typeface, space-race

Previously, we’ve looked at the creative application of æsthetic principles to pull together a compre- hensive, “corporate” face for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration but we failed to realise that there was an entire movement throughout the 1970s behind it that marked the US federal government’s embrace of graphic design and style. One of Richard Nixon’s advisors, Leonard Garment, persuaded the president that support for the arts made for good politics and to establish a National Endowment for the Arts and the Humanities (the NEA and the NEH). The attention to presentation was championed by new cabinet appointee and chairperson Nancy Hawks, with the mandate that good design facilitated communication both between agencies and to the public that the government served. Good design also of course has an intrinsic value of its own and creates icons inseparable from the message and responsibilities of the office.