Stylogeny combining De Stijl × Wendingen

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Style combination · Contrasts

De Stijl × Wendingen

Same country, same years and the same rules and bars: De Stijl set them asymmetrically in primaries as pure abstraction, Wendingen piled them symmetrically into monumental, decorative frames; set one against the other to choose between open balance and a formal facade.

From the research on Wendingen & Amsterdam School Typography

Mix them and make something De Stijl Wendingen

DAWNDe Stijl × Wendingen1917 · 1918
A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from De Stijl, their arrangement from De Stijl, the finish from Wendingen. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

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What each style brings

Each part of the design comes from the style with the stronger say in it, and each style gives at least two.

De Stijl Wendingen & Amsterdam School Typography

Type from Wendingen
Colour from De Stijl
Form from De Stijl
Composition from De Stijl

Wendingen avoids dynamic asymmetry: this is where the two pull against each other, which is the point of the contrast.

Surface from Wendingen

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The type

Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.

Display · Wendingen

Dawn

Rubik Mono One; Wendingen used H. Th. Wijdeveld's capitals and meanders assembled from compositors' brass rules and type-case pieces and Architectuur NF (Nick Curtis, Nick's Fonts, 2006), a digital revival of the rule-built letters of Wijdeveld's 1925 Frank Lloyd Wright issue, with his meander ornaments

Text · De Stijl

A Dutch movement formed around Theo van Doesburg's journal De Stijl and Piet Mondrian's Neoplasticism, which sought universal harmony through the most elementary means: horizontal and vertical lines, rectangles, the three primaries and black, white and grey. In typography it produced block-constructed letters and orthogonal, asymmetric layouts whose principles flowed directly into the Bauhaus and the New Typography.

Archivo; De Stijl used Theo van Doesburg's rectilinear alphabet and Vilmos Huszár's block-letter De Stijl masthead

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The colours

The ground and leading colours come from De Stijl, with a counter-accent from Wendingen. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

De Stijl Wendingen & Amsterdam School Typography

  • #f5f3ee ground · 36%
  • #111111 ink · 14%
  • #f4c20d accent · 18%
  • #c4561e accent · 14%
  • #b8913a accent · 10%
  • #1f4ea1 accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #f5f3ee;
  --ink: #111111;
  --accent-1: #f4c20d;
  --accent-2: #c4561e;
  --accent-3: #b8913a;
  --accent-4: #1f4ea1;
  --font-display: "Rubik Mono One", sans-serif;
  --font-text: "Archivo", sans-serif;
}

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The two styles

A geometric poster features the words “NEW ORDER” in heavy black capitals at the upper left. Thick black bars divide an off-white background into unequal rectangles filled with red, blue, yellow, grey, and white. 1917–1931 · Western Europe De Stijl A Dutch movement formed around Theo van Doesburg's journal De Stijl and Piet Mondrian's Neoplasticism, which sought universal harmony through the most elementary means: horizontal and vertical lines, rectangles, the three primaries and black, white and grey. In typography it produced block-constructed letters and orthogonal, asymmetric layouts whose principles flowed directly into the Bauhaus and the New Typography. A symmetrical geometric poster in rust orange, ochre, black and cream features a rising semicircular sun with angular rays above the large word “HORIZON.” Stepped shapes, vertical bars and small squares fill an elaborate border on a grainy, aged-paper background. 1918–1932 · Western Europe Wendingen & Amsterdam School Typography The graphic language of Wendingen (1918–1932), monthly of the Amsterdam architects' society Architectura et Amicitia, and its editor H. Th. Wijdeveld: the Amsterdam School's brick Expressionism in print. Wijdeveld built heavy capitals and meanders from compositors' brass rules and centred them in thick rule frames on square, Japanese-sewn pages; invited artists drew the covers. The School also built such capitals in brick and on bridge nameplates. Avant-garde covers, such as El Lissitzky's Proun (1921 no. 11, out 1922) and Vilmos Huszár's De Stijl design (1929), sit outside the house style.

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More combinations

With De Stijl

With Wendingen

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