Twilight on a vast inland sea and a flock of rising cranes silhouetted against the moon... The artist stands on the shore with her collar up against the wind, hands tucked in her pockets and a camera around her neck - she is watching with passionate intensity as light, wind and water weave a wild and elemental tapestry at the close of this summer day. Perhaps the great birds above her head are "whoopers" - the Whooping Crane (Grus americana), is one of the world's rarest and most endangered creatures. It is also one of the most beautiful.
For the ancients, the dance of the tsuru or crane was a celebration of life. In Japan, the crane is a national treasure, and it makes frequent appearances in the culture's art, literature, mythology and folklore. The Japanese crane is the second rarest crane in the world (after the Whooper). A symbol of good fortune and longevity because of its fabled life span of a thousand years, the crane also represents honor and fidelity, for Japanese cranes mate for life. In China, the crane represents nobility and immortality, and it is a prominent motif in Taoist wisdom tales. Images of cranes appear in ancient Chinese works of art and have been found as far back as Shang Dynasty tombs and Zhou Dynasty ceremonial bronzes. A common theme in later Chinese art and literature is that of the reclusive scholar who withdraws from the world to a remote hermitage, there to meditate, write poetry, cultivate bamboo forests and tend flocks of cranes.
Banner text for this place is set in Feathergraphy (Less Decorated) by Swedish graphic designer and typographer Måns Grebäck. I have a large font collection and seldom need to purchase them these days, but Grebäck's creation is a spirited blend of brushy calligraphy, grunge and Asian influences, and when I saw the font for the first time, I just had to have it. Body text is, for the most part, Gill Sans, just because I like it. Created by the legendary Eric Gill for Eric Cleverdon's Bristol bookshop in 1926, Gill Sans remains (to my mind anyway) the most elegant of all sans serif typefaces and the easiest on the eye.
For the lover of typefaces and lettering, the world is full of wonders, and every scrap of print is an adventure in the offing. It helps to have a good guidebook along as one traverses the soaring peaks and pastoral valleys of the typographical landscape, and I recommend one book alone—book designer, typographer, poet and mythic historian Robert Bringhurst’s magnificent The Elements of Typographic Style.
