TYPO Talks: What were some of the influences that lead you to your professional focus?

Alastair Johnston: Reading, drawing, and daydreaming. [Influential] people: Frances Butler, HN Werkman, Piet Zwart, Kurt Schwitters

TT: How have your creative interests evolved over the span of your career? Or, is there a specific discipline that has always captured your attention?

AJ: I’ve always worked with the creative possibilities of letterpress.

TT: What’s your preferred environment when it’s time to focus on a project?

AJ: My studio, though it’s hard to get out of the hammock on a sunny day.

TT: Which speakers are you most excited to see and meet at TYPO SF Focus?

AJ: Any I have not heard before.

TT: If you had to choose a favorite place in San Francisco, where would it be? If you’re new to San Francisco, what would you most like to explore?

AJ: The Wave Organ at the Yacht Club, the San Francisco Public Library rare book room, Friends of the San Francisco Public Library book sale at Fort Mason, and La Taqueria at 25th and Mission.

TT: Finally, everyone’s favorite question: what’s your favorite typeface, and why?

AJ: Bell (Monotype, though I would like to get hold of the Stephenson casting), because it’s perfect (and if anyone says Helvetica I am going to cut them).

Alastair Johnston

Typographer (Berkeley, California)

Alastair Johnston is a partner in Poltroon Press, Berkeley. He taught college level courses in typography for over 30 years. He has published scores of books and won the Award of Excellence in the AIGA Just Type Show. His published works include bibliographies and discographies, as well as Alphabets to Order: The Literature of 19th-century typefounders' specimens (The British Library, 2000), Nineteenth-century American designers & engravers of type by William E. Loy (co-editor/designer; Oak Knoll Press, 2009), Hanging Quotes (Cuneiform Press/University of Houston, Texas, 2011), Typographical Tourists: Tales of tramping printers (Poltroon Press, 2012) and Transitional Faces: The Lives and Work of Richard Austin, type-cutter, & Richard Turner Austin, wood-engraver (Poltroon Press, 2013). He has also translated and published works of Jan Tschichold and Hendrik Vervliet.

Speaker page

Register today to see Alastair Johnston at TYPO San Francisco 2015 – Focus.