Helvetica is the only typeface to have a
feature documentary made about it. Developed in 1957 by Max Miedinger, at the Hass type foundry in Münchenstein, Switzerland, Helvetica was key in the paradigm shift that occurred to graphic design in the sixties. It was orignally called:
But this was changed to Helvetica [Helvetica being part of the Latin name for Switzerland] to make it more appealing outside, German speaking, Switzerland.
Two years later Letraset was founded in London and by 1960 it was producing the dry transfer lettering, with which is name is synonymous, and which allowed designers to break the shackles of cold metal type, shake off the chains of hot metal type and go round corners with relative ease. Helvetica together with Letraset was a powerful tool in the shaping of new typographic thinking.
In the early eighties when Microsoft wanted a typeface for it’s word processing software they approached Hass for the Helvetica typeface but Hass weren’t interested. Microsoft sulked, and threw a few toys out the pram before going round to Monotype where together they developed Arial. Arial to most people is indistinguishable from Helvetica, which is a shame because Helvetica is fonts ahead of Arial.
There was a lot of angry mutterings in the graphic studios of the Western World, the graphics studios in the Eastern World couldn’t give a fuck, they were too busy trying to get a typewriter that could operate with their complicated pictographic system:
Designers felt Microsoft and Monotype had just ripped off Helvetica, what with Arial’s glyph widths being almost identical to Helvetica’s and the fact that, to most people, they were indistinguishable.
How to tell the difference between Helvetica and Arial:
