Thomas Huot-Marchand designs bespoke typographic solutions for brands and institutions seeking to strengthen their visual identity. His research expertise allows him to advise and support both clients and creative teams on typographic history, technology, and concepts.
Garaje takes its inspiration both from the alphabets of the Bauhaus school and the vernacular inscriptions of Spanish garage owners: two worlds that share a desire to reduce typographic forms to simple geometric elements. At the Bauhaus this geometrization is ideological: it represents a rejection of tradition and the affirmation of an objective and rational vocabulary. With garage owners it is a simple matter of logic, certainly due to an ignorance of tradition. It is somewhat naïve to wish to reduce the shapes of the alphabet to elementary forms. Perfect geometrical forms seem less than perfect to our eyes: type Design abounds with optical corrections that compensate for our perception of forms.
Garaje plays specifically with this paradox: its construction is rigorously geometrical, anchored to a scalable modular grid, with no optical correction. A perfectly objective system, but a typographical aberration, simultaneously right and wrong. For the last 20 years, I have extended this family in every direction, to the point of absurdity: extremely narrow or outlandishly wide letterforms, all built from the same modules. Today it is a complete system, available in 44 widths and 5 weights. The complete family counts 445 fonts, hundreds of thousands of glyphs, and zero contrast: Garaje is a typeface which is at the same time brutal and playful, rational and naïve. Garaje Condensed subfamily goes from 0703 (7 on 3 grid) to 3503 (35 on 3), and includes 145 fonts, + one variable font. Its construction allows to compose in many sizes without changing the stem weight. Specimen made with DrawBot by Rémi Forte.
Published by 205TF
Garaje takes its inspiration both from the alphabets of the Bauhaus school and the vernacular inscriptions of Spanish garage owners: two worlds that share a desire to reduce typographic forms to simple geometric elements. At the Bauhaus this geometrization is ideological: it represents a rejection of tradition and the affirmation of an objective and rational vocabulary. With garage owners it is a simple matter of logic, certainly due to an ignorance of tradition. It is somewhat naïve to wish to reduce the shapes of the alphabet to elementary forms. Perfect geometrical forms seem less than perfect to our eyes: type Design abounds with optical corrections that compensate for our perception of forms.
Garaje plays specifically with this paradox: its construction is rigorously geometrical, anchored to a scalable modular grid, with no optical correction. A perfectly objective system, but a typographical aberration, simultaneously right and wrong. For the last 20 years, I have extended this family in every direction, to the point of absurdity: extremely narrow or outlandishly wide letterforms, all built from the same modules. Today it is a complete system, available in 44 widths and 5 weights. The complete family counts 445 fonts, hundreds of thousands of glyphs, and zero contrast: Garaje is a typeface which is at the same time brutal and playful, rational and naïve. Garaje Mid subfamily goes from 0503 (5 on 3 grid) to 0504 (5 on 4 grid) and 0603 (6 on 3 grid), and includes 15 fonts + 3 variable fonts. Its construction allows to compose in many widths without changing the stem weight.
Published by 205TF
- 2015
Le Pigalle × be pôles
- 2015
Le Pigalle × be pôles
Le Pigalle is a hotel in the eponymous district of Paris. The agency be-poles (Paris / New York) commissioned me to create its custom typeface, which is inspired by the vernacular signs and inscriptions of this lively and typical district. Photos © Benoît Linero
- 2011
Théâtre musical de Besançon — lumières
- 2011
Théâtre musical de Besançon — lumières
A poster for the Théâtre musical de Besançon. The illustration is, as usual, very litteral : a crystal chandelier for a concert on the music of the Enlightenment. It is of course made of circles, and thanks to and thanks to a black pattern printed on the back, the chandelier lights up when the night comes, when the poster is backlit.
Garaje takes its inspiration both from the alphabets of the Bauhaus school and the vernacular inscriptions of Spanish garage owners: two worlds that share a desire to reduce typographic forms to simple geometric elements. At the Bauhaus this geometrization is ideological: it represents a rejection of tradition and the affirmation of an objective and rational vocabulary. With garage owners it is a simple matter of logic, certainly due to an ignorance of tradition. It is somewhat naïve to wish to reduce the shapes of the alphabet to elementary forms. Perfect geometrical forms seem less than perfect to our eyes: type Design abounds with optical corrections that compensate for our perception of forms.
