Review: Monotype’s The Recorder
Monotype's magazine The Recorder has been relaunched with a completely new look, and a new focus: the wider role that typography and type design play in contemporary visual culture.
100+ pages on typography and graphic design, exploring type’s role in a wider cultural context and printed by Leycol in London onto some of the best paper around.
The Recorder features a range of bold typographic layouts and illustrations and showcases a variety of Monotype fonts whilst remaining respectful of the magazine’s illustrious 112 year history.
Created by a team of two working out of hours and having just won 1st place in the 8th Annual International Design Awards in Professional Print, The Recorder is testament to the power of the passion project.
Senior Designer at Life Agency and upcoming Glug Brum speaker Luke Tonge was awarded Gold for his role in bringing the publication to life. He shared his thoughts on the Design Award Winners site:
To be entrusted with such a big profile redesign was a rare opportunity and a passion project I just couldn’t pass up.
A huge gold foil masthead wraps around front to back cover, and the sewn-bound gives it a lovely tactile feel and reading experience. This first new issue adopts a new approach, exploring type from a more cultural standpoint, and showing how its influence has played a role in our lives over the years, in everything from street signs to sci-fi. The issue explores traditional forms of working, as well as the way a new generation of designers are interpreting type’s role, and the way people respond to it:
We’ve considered how letterforms have been used to portray our hopes and fears for the future, both in the design industry and in pop culture, and we’ve looked at how history and culture have contributed to the development and popularity of particular styles of handwriting and typefaces.
The first issue also features a photo story that goes behind the working process of one of the most well-respected British printers and typographers – the artist Alan Kitching.
Luke Tonge is one of five speakers taking the stage at our upcoming creative talk event Glug Brum on Thursday 4th June at Spotlight & Next Door in Birmingham. Join our Facebook event for more details. Tickets for Glug Brum are now on sale, priced at £7.50 (early bird).