Video summary
Noah Bryant introduces Project Island, a personal initiative dedicated to reviving and educating the public about the exotic typefaces of Herman Isenberg, a pioneering 19th-century designer based in Philadelphia. Inspired by Isenberg's unique Victorian style that blended nature motifs with intricate details, Noah embarked on an academic journey at RIT to master digital type design. His fascination grew when he discovered Isenberg's work in everyday advertisements and products, prompting him to travel to Philadelphia to uncover the stories behind these historic fonts. The project aims to bridge the gap between vintage typography and modern digital applications, proving that these once-obscure designs can thrive in contemporary contexts.
To gather information for his research, Noah undertook a physical odyssey across Philadelphia, visiting significant locations tied to Isenberg's life and career. He first attempted to locate the original McKeller Smiths and Jordan type foundry at 606 Sansom Street, only to find the building had been demolished, which led him to seek alternative sources of historical data. His efforts were rewarded at the Athenaeum of Philadelphia, where he discovered rare "blue books" and address books from the 19th century containing original advertisements featuring Isenberg's typefaces. Furthermore, Noah visited Isenberg's former residence and West Laurel Hill Cemetery, where he obtained a rubbing of the designer's grave, ensuring that his research was grounded in tangible historical evidence rather than just digital speculation.
The core technical challenge of the project involved translating these physical specimens into modern digital formats while preserving their original character. Noah encountered significant difficulties with ink bleed issues on specific lead typefaces, such as the one he renamed "Eldrich," which caused letters to appear too thick when digitized. For other fonts like "Zeitgeist," derived from print specimens rather than lead, he had to manually redraw and adjust individual characters to correct proportions and ensure visual accuracy. Throughout this process, Noah constantly balanced the need for digital usability with the obligation to remain faithful to Isenberg's artistic spirit, resulting in a series of beta releases that are still being refined and expanded upon.
To demonstrate the viability of these Victorian designs in the modern era, Noah integrated them into a marketing strategy by producing a custom wine run labeled "Island." This venture involved creating approximately 200 bottles that featured his digitized typefaces on the labels, alongside an original sketch of a bird taking flight to honor Isenberg's legacy. The successful reception of this product served as proof that eclectic and exotic fonts could be effectively utilized in current digital marketing and product design. Ultimately, Project Island stands as a tribute to Herman Isenberg, illustrating how learning from the past can inform future design trends and keep the spirit of these historic typefaces alive for new generations of designers.
Read the full video transcript
if you've ever eaten cup noodle Ramen
watched any of The Godfather Trilogy or
drank kettle1 vodka you have firsthand
experience with the work of one of the
most badass type designers of the 19th
century his name is Herman isenberg he
created type faces in Philadelphia for
the McKeller Smiths and Jordan type
Foundry only 5 minutes away from where
we were originally supposed to have
typon pulling the Deep typographic
resources from several different
libraries including the graphic arts
collection in Rochester New York and
Philly's own athenium Library my ongoing
project Island aims to revive and
educate people about these exotic type
faces that are so
fantastic this presentation will feature
Tales from sneaking into spooky
graveyards and search of epitaphs paging
through Toms and rare book libraries and
even printing my own specimens of rare
vintage Victorian type the obsessive
research has yielded several isenberg
type faces with May which may not be
complete but they will be presented to
you for analysis from serif to counter
the revive type faces are a case study
to examine the trials and tribulations
of translating vintage 19th century type
into the modern digital age the spirit
of Herman isenberg lives on in the City
of Brotherly Love hi everyone my name is
Noah Bryant thank you so much for
attending my uh presentation today and
I'm here to tell you about project
Island so originally project Island came
about because I was in my final
semesters at RIT the Rochester Institute
of Technology and I decided to basically
learn the basics of type design and you
know originally my professors uh said
that may be a little bit of a difficult
task to do um in just two uh you know
two semesters but I decided you know I
might not be able to have a full type
face but I wanted to really delve into
typography and learn more about type
design and really uh gain a massive
appreciation for um type design and how
it works so that was initially how I um
how the idea started and really what
drew me to isenberg is is I went into
the library and I was researching
different type designers and Herman
isenberg suck out to me just because I I
already knew his type I had seen it in
different advertisements and different
products um all over the place and I was
instantly drawn to it um and you know
Herman isenberg has such a unique style
um that would be best noted as uh
Victorian exoticism um he really Drew
from a lot of interesting exotic um
motifs he combined that with motifs from
nature and he used it to really form
something that was that was an