Garaje plays specifically with this paradox: its construction is rigorously geometrical, anchored to a scalable modular grid, with no optical correction. A perfectly objective system, but a typographical aberration, simultaneously right and wrong. For the last 20 years, I have extended this family in every direction, to the point of absurdity: extremely narrow or outlandishly wide letterforms, all built from the same modules. Today it is a complete system, available in 44 widths and 5 weights. The complete family counts 445 fonts, hundreds of thousands of glyphs, and zero contrast: Garaje is a typeface which is at the same time brutal and playful, rational and naïve. Garaje Multi embeds 13 different widths in each font, from 0503 (5 on 3 grid) to 05015 (5 on 15 grid). The default set is a mix of 0503, 0504 and 0505. The subfamily includes 5 fonts (2352 glyphs each) + 1 variable font. Its construction allows to compose in many widths without changing the stem weight. Letters on the lowercase set go wider and wider when repeated, and it’s fun.
Available at 205TF.
Online specimen
A series of posters for Blago Bung events, Emily Harvey Foundation (NYC, USA) and Cabaret Voltaire (Zurich, CH). Art, Sound, Poetry and Performance. Posters are printed in split fountain : gradients evolve during the printing process, each poster is unique.
- 2021
Samaritaine Serif × Ateliers Saint-Lazare
- 2021
Samaritaine Serif × Ateliers Saint-Lazare
Along with Samaritaine logotype, I was commissioned by Ateliers Saint-Lazare to develop a custom typeface for La Samaritaine brand identity. Samaritaine Serif is inspired by Latines and Elzévirs of late XIXth Century French typefoundries. With sharp triangular serifs, monocular g, flourished endings, some alternates and a very French Art Nouveau touch.
Visual dentity by Ateliers Saint-Lazare, 2021 (art Direction: Reynald Philippe).
Luxeuil script is a very rare Merovingian script, from the beginning of the seventh century. It is derived from uncial, half-uncial and roman cursive: before the advent of the Carolingian Minuscule, it is considered as one of the first formal minuscule.
Intrigued by this local unknown writing, born a few kilometers from my home, I studied it with my friend Claude-Laurent François and tried to design a digital version of it. I had to understand the ductus and then to reproduce the gesture and stroke of the pen. Rather than drawing the outlines, I digitized the inner skeleton, and applied afterwards a virtual elliptic pen. This dynamic approach allowed me to create the very large number of ligatures contained in this handwriting: these ligatures are created automatically with initial, medial or final contextual forms.
Unpublished
- 2010
Théâtre musical de Besançon — abribus
- 2010
Théâtre musical de Besançon — abribus
Posters for the Théâtre musical de Besançon.
The Musée d’Orsay wanted, in 2010, to renew its typography, returning to the typeface defined in its original visual identity, developed by Bruno Monguzzi and Jean Widmer (1986). The museum will was to update Walbaum, cut by Justus Erich Walbaum (around 1830), then unique typographic voice of the institution. With Philippe Millot, we defined a family of «cousins» of Walbaum, in styles that appeared later in the 19th century. For text typefaces, a Grotesk (sans serif and bold), and a Typewriter (slab serifs, low contrast, and light). For display typefaces, the uppercase present variations of texture in the manner of 19th century display type. Unfortunately, the Museum barely used this new typeface system.
Minérale is a typeface based on uncommon stems, whose sides intersect at their centers. These two triangles that meet at the tip are an exaggeration of triangular serifs.
This project was born from a lettering for an exhibition entitled Splendeurs Minérales at the Musée de Montbéliard (France). I then developed a series of weights, which share the same width: a Multiplexed typeface that occupy the same space, whatever its weight.
The same goes for Roman and Italic. Italics turn around a central, vertical axis: the more the weight increases, the more slanted is the typeface.
Minerale is published at 205.tf since 2017 for Roman, 2018 for italics. It is developed in the new technology of variable fonts, which allows the user to act directly on the appearance of the characters, on a weight axis.
Minerale was designated Favorite Font of 2017 by Typographica, and won a TDC award in 2018.
Try and buy at [205.tf]Published by 205TF
Cast iron is used on all signage and property objects, in a wide range of techniques: enamel plates, sign painting, silscreen, embroidery, etc.
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