identity with the goal of understanding how these elements can be used, manipulated, flexed, so that the resulting designs can be instantly recognizable as connected to the school, but remain fresh and appropriate for the target audience.

Design is a Melody, The Brand is the Symphony

An analogy to this approach can be found is music. Listen to the score of a symphony or even a movie soundtrack. Within this, you’ll often hear a core melody which changes, becomes clearer, more obscured, which is passed between instruments, changed again, returning to its original form over and over. This playfulness is key to keeping the listener entertained and engaged. Periodically, the composer will introduce unexpected elements, quiet passages, loud crashes, syncopated rhythms, minor keys, while keeping within an overall melodic structure. In the end, the work tells a story, completes a picture. In much the same way, designing for an educational institution is like writing that symphony. Individual elements are created that address specific communication needs within an overall structure that is the brand.

Knowing how flexible or how inflexible to be is our expertise. The look and language of a Shapchat filter that targets high school students is different than a dinner invitation that targets your board of trustees. But whether that’s a 1080-by-1920 pixel .PNG file uploaded to a remote server or a 130# uncoated vellum, ivory white, 100% cotton sheet that’s been letterpressed using soy inks, we’ve done it all. We look forward to working with our education clients in the future. As they grow, so will we.

What’s in a Name?

The Wikipedia entry says it right there: John Jay High School is a public high school located in Cross River, New York. It is the only high school in the Katonah-Lewisboro School District. The school, which opened in 1956, is named after John Jay, a Founding father of the United States, and first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, who lived nearby. Over the years, the school has been heavily criticized for its mascot, the Indians.

At several times over the past 30 years, the question has been raised whether the school should change its mascot yet, although a 1989 vote by student congress revealed it should, nothing has changed. A recent poll of students revealed a majority of students voting were reluctant to abandon the Indian although there was considerable discussion at the school about the issue. As members of the community, we at Studio 23 had some thoughts.

At the time of the school’s founding, there was much less cultural sensitivity. The “Indian” was chosen, no doubt, as a symbol because it was white affluent society’s interpretation of a kind of fierceness. But recently, the student congress reached out to a native American cultural organization which pointed out that the term “indian” is a racial construct, and is offensive to many in their culture. Clearly, the mascot needs to go.

John Jay Indian Logos
Current John Jay High School iconography.

There are many reasons people are uncomfortable with change, particularly for symbols which hold special meaning to them. Tribal loyalties are questioned, emotions get stirred. But sometimes the issue can be as simple as not being able to see the possibilities beyond what they currently have. To that end, Studio 23 created a series of alternate identities as talking points, not as finished designs. For inspiration we looked at meaningful fauna that were native to the area in the time of John Jay—ravens, wolves, wildcats, hawks—as well as more intangible concepts such as patriot, pioneer, and American.

Below is a result of one of those explorations—the John Jay Revolution, inspired by the fact that John Jay was a prominent figure during the American revolution. The concept uses a tattered “revolutionary flag” as a core part of the identity. The new name implies rebellion and uprising but also implies a sense of speed and motion. The primary typeface used is Franklin Gothic (which would have made Ben Franklin proud) and the color is retained from the existing identity. The modular identity, shown in various possible configurations, includes the name, flag, stylized “JJ”, and is flexible enough to accommodate not only sports teams but clubs and organizations affiliated with the school.

While this is only a concept intended to spark a discussion, we urge the folks at John Jay to move the project forward and hope that our efforts can help in some small way to make that happen. We’d love to come to a game and see the crowd proudly waving their flags. That would be, ahem, revolutionary.

John Jay Indian Alternatives