incredible um an incredible combination
of all of these things um and so you
know initially I was just I was drawn to
his Artistry I was drawn to his type and
then I found out that he created type in
Philadelphia um and I grew up outside of
Philadelphia I love the city um I'm
really tied to Philly and you know I I
just instantly wanted to learn more I
instantly wanted to know more about who
Herman isenberg was so I really delved
into the books um I found out you know
that he used to make type for this
Foundry called McKeller Smiths and
Jordan and I said let's go to the city
and and let's do some research let's
find out you know where he used to make
type let's see if I can find out any
information about who he was as a person
and really the project just went from
there after the initial academic
research portion when I decided to go
back to Philadelphia in order to start
my research um first I tried to actually
find the McKeller Smiths and Jordan
building itself where isenberg you know
used to create all of this type um so
utilizing my research I found the
address actually in Philly of the of the
type Foundry so I went to that address
it's 606 Samson Street you can actually
look that up on Google Maps right now if
you'd like um it is a real address um
and I went there and unfortunately I
found that the building was a bit
different uh than what I found in my
research so I walked into the lobby and
I asked the lovely people at the front
desk hey um you know I'm doing this
typographic research could you tell me a
little bit about the history of the
building uh and they let me know that it
actually was torn down at one point um
so the building was no longer uh
original so I honestly was a little bit
disappointed um and I was looking for
another lead and um you know the lovely
staff there they said hey the um the
oldest Free Library in the city is a
block away why don't you go there try
and look see if you could find any
research there um which was a fantastic
suggestion so I walked down the street
to the athenium library which is again
the oldest um Free Library in the city
of Philly and uh when I went there I met
with the curator who was extremely
helpful and he led me up to the
collection um that they had and the most
fantastic thing that I found there were
these things called um the blue books
and their address books um from you know
the 19th century and in these address
books were you know again they were
basically the Yellow Pages of the 1900s
so everyone's address was listed did so
you could go look up hey I need to find
a carpenter so I'm going to go look that
up in the address books um and what was
so great about it was in the address
books were period advertisements of that
time and you wouldn't believe it but in
the advertisements were Herman isenberg
type faces so I was able to actually
hold the initial like the original
advertisements that um hurin isenberg's
type was utilized in um and it was just
so fascinating to see again I'll I'll
post some pictures up next to me um to
just see how those uh how those type
faces were originally used they were
used by Banks they were used by big
companies it was cuttingedge technology
back in the day it was it was
fascinating to see um how they were
utilized in their original function um
and you know I I basically was able to
get a bunch of these specimens and be
able to use this information to inform
me about how can I utilize these type
faces in the future um you know here's
how they were once used and here's how I
can bring them into modern digital
design so you know after I uh researched
at the library one of the things I found
of course in the address book was Herman
isenberg's address so from there I went
it would be really cool to go to his
address and just see what's there um so
I actually managed to go um to Herman
isenberg's house um I did take some
pictures it looked looks like it you
know was occupied at the time so I
didn't want to cause any problems um but
I did manage to go and and basically
find his house and see where he once
live that was an original building that
was an original um you know building in
the city of Philadelphia so that was
fascinating to find um and then from
there I also did some um some more
research in the library and I found the
location um of his resting place of his
grave in West Laurel Hill Cemetery which
was you know about a 10-minute drive
from his house um so that's where I went
next on the journey I I actually went
through the um the cemetery I talked
with a bunch of the staff there they
helped me find the grave um and I was
able to you know take a grave rubbing
get some information about it um I found
out that the grave was being actively
preserved which was fantastic so you
know someone is taking care of it
someone's preserving his legacy um so it
was it was awesome to go through all of
that information and and basically you
know guide myself on this own little
typographic Odyssey where I learned more
about Herman isenberg and his life um
and was able to you know basically
utilize all of this information in order
to pour that into the type faces that
you know I started to work on after
going on my typographic Odyssey um The
Next Step of my journey was to really go
back to RIT and and learn the basics of
type design and to learn how to
translate these incredible type faces
that I learned so much about into the
digital age um and so basically that was
done through first of all a lot of
research um I read a lot of different
books and I learned the basics of how to
translate type um into into a digital
format um and I ran through a bunch of
different you know trials throughout
this process you know um in terms of
specifics things like ink bed were a
really big issue um so for one of the
type faces originally called spiral
which I renamed to eldrich um ink bed
was a huge thing um because that type
face was actually generated from
original lead type found in the carry
collection at RIT that I took a specimen
of um and when I was redrawing them um
physically and in font lab 7 which is
the program I used um I was finding that
it was really difficult to actually try
and um you know account for that ink
bleed it made the letters look um too
thick it made the stems look too thick
um it's such an intricate type face that
it just it wasn't translating correctly
so it came down to me redrawing it came
down to me you know basically figuring
out uh you know how do I recreate the
type face while remaining true to the
spirit of what Herman isenberg wanted to
create with the type um so really that
was one of the um one of the issues that
I dealt with throughout the project um
in terms of the other type face that um
ended up you know being created from
this project um originally it was called
japanesque um it was renamed by me to
Zeitgeist and Zeitgeist was actually
created from original print specimens so
I did not have the lead type for that um
but you know it was basically created
from those from those print specimens
and again there were there were um
certain issues with that too that
approach too that I found um with that
approach you know a lot of times I when
I was Redwing them I found that some of
the letters um you know just didn't look
right when I was putting them in digital
designs um so I had to redesign some of
them and again it was all finding that
balance between how do I recreate this
and something that I believe is an
artist looks great but still remains
true to the Original Soul of of what
Herman isenberg created and pays homage
to him and his work so those are some of
the things that came you know came into
effect when I was when I was working on
the project and really uh again I'm I'm
happy to present these gu uh these type
faces to all of you and they're not
finished um they're still in progress
this is a living breathing project I'm
restoring uh working on working on
restoring and then digitizing another
typ lead type face as we speak in
another Library um and you know it's
this is a a living pro project so um
again I'll provide links to my Beta
releases of these type faces they are
not um finished yet but uh you know it
it will allow again it it allows to just
see my process see where I was coming
from and hopefully you know you would be
able to utilize some of these type faces
in your designs and and be able to
utilize these uh across multiple
projects the next portion of the project
and the final portion of the project uh
really came down to me learning how to
uh utilize these type faces in uh modern
digital design so besides my work in
type besides my work as a designer a
videographer and an artist um my primary
career is in digital marketing so my
question then became how do I push these
type faces into a marketing strategy how
can I basically make these type faces um
you know valid in modern design how can
I push forward an idea to make other
people believe that these are incredible
type faces that you need to appreciate
them um and so that came up with the the
next portion of the project which being
in the fingerlakes I came up with this
idea to basically produce a custom uh
run of wine um and it it kind of was a
was a crazy element to the project but
we basically um we basically released um
about 200 different bottles that were
based on um both isenberg type faces
that I produced um and the wine was
called Island so um again just a uh it
was received very well by people that I
was able to give it to and um you know
the wine itself did turn out um pretty
good I got I got good feedback on it um
but it really was a part of you know me
saying how do I Market these type faces
um and how do I prove to myself that
they're not just something that was used
in in the 19th century by a bank it's
it's not just that it's something that
um is again continues to to to permeate
um modern digital design it continues we
see it everywhere around us and I just
wanted to show that even these type
faces that you may think are too
eclectic or too exotic or too Victorian
can still be used in in modern product
design can still be used in modern
digital marketing um and so this was
kind of the final um homage to Herman
eberg um and then as you'll see on the
label I actually um utilized one of his
original sketches of this beautiful bird
Taking Flight um and that was used just
to kind of you know again pay homage to
him and and show really the world that
this is not just a a dying type face
this is this is the future this is the
future of design we're learning from the
past and we're using it to be informed
about the future and to create
incredible things in the future um and
that's really what island is all what
project island is all about is is
learning from the past paying homage to
this great artist and utilizing his work
to create incredible things in the
future um so yes thank you so much for
uh attending my presentation thank you
so much for taking the time out of your
day to listen um and as uh stated I will
provide links to not only the type faces
for you to check out and use in your own
designs um but also to a digital uh book
that I wrote that again explains more
about the process um of the type design
portion itself if you're interested and
also about more about my typographic
journey throughout this project um so
thank you so much for tuning in um and
please enjoy the rest of typon I hope to
see all of you in person someday soon
thank you so much