My year 2020 treasure hunting began at the Waterlooplein flea market in Amsterdam, Holland. For the price of 1 Euro, I picked up LETTERING II - a lovely pocket-sized hardback book (15.5 x 11 cms) published by ARTI, and printed in the Netherlands. The edition is undated, but I'd guess it's from around the early 1960s?
The book is Number 18 of ARTI's 'Picture Encyclopedia' series. Other titles included Flags, Calligraphy, Supersonic Aircraft, Warships, Breeds of Dogs & Musical Instruments - and the contents pages and the short instructional text pages in each book are written in Dutch, French, German and English.
Most of the 64 pages are devoted to illustrations printed in Blue, Yellow, Red, Green and Black - and the following are a representative sample of the first section of LETTERING II called 'Constructed Letters'...
I wonder who actually bought this title at the time? Did they end up kicking around art schools during the 60s and 70s before being slung out in favour of Instant Lettering like Letraset, and then by computers?
