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Erich Alb, born in Zürich, Switzerland, has been active in the typographic world since 1961. Alb trained as a compositor in hot metal and as a Monotype keyboard operator. He completed further advanced studies in typography at the Allgemeine Gewerbeschule Basel, followed by a typographic design career in editorial and book publishing. Alb established Syntax Press 1994 in Cham/Switzerland. With Adrian Frutiger, he formed Syndor Press GmbH in 1996 to publish books about type. After the closing of Syndor Press GmbH in 2002, Alb received a grant from the Swiss National Science Foundation for a one year research project on [20th Century] Swiss Type Designers. He continues to spend much of his time assisting Frutiger, André Gürtler, H.E. Meier, Alfred Hoffmann and other important figures in Swiss typography who are also his close friends. He is a “midwife” for many typographic projects, most recently for the “Global Type” website and the book “AF–Typefaces”. 

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L E C T U R E  | 1445h | 13.02.09 | view programme

Frutiger by Frutiger: History of a typeface

The typeface Frutiger has, after Univers, been the second great sans serif success by Adrian Frutiger, and next to his typeface OCR-B among the most important typefaces since World War II. The typeface Frutiger was accepted worldwide very quickly since the Charles de Gaulle Airport, near Paris used it as a typeface for all signage. Many other airports took advantage of this “airport typeface” as well as supermarkets, telephone books, company brands etc. Being a very readable typeface, it has been chosen for all new road signs in Switzerland since 2004. Erich Alb, Swiss typographer and close friend of Adrian Frutiger, explains the development of this typeface, from the initial trials in 1961 to 2001, when LT Frutiger Next as a successor came onto the market.

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About the images

Beautiful books published by Alb’s Syndor Press, including “Forms and Counterforms”, “Signs and Symbols”, and “Life Cycle” by Adrian Frutiger, “Irland” by René Groebli, and “The Development of Script and Type” by Hans Meier.

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