A Typographic Quest, Number Two, ‘Display Types' – Westvaco, Carl Dair, 1965

For the cover of A Typographic Quest No. 2 on display types, Dair uses a photograph of a portion of the Roman lettering from the base of the Trajan column, AD 113, paired with a contemporary condensed sans serif. Together they represent almost 2000 years of display lettering. Then, Dair treats the title as if it were the text, setting it in Univers 65, all lowercase.

Ornate initials, on the left, were originally used to indicate where a new paragraph began. They also provided a bit of visual relief in the solid mass of Blackletter text. However, by the 19th century those few initial display letters had almost become the text itself – with each line apparently expected to fight for attention.

One of the more interesting aspects of display typography is the creation of typographic images. Dair suggests that these ‘type images’ work best when the image is not forced. The result should appear natural, as if formed out of the type itself.