Ships and boats really get me going. Long and elegant from one angle, squat and robust from another; they represent a nostalgic way to travel where instead of being cosseted away one’s senses are assaulted by the journey. The travel is about taking time away from everything and seeing the world at a remove. These mechanical Jonah’s whales battle their way though the seas to deliver those in their bellies.

Mid twentieth century ships particularly excite me with their proud bows vertically rising from the point where they obtusely cleave the water apart. They make no concession to ergonomic theory or streamlining. Everything is upright and proper.

Since then I have been irked by this piece. It is only legible when used as a titling face and is strictly incoherent and unreadable in any form even nearly approaching body copy. I began to wonder could a font be created that is entirely logical in its construction? It would need to be usable in all sizes and in any situation. FF DIN is about as close to this idea as I could find. Yet it still has its “illogical” idiosyncracies that help it retain some humanity.

I now want to design a font that reflects our concerns as a race going into the future – it needs to be entirely logical, can appear in print from small print to poster headlines, on the side of children’s bicycles to the side of a space fleet that travels the galaxy. Most importantly it needs to be economically minded in its use of resources, which is to say it must have as few lines as possible so as to use as little ink as possible. Where to start? Well, by trying to figure out what the essence of our alphabet is. How much and what bits can a letter afford to lose?

The drawings are, at least to me, interesting when I work on logos as they are almost binary in their on/off approach. They are quite different from my drawings for the sake of drawing.

Here is Lionel Ritchie & Tony Blair. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you… Lionel Blair!