Professor of Typography. Focusing on knowledge transfer projects, consultancy, and course development. Programme director for the MRes Typography & Graphic Communication and MRes Typeface Design; Pathway lead for MA Communication Design / Typeface Design; course director for the TDi summer course.
Past President of ATypI. Co-founder of ISTVC and Granshan Foundation. SFHEA.
Research interests: typeface design processes, typographic education, and Greek typeface design and typography. Comments on typefaces, typography, knowledge construction and documentation in design, global visual culture, and education and research in applied disciplines.
→ Support for Greek typeface design
Knowledge Transfer activities
Publications
Presentations, lectures, keynotes
Research co-supervision
Invited teaching
Reviewing, organising, and related work
Interviews
Knowledge Transfer activities
Workshops on curriculum design, research methods, course planning, student feedback and evaluation, and integrating research into practice
• Tsinghua University, Beijing : April 2024
• South West & Wales Doctoral Training Partnership : November 2021
• University of Ghent : November 2020
• Academy of Fine Arts, Katowice : October/December 2020
• ATypI Working Seminar series initiator: Colombo (2019), Puebla (2019), Amiens (2020)
• RCA | Beyond the Margins, London : May 2019
• Jingren, Beijing : April 2019
• Dongdao Design, Beijing : March 2018
• Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok : October 2017
• University of Moratuwa, Colombo : March 2017
• Bezalel Academy, Jerusalem : January 2012
• AFA Katowice : January 2012
(Seminars and lectures on this subject also at other institutions)
Mentorship and strategic support
For professionals and companies active in the typeface and typography market, and for companies requiring insights and guidance for decisions that involve typeface design and typography. (Client list: confidential)
Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship supervisor (2019–22)
Titus Nemeth (Researcher). TypoArabic: Towards historically informed practice in contemporary Arabic typography.
Typographic knowledge for global communication (2016–)
Initiation and series editorship of books on typography and typeface design translated into Chinese, in partnership with CITIC. With the support of ATypI, CAFA, and the University of Reading.
Greek typeface design and typographic support for:
A2SWHK, Adobe, Bigelow & Holmes, BlackFoundry, Chank Diesel, Clubtype, DaltonMaag, Darden Studio, Łukasz Dziedzic, Farnhill, FontShop, FontSmith, Frere-Jones, Hoefler & Co, Letterjuice, Microsoft, Štorm Type, Monotype (incl. Ascender, Bitstream, FontShop, Linotype), Morisawa, Munchfonts, Optimo, Process Type Foundry, Saja Typeworks, Jeremy Tankard, Terminal Design, Mark Thomson, Tiro Typeworks, Type-Together, Typotheque, and others.
KTP Merson Sign Design (2010–12)
A two-year, funded project to enable a company with an established presence in sign design and manufacturing to develop and embed in-house capability in multiple language and multi-script applications.
KTP Monotype Imaging (2008–10)
A two-year, funded project to develop a strategy for bringing to market fonts based on Monotype’s archive of historic drawings for legacy typemaking technologies, and develop new, extended-character set typefaces for the Indian mobile market.
Publications
[Last ten years only. Publications before 2015 here.]
Identifying patterns in the globalisation of typeface design. In Zhuangshi | Chinese Journal of Design, no 358, 02 (2023)
Reframing research-informed practice. In Titus Nemeth (Ed.), Arabic typography: history and practice. Niggli (2022)
Editor. Designing type revivals. Michele Patanè, Riccardo Olocco. Lazy Dog (2022)
Global type tour (2022). In Eye 102, pp 48, 61
Type specimens as learning tools (2020). In Marian Misiak (Ed.), Support independent type—the new culture of type specimens, Slanted Publishers, pp 18–19
The letters also loved him: Gerard Unger, ATypI member extraordinaire (2019)
Slanted Babylon (2019). In Ian Lynam (Ed.), Total Armageddon: a Slanted reader on design. Slanted Publishers, pp 273–279
Enabling modernity: innovation in modulated Greek typefaces (2018). In Philological Encounters. Brill • available to buy via Brill • also free download
Writing for design students. Notes in three parts : Part 1: A pattern for structured writing (2016) |Part 2: Describing things (2016) | Part 3: Three essentials (2018). Published on Medium (2016)
Designing Greek (2018). In Ben Wittner, Sascha Thoma, Timm Hartmann (eds.), Bi-Scriptual: Typography and Graphic Design with Multiple Script Systems. Niggli • A later version published on Medium as Designing Greek typefaces (2018)
Reflections about supervision in Communication Design Research (2018). Rafael Dietzsch (ed.). In De Mãos Dadas: Uma reflexão sobre orientações na pesquisa em Comunicação, Publicações da Faculdade de Comunicação da Universidade de Brasília – FAC/UnB, pp 120–127
Conversation with Pouya Ahmadi (2018). Amalgam, no 1. Full transcript here, and on Medium
A reappraisal of Baskerville’s Greek types (2017). In Caroline Archer & Malcolm Dick (Eds), John Baskerville: art, industry and culture in the Enlightenment. The University of Liverpool Press
Book review (2016). History of the Monotype Corporation, Judy Slinn, Sebastian Carter, & Richard Southall; Andrew Boag & Christopher Burke (Eds). Vanbrugh Press, 2014. In The Times Literary Supplement, 11 February 2016
Farewell, Richard Southall : Personal obituary for a teacher. (2015)
Snapshots from 1985–1995 (2015). Exhibition, FAAP: Fundação Armando Alvares Penteado, São Paulo
On systems and quality in typeface design (2015). In 5th Meeting of Typography – Book of Proceedings. Ana Catarina Silva & Marta Madureira (Eds). IPCA, Barcelos • Text also on Academia.edu
Beyond Latin (2015). With John Hudson, Neelakash Kshetrimayum, Kamal Mansour, and Pascal Zoghbi. In Eye 90
All trousers, no legs. Published on Medium, republished on Business Insider and the UoR News site, and translated into Spanish for Don Serifa. (2015)
Typeface review: Essay Text (2015). In Typographica, Stephen Coles (Ed.)
Greek printing outside Greece, from the 15th century to e-books. Exhibition, Reading (2015)
Presentations, lectures, keynotes
[Last ten years only. Lectures before 2015 here.]
Consequences of being early and a few: unfinished business for Greek typography (with Kostas Bartsokas, Eleni Beveratou, Natalia Qadreh, Emilios Theofanous, Irene Vlachou, and Alexios Zavras). Automatic Type Design 3, ANRT Nancy (February 2025) • video
Self, place, texts and ways of looking. Brumen Biennale, Ljubljana (April 2024)
The building blocks of visible language. Design 360º, Beijing (April 2024)
Typeface design as a framework for design research. UK-China Humanities Alliance conference, Fudan University (December 2022)
Arabic typography: a paradigm for research-informed practice. ISType Mukaddeme (November 2022) • video
Towards a research framework for the South Slavic typographic heritage. ICTVC8, Thessaloniki (July 2022). With Irma Puškarević
A framework for type revivals. ICTVC8, Thessaloniki (July 2022). With Riccardo Olocco and Michele Patanè
From “exotic” to to where? Granshan Signs of the Times (May 2022) • video
From exotics to “non-Latin” to where? Panel with Eleni Beveratou, Abeera Kamran, Chorong Kim, Aadarsh Rajan, Liana Shushanyan, Mariko Takagi. Signs of the times, Munich (May 2022)
Collections and archives as spaces of ideas and knowledge. Museum of Architecture and Design, Ljubljana (March 2022) • video (10:20–30:30)
Designing for the future: diverse and inclusive typeface design by default : Hong Kong Design Institute (October 2021) • video with Simplified Chinese subtitles | Adapted and delivered also at the International Conference of Chinese Characters Typography Forum, hosted by CAFA / Anyang. (October 2021)
Fonts as infrastructure (short version, for an ASP Katowice Masters group). (November 2020) • video
Three public talks for the 2020 International Summer School of the Academy of Fine Arts and Design, University of Ljubljana : Identifying genres and styles, The type market & career options, and Studying typefaces to improve your briefs (videos in the links)
The current state of PhD research in Typography. (Keynote) ATypI Working Seminar, Amiens (February 2020) • video
Type for global audiences: An introduction to font issues for language support. Translation Commons (July 2020) • video
Themes in the globalisation of typeface design. Future Graphic Language: New Directions in Verbal Communication, Warsaw (December 2019) • video
The decentralised mainstream. (Keynote) ICTVC, Patra (June 2019) • video • also: Beijing (October 2019)
Integrating research in practice. ATypI Working Seminar Colombo, University of Moratuwa (March 2019) • video
Typefaces, texts, and global documents. Oxford International Centre for Publishing Studies, Oxford Brookes University (March 2019)
Heritage and creativity, productivity and innovation. (Keynote) Symposium on Creative Chinese Character, Beijing (October 2018)
Themes in the globalisation of typeface design. Script, print, and letterforms in global contexts, Birmingham (June 2018)
Giving form to Variable Fonts. (Keynote) TypoLabs, Berlin (April 2018) • video
Tools and shapes. (Panel lead) TypoLabs (Berlin 2018) • video
Teaching with archives in a practice-based discipline. Graduate School, Chinese National Academy of Arts (March 2018)
Enabling modernity: innovation in modulated Greek typefaces. (Keynote) Face-Interface conference, Stanford (December 2017) • slides on Speakerdeck
The designer as social mentor v. 2. BITS conference, Bangkok (October 2017) • video
Enabling modernity: innovation in modulated Greek typefaces v. 1. Granshan conference, Yerevan (October 2017) • video on YouTube
The designer as social mentor v. 1. TGA triennial symposium, Raabs (August 2017) • video forthcoming
Research-based design: integrating archives in a practice-based discipline. AEPM Conference, Chania (May 2017) • report here
Design education for the next twenty-five years. Tsinghua University, Beijing, (March 2017)
Typography and diversity (China version). Way of Type, Beijing (March 2017)
Typography and diversity. (Keynote) Typography Day, DID: University of Moratuwa, Colombo (February 2017) • video on YouTube
What would Richard do? Automatic Type Design 2, ANRT, Nancy (November 2016) • video forthcoming
Helvetica is dead. Sans Everything, ESAD Amiens (October 2016) • video
Putting words in front of eager eyes: type for global audiences. UX Oxford (July 2016) • slides on Speakerdeck • video on Vimeo
A framework for developing discourse in typeface design. ICTVC6, Thessaloniki (July 2016) • slides on Speakerdeck
Zombie typography. Kerning.It, Faenza (June 2016) • slides on Speakerdeck • video on Vimeo
Enlightened typography for a small world (Korean version). (Keynote) KSBDA, Seoul (May 2016)
Enlightened typography for a small world. Basel School of Design (April 2016) • video pending
Typeface design at Reading. Dongdao Design, Beijing (March 2016) • video
Key ideas in typeface design. Font Forum, CAFA, Beijing (March 2016) • video pending
A framework for developing discourse in typeface design. FaceForward conference, Dublin (December 2015)
From tragedy to politics: Doxiadis’ argument for post-war reconstruction. Presentation in the “Books in unexpected places” series of the Being Human festival (Reading 2015) • video pending
Swift strokes and sampled constructs. ISType, Istanbul (June 2015) • slides on Speakerdeck • video on Vimeo
Research co-supervision
Chen Yue (2025–) : Typographic implementation of the Yi script.
Xin Guocheng (Shin) (2025–) : Chinese connecting writing styles typefaces and parametric design methods.
Fabiana Candida (2025) : Multigraphism in type design: the case of Salentino Greek. Visiting researcher from the Sapienza University (Rome).
Yuseon Park (2024–) : Understanding the evolution of Hanguel typefaces in response to technological changes and new document genres.
Ma Weiji (2024–) : The past of calligraphy in Sanyi, 1644–1912: establishment of the calligraphic artworld in a Chinese multi-ethnic borderland.
Abeera Zishan (2023–) : Lahori Nastaʿlīq as a case study for enabling digital parity across global scripts.
Yang Xicheng (2023– ) : Exploring design innovation for an extinct script: the case of the Tangut script.
Hanan Alshawi (2022– ) : An investigation into teaching methods of Arabic-English bilingual typography design for graphic design students at Princess Noura University, Riyadh, KSA.
Chhandak Pradhan (2022– ) : A comparative study of Bengali letterforms: decolonial perspectives for the development of variable Bengali fonts.
Yong Ring (2021– ) : Typographical variations in Chinese print: missionaries, metal type and printing press in late imperial China (1813-1860).
Andrew Byrom (2021– ) : The interpretation of suggested/predictive (unknown) forms in dimensional typeface design.
Najla Badran (2017– ) : Diacritics in the Arabic script and typography.
Sorin Pintilie (2018–22) : Thinking with type through materialities: a theoretical approach to digital type systems.
Ferdinand Ulrich (2015– 22) : The discourse in early digital type design technologies.
Arjun Khara (2018–22) : Facilitating fairness: a critical analysis of government forms in the Republic of Singapore from 2007 to 2020.
Mohamad Dakak (2017–22) : Towards understanding inconsistency in Arabic type design and its effect on Arab readership.
Borna Izadpanah (2016–21) : Typesetting Persian books and newspapers: the tensions between traditionalism, modernity, and perceptions of national identity.
David Osbaldestin (2014–21) : The sans serif in nineteenth-century printed ephemera: a Birmingham and the Midlands case-study. (registered at BCU/BIAD)
Esra Bulut Peynirci (2019–20) : [The contribution of Geographical Information Systems to a web-based system for the improvement of a participatory approach in Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Hampshire]
Victor Gaultney (2015–20) : Italics redefined: influences and approaches in the design of contemporary secondary text typefaces.
Pria Ravichandran (2015–20) : The development of typographic forms for Kannada and Telugu scripts.
Eduardo Novais (2018–19) : Methodology for the teaching of calligraphy in undergraduate courses of graphic design. Visiting researcher from the Universidade Federal de Pernambuco.
Riccardo Olocