Field Notes "Two Rivers" Edition

“It's a hand-used book so it should be a hand-made product. That's kind of ideal.”
—Jim Moran (Director, Hamilton Wood Type and Printing Museum)

The Spring 2015 Field Notes Colors edition is finally here, and it's called "Two Rivers". My wallet and mind are ready.

This edition celebrates the history, Americana, and old-fashioned style of wood-type printing — particularly, the kind found on display at the Hamilton Wood Type and Printing Museum in Two Rivers, Wisconsin. Watch the trailer:

Using the museum's collection of vintage type and ornaments, the Field Notes crew hand-set several of their own designs, which were then printed in two random colors on one of four cover stocks over the course of eight months. Further variations were introduced thanks to the vagaries of wood type and letterpress printing.

All of this work added up to thousands of variations, meaning no two books are exactly the same. a small sampling of the variations can be seen in photos at the bottom of the store page. (My heart goes out to the Field Notes completionists out there.)

What's more, two bucks from the sale of every 3-pack goes directly to support the museum. If the edition sells out, that means a minimum donation of $50,000. But even more can be donated, if buyers choose to add an extra amount to their order. I hope you'll consider it.

Get a "Two Rivers" 3-pack for $10 at Field Notes.

Typography in Ten Minutes

Matthew Butterick, in his online book Butterick's Practical Typography:

This is a bold claim, but I stand behind it: If you learn and fol­low these five ty­pog­ra­phy rules, you will be a bet­ter ty­pog­ra­pher than 95% of pro­fes­sional writ­ers and 70% of pro­fes­sional de­sign­ers. (The rest of this book will raise you to the 99th per­centile in both categories.)

All it takes is ten min­utes—five min­utes to read these rules once, then five min­utes to read them again.

A short, concise ruleset that can make any website look more professional. So often I come across blogs that would be 10x more readable if they accounted for rules #3 and #4 alone.

If you end up reading through Mr. Butterick's typography guide in its entirety, consider paying him a few bucks (or more) in thanks. He did a wonderful job with it. (Tip: hyperlinks throughout the guide are indicated by prepended diamond symbols.)

Words Are More Important Than Design

Frank Chimero:

“A young designer is beaten over the head with typefaces, grids, and rules—and rightfully so—but typography can act as a smoke-screen. There is so much to learn about the letters that it’s easy to forget about the words. Once a designer has the typographic skills in their pocket, anyone with their head on straight realizes ugly words in beautiful typefaces are still pretty dumb.”

This is just as useful a lesson for us writers as it is for designers. You're better off getting the words right than fiddling with the blog design—believe me, I know.

* * *

You want to know which site consistently delights me, one that I go back and read time and time again despite its ancient design? Maciej Cegłowski's blog, Idle Words. You know, the guy behind Pinboard. The man is such a fantastic storyteller that I'm always, always helplessly drawn in by his words. It doesn't matter that the site is ugly as sin.

Start with his Argentina on Two Steaks a Day piece and you'll see what I mean.