Over the past year, several people have provided invaluable help to me in putting this website together.

Firstly, thank you to Dr. Philip A. Metzger for introducing me to Orbis Typographicus four years ago — and, more recently, for lending me his set of broadsides to scan, and for kindly writing his reminiscences for this website.

I am deeply indebted to Professor Hermann Zapf for allowing me to publish his work online. I can only hope that my reproduction does justice to the incredibly beautiful design work of his original.

A special thank you goes to my good friend Dr. James Tyler, for his guidance in obtaining necessary permissions, and for his general enthusiasm for the project.

Thanks are also due to Amelia J. Hugill-Fontanel, Assistant Curator of the Cary Graphic Arts Collection at RIT, for her help in contacting Professor Zapf, for providing images from the Cary Collection, and for going far beyond the call of duty in helping me spread the word about this project.

Thank you to Jerry Kelly for reviewing my work and offering helpful corrections.

Thank you to Emily “Si” Gibson for transcribing the text of Orbis into searchable form, and to Alec Kubas-Meyer for his skilled proofreading.

And thank you to you, for stopping by and taking a few moments to appreciate the beauty and ingenuity of Orbis Typographicus.

J.L.
Allentown, PA · 2013

 

 

 

 

Professor Zapf’s response to my proposal