Starting up FontShop was only the beginning of Erik Spiekermann’s ventures in digital type. Soon after the launch of the original vendor of digital type he teamed up with that other famous graphic designer, Neville Brody, and founded FontFont, which has since then become the largest independent foundry of original type designs. Not only does it produce some contemporary classics, but it also houses wildly imaginative designs, and spearheaded many innovations in digital type technology.

he idea came because we suddenly saw all this great stuff being done by young type designers, mainly in the Netherlands. Two of them, Just van Rossum and Erik van Blokland, worked with me at MetaDesign in Berlin. They had Beowolf – the first RandomFont – that took PostScript into previously uncharted territory. And then there were friends like Max Kisman and Martin Majoor. The little publication Five Dutch Type Designers showcasing the first FontFont release included some of these new typefaces from the Netherlands. Neville Brody also had some artwork lying around that could be turned into digital fonts fairly quickly, and I had that old typeface that the German Post Office (Deutsche Bundespost) did not want: PT 55, to be re-issued as FF Meta.

FONTSHOP:  http://www.fontshop.com
FONTFONT: http://www.fontfont.com/
Spiekermann blog: http://spiekermann.com/