The Rise and Fall of the New Typography

The Rise and Fall of the New Typography is a book I put together that looks at the life of Jan Tschichold. A leading advocate of modern design, he wrote Die neue Typographie (The New Typography) in 1928. Aside from admiring this period of work, I was fascinated by his change of heart after being arrested during the Third Reich and subsequently fleeing to Switzerland, never to return to Germany again. This book takes content from Ruari McLean’s Jan Tschichold: a life in typography, Tschichold’s The New Typography, and Steven Heller’s Iron Fists: branding the 20th century totalitarian. Here we look at Tshichold’s views on design pre- and post- World War II, and the design and symbolism of the Third Reich. Poster images are sourced from artstor.org. Also included throughout the book is a timeline that calls out important events in Tschichold’s life and the life of the Third Reich. Part One Part One describes Jan Tschichold’s influences and what he contributed to design. It begins with him visiting Bauhaus exhibits and ends with he and his family fleeing Germany, after the Bauhaus was shut down. The body copy and images are set asymmetrically. During the course of the first section the text columns dwindle down from two wide to six thin columns per page. Gray boxes in the background also grow larger towards the end. This was designed to build anxiety as Tschichod’s arrest comes and World War II begins. Part Two As World War II begins, the whole background turns gray. The body copy is indented to mimic the swastika and express discord in the world during that time. Part Two talks about the Nazi’s use of type, originally holding to black-letter for historical reasons, then transitioning into more modern types for legibility reasons. It then goes on to describe some of the swastika’s history and the Nazi’s highjacking of it. Following that is a section on their imperial symbols, with Hitler, the swastika, and eagle. Part Two finishes with the Nazi’s use of propaganda and posters. The last spread of Part Two ends with the gray background breaking away back into the white. Part Three The book ends with a post-World War II Jan Tschichold. He fled to Switzerland where he spent most of the rest of his life, with the exception for some time in England while working with Penguin Books. Part Three describes Tschichold’s change of heart concerning design, actually opposing the modernist design he previously advocated. This part also reviews his composition rules for Penguin Books, and ends discussing his Sabon typeface. For this last part I kept a simple layout with clean text blocks to express the peace him and his family had after their ordeal in Nazi Germany.