Apparently, this year is the 50th anniversary of the font Helvetica. An article on the Slate site called “The Helvetica Hegemony” discusses the history of Helvetica with an online slide show. It’s sort of astonishing how many companies have used this typeface, even before the days when you could find it on every computer.
My favorite line is this one, which appears on the last slide:
“It’s the tofu of typefaces: bland in itself but ready to absorb whatever flavors you add to it.”
As a vegan graphic designer who has seen a lot of both tofu and Helvetica, I was seriously amused 😉