Stylogeny combining Suprematism × Victorian Letterpress

Try

Style combination · Contrasts

Suprematism × Victorian Letterpress

Crowded, ornamented Victorian bills make Suprematist emptiness feel even more radical; use the clash for editorial openers.

From the research on Suprematism

Mix them and make something Suprematism Victorian Letterpress

RISERISESuprematism × Victorian Letterpress
A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from Suprematism, their arrangement from Suprematism, the finish from Victorian Letterpress. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

01

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.

Suprematism Victorian Letterpress & Wood Type

Type from Victorian Letterpress
Colour from Suprematism
Form from Suprematism
Composition from Suprematism

Victorian Letterpress avoids generous white space: this is where the two pull against each other, which is the point of the contrast.

Surface from Victorian Letterpress

02

The type

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

Display · Victorian Letterpress

Rise

Abril Fatface, standing in for Fat face romans (Thorne, Figgins)

Text · Suprematism

Kazimir Malevich's non-objective art, unveiled with the Black Square at the 0.10 exhibition in Petrograd in 1915, reduced painting to pure geometric planes floating in white, infinite space. Through the UNOVIS collective in Vitebsk and El Lissitzky's books it became a graphic language of squares, bars and circles tilted on dynamic diagonals, the seedbed of Constructivist layout.

Hanken Grotesk; Suprematism used Russian grotesques (rubleny shrift) as set by Lissitzky and Hand-drawn lithographic lettering of UNOVIS publications

03

The colours

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

Suprematism Victorian Letterpress & Wood Type

  • #f4f1e8 ground · 36%
  • #121212 ink · 14%
  • #e9b824 accent · 18%
  • #b3322b accent · 14%
  • #d9b45a accent · 10%
  • #2a4d8f accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #f4f1e8;
  --ink: #121212;
  --accent-1: #e9b824;
  --accent-2: #b3322b;
  --accent-3: #d9b45a;
  --accent-4: #2a4d8f;
  --font-display: "Abril Fatface", serif;
  --font-text: "Hanken Grotesk", sans-serif;
}

04

The two styles

An off-white cover features a large red circle crossed by a thick diagonal black bar, with a red square, blue triangle, yellow bar, and small green circle. The black uppercase word “DRIFT” angles upward across the upper portion. 1915–1925 · Eastern Europe Suprematism Kazimir Malevich's non-objective art, unveiled with the Black Square at the 0.10 exhibition in Petrograd in 1915, reduced painting to pure geometric planes floating in white, infinite space. Through the UNOVIS collective in Vitebsk and El Lissitzky's books it became a graphic language of squares, bars and circles tilted on dynamic diagonals, the seedbed of Constructivist layout. An ornate vintage-style poster reads “RIVER FAIR” in huge red and navy letters on distressed cream paper. A circular illustration of a paddle-wheel steamboat sits between the words, surrounded by floral scrollwork, patterned borders, and a rising sun. 1810–1900 · Western Europe, North America Victorian Letterpress & Wood Type The commercial jobbing print of the industrial century: posters, playbills, auction notices and ephemera built from a flood of new display types (fat faces, Egyptians, grotesques, Tuscans and condensed wood type). Lines are centred and each is set in a different face and size to fill the measure, framed in rules and stock borders and printed in black with one or two flat colours.

05

More combinations

With Suprematism

With Victorian Letterpress

All 33 combinations with Victorian Letterpress

Every style combination