An interview by email; December 2003.
A remark about the form of this entry (and many others):
Most of them have simply copied out of emails. That results in lower case writing (mostly and not very consistently), wrong apostrophes, wrong hyphens and wrong quote marks. Too bad, but inevitable in international correspondence. Pragmatic, not righteous.
‘ ≠ ’ | – ≠ – | — ≈ – | ” ≠ „ | ” ≠ ”
1. What is your profession?
type and typographic designer
2.What College did you attend (if any)?
Freie Universität Berlin
3. Do you feel that your schooling played a big part in your decision to become a designer?
nope (is that better than a plain no?)
4. What is your favorite car, and why?
my NSU Ro80; i’ve had it for 1985 (it’s a 1977 model); it was the first sedan with a Wankel (ie rotary) engine and the first car to be designed to a wedge shape (see photo).
5. In a short paragraph, describe how you became interested in design.
i was a printer and typesetter, but my shop burned down in 1977. So i ended up making sketches (which i had also been doing as a typesetter) and giving them to a photosetter instead.
6. Do you feel that design is art? Why or why not
of course it isn’t. A designer visualizes a client’s issues, problems, brief. An artist his own. Designers and artists use artistic means to show their concepts and designers also use intuition. Thus the confusion. But if i wanted to work like an artist, i would have become an artist and not a designer. I also use science more than an artist would.
7. Where do you see design in the next five years?
questions like this are silly because even if i had any idea, i wouldn’t be stupid enough to predict the future. Anything can happen.
8. Serif or sans serif? (and why)
Both, whatever fits the purpose. If i designed more books or newspapers, i’d use more serifs. As i design a lot of information systems, i use more sans — less noise (and i haven’t designed a real serif face yet)
9. Are there any designers that you look to for inspiration on your own work?
my colleagues in the office and wherever i meet them
10. If tomorrow your life depended on the loss of either your eyes or you arms, which would you prefer to give up?
my arms. I could always use someone else’s, but not without my eyes.
Bonus Question.
Were you really told to “stop stealing sheep,” or is that a watered down version of what was said for letter-spacing all caps?
frederick goudy said that “men who would letterspace lower case would shag sheep’, as that was (and is) considered a cardinal sin by typographers. Letterspacing caps, however, is done and should be done generously.