I found this interesting article on the Canadian Design Resource blog… Take also a look at the others post on general design.

I had always assumed that the Canadian Government used Helvetica for all of its brand outputs — but after spending far too many hours staring at a sign hanging from the ceiling of my local passport office, non-Helvetica flourishes began to appear (see ‘r’ comparison above with Helvetica Medium overlaid in red). At first I assumed that, like so many large institutions, various smaller agencies within the larger whole had gone off-brand by substituting Arial or Helvetica Neue for Helvetica proper (because whoever made the sign was using a PC, or didn’t know any better, or some combination of the two), but after a bit of design geekery (apparently government offices don’t like you taking hundreds of detail shots of their signage) and some googling, I came across Section 4.5 of the Federal Identity Program’s Usage Manual, aptly titled ’signage typeface’.

-John Ryan

Sam Mallett, 3rd year Graphic Design student form The University of Wales Newport, just sent me mail talking about his poster project.

Last summer I did a short work placement in Zürich and had the opportunity to play with some lead type. As it was the 50th birthday of Helvetica and I was in its home country I thought it would be only fair to celebrate it, so I designed and printed this poster to illustrate a small but important change in the typefaces development.
Its an A3 poster with 72pt. Halbfett Haas Grotesk in one colour and 72pt. Halbfett Helvetica in another.
To make some funds for my final major project I was hoping to sell a few

If you want a copy you can contact him : sammallett [at] mosaicparty.com

See some pictures of the project here.

Short film celebrating the launch of the 50 years of Helvetica exhibition at the Design Museum last year.

Blu-ray Limited Edition “Record” Package
Designed by Experimental Jetset

The Helvetica Blu-ray high-definition disc in a special limited-edition package conceived and designed by Dutch design team Experimental Jetset. The 12″ gatefold record cover holds a 4-panel Blu-ray disc insert in one side and a fold-out poster (60cm x 60cm / 23.5″ x 23.5″) in the other. The whole package comes in a custom black cloth record bag.

Only 1,500 copies have been produced, and this edition will not be reprinted. Each copy is signed by director Gary Hustwit. Ship date: May 6th.

$125. Limit two copies per customer. Buy here.

My best friend Romuald Stivine (The Lazydog) is having a 12 pages focus in the next issue of WAD Magazine. We wanted to make a “All-Time Winners” book selection. So he asked me to make mine. Here it is… A little bit of swiss, a little bit of that…

The List: