GDIF: The Right ___ for the Job

In class the other day, we were talking about typefaces and their use... which lead me to a story — the later should be no surprise.

When my wife and I lived in Oakland, we owned a small two-seater car. For a lot of things, it was perfect — we were able to commute across the bridge in the car-pool lanes, parking was easy, and it was fun to drive. However, I have a picture somewhere of me trying to haul three 10-foot rolls of carpet in it. It was not a pretty sight.

Typefaces are like that: what might be fun for a short drive might not be good for a shopping trip to Costco and IKEA. Granted, some typefaces are the Honda Element of faces — multipurpose and useful for a lot of different things — but, most are more single-purpose like a pick-up truck or a sports car.

From a typeface POV, are you using your Nissan Versa to try to haul plywood? Are you planning a road-trip in a pick-up truck?

Generally typefaces that are good for body copy are not good for display... and faces that are good for display are not good for body copy. Body faces are optimized for reading at small sizes and when scaled up either look a bit goofy or lack the visual weight to really capture attention. Conversely, faces designed to capture attention are too bold or characteristic to be used small and over many pages. For instance, could you imagine reading pages and pages of type set in Rosewood?

If you need to haul a mattress, find a friend with a pick-up truck — don't try to strap it to a hatchback... and if you need a typeface for a headline, look to one designed for the job.