Teaching Type Design: The More I Learn, the Less I Know

I teach typeface design at an undergraduate level at the University of Washington in Seattle, USA. Most of our students become visual (graphic) designers rather than typeface designers. That is, they will be responsible for selecting and commissioning typefaces—and they may design logotypes and typographic illustrations—but they will probably not be involved in producing digital fonts for professional foundries. Over the past two decades, I have experimented with a number of approaches that vary in the amount of time required and the level of students enrolled. In this presentation, I would like to share both successes and failures, and reflect upon what, how and why students learned (or did not learn). I hope that discussing these projects will be helpful to other teachers of type, and that this talk will encourage other design faculty to share how they teach type design at their institutions.