Mechanographic Beauty: Jan Tschichold’s Letterheads and Envelopes Collection

Abstract

Numerous letterheads and envelopes held in Jan Tschichold’s archive at the Getty Research Institute can be seen as a true artistic collection. Their layout is closely linked to the mechanical requirements of the first machine age because of the real enthusiasm of European avant-garde artists for the typewriter, which was considered an important symbol of peaceful international communication. In the 1920s and 1930s, the typewriter became the subject of numerous photographs and posters. It was also a tool for producing a new kind of work of art in which the boundaries between visual art and poetry were blurred. Graphic designers from different countries elaborated together a new aesthetics of letterheads based on sans serif fonts, geometrical shapes, and primary colors. Such a pure design was supposed to be balanced by the forms of the typewritten letters used by the client. Therefore, standard letterheads represented the first step toward “participatory design.”