Designed by the Foundry Sorts in partnership with Studio Sutherl&, the London Fireplace Brigade’s new typeface seems to be again to the service’s prolonged historical past for inspiration, drawing on structure, signage, fireplace engines, and the lettering seen on Victorian water pumps.
The London Fireplace Brigade wanted a typeface for sure touchpoints like its new store and signage round its buildings, and had initially deliberate to make use of its present typeface, Foundry Sans. Nonetheless, it grew to become obvious that Foundry Sans wouldn’t shine in these contexts, so Foundry Sorts and Studio Sutherl& set about creating a brand new design, culminating within the typeface Fireplace Brigade Sans, in a course of that took round 18 months.
“The design has a flavour of twentieth century geometric grotesque fonts, actually. The model could be very outdated,” says Foundry Sorts director and designer Stuart De Rozario. “They need to get away from the robust macho picture – you recognize, ‘males preventing fireplace’ – as a result of they do a number of group work and charity work, so they need that caring facet. We tried to include that by having a daring, robust typeface, however having a softer facet to it, and that’s evident within the curves of the kind. It’s in your face, however there’s a gentle facet to it.”
“To get that drop shadow and the common fonts to work, to match up, was fairly a technical factor,” explains De Rozario. Merely layering the 2 fonts meant that “the excessive level on the cap top was very, very up and down. It was like a heartbeat,” he says, notably on letters with robust curves, however the staff remedied this by “taking the curve of the shadow larger”.
The design might be used throughout Shoreditch Fireplace Station – count on to see it “everywhere in the wall and on the ground”, in line with De Rozario – which is enjoying host to an exhibition referred to as The Working In the direction of as a part of London Design Pageant. A part of the exhibition brings collectively posters that includes the brand new typeface, which have been designed by an array of studios – amongst them the Foundry Sorts, plus different companies together with Pentagram, Superunion and DNCO, together with stunning illustrations from a variety of artists.
The Working In the direction of is on show at Shoreditch Fireplace Station, London till September 24; londondesignfestival.com
