Background Layer #2
This is Background Layer Issue #2, keeping to our every two weeks or so schedule. As always, if you have feedback, hit reply.
This issue was written by Ben.
In progress
Thursday was the press check for the Polymode specimen at Advertisers Printing here in Saint Louis. It wasn’t a complex job, but it was good to go and bump a couple of spots where the metallic copper (Pantone 871) wasn’t holding the 10% tint on the 70# Lynx paper as well as we thought it would. Folding for this one will be the most challenging part of the job, so I’m going back for that check, too.
In between working on a large project (it started last fall and goes to the end of this year) that we can’t yet talk about, Zrinka has been working to see what adding Cyrillic to some of the retail library will look like. Above is the start of Escalator Cyrillic. More to come on that front.
Recommendations
I have been in full-on marketing mode for the past couple of weeks, which has colored these recommendations. First is Yes Plz coffee (used to be Tonx). Their beans (very good, strong recommend) show up twice a month at our house, and with each shipment is a little folded letter sheet (Riso printed!) with some playlists and thoughts from Tony about their wins and struggles running a small business. I’ve enjoyed the honesty of their discomfort but acceptance of social media as a marketing platform —something that resonates with me; I hate it, but then I must remind myself that nowhere else do we have access to an audience of scale for free.
Next is the Cortex podcast. I think I started listening to it when we launched XYZ and have been ever since. It’s been helpful for picking up bits of thinking on how to work, how to set goals (by not setting a goal but a theme for a year/quarter/month), and how also to navigate being a small business in the sea of the internet. Thank goodness we are not a business of physical goods, though!
Last is another podcast that is now dormant. I Only Listen to the Mountain Goats is a fantastic meditation on creative practice. I’ve started to re-listen as I find myself in a creative slump due to increasing meeting and coordination demands on my time. I’ve not read it, but in a similar vein, Erik van Blokland has recommended Jeff Tweedy’s How to Write One Song. I guess Rick Rubin’s book is also in this vein, but I feel ambivalent about it. Has anyone read it that can give a thumbs up/down?
Admired type releases
Friend and reader Eve Wallack suggested putting in our typefaces or typefaces from other folks we like, so here are two of the latter:
Robin Meintjes just wrote two case studies for us (HashiCorp, Brand New), but her real skill is drawing type. Her Tiny Grotesk launched this week and is worth checking out.
Also, Agyei Archer released Jaro, a really lovely display variable font with optical sizes that has Pan-African Latin support. More here by Agyei on the project and a good Instagram follow.
Love to see
Mathieu Christe’s Footnotes is about to send out issue E. If you’re into type history, this little ‘zine is something you want to nab and support, as it is always well done.
Summer fun
I am a terrible bike racer, but my summer release valve is kitting up and racing every Thursday evening at the Penrose Park Velodrome here in Saint Louis. If you are in town, join the fun by either racing or spectating. The scene is nice and mellow, and the racing is spicy.
On repeat
Love this bit from the late Steve Albini. At some point, someone will write about the connection between punk ethos and independent type foundries in the ‘90s.
Don't forget the discount code from the first issue, good until the end of July: THATWASALOTTOREAD