Out of the Back Window

Frank and Caravan at xmas

TOP CHRISTMAS PICKS

Heartfelt thanks to Emily of Caravan who took us (and the Caravan girls, Anna and Violeta) out for a wintery rooftop treat at Boundary last night. Among the lovely festive fodder on offer was spiced cider, stinky cheese fondue, mince pies, port, and satsumas! We were also each given a set of these cool guitar picks by David Shrigley. Thanks Emily!

Stimulating typographical debate

After a jolly festive lunch with some of our friends and neighbours last week, the hard core retired to The Water Poet for the now-traditional pool tournament. Whilst there, we also got to try out my splendid xmas present from Mr Webb, a set of Type Trumps. As a Top Trumps fan in my youth, they proved a most welcome diversion. The categories included obvious things like number of weights / legibility etc, but it was the 'special power' section which proved the most controversial. According to the rules, when a player calls on his card's special power, a debate should ensue until a winner is agreed upon. So somewhat bizarrely, we found ourselves arguing over some unlikely pairings... the Nazi Regime vs The Face (Fette Fraktur vs Brody)... the BBC vs Glaser's I "heart" NY (Gill Sans vs American Typewriter)... Trajan's Column vs London Underground (Trajan vs Johnston)... I'm sure you fellow type nerds out there get the idea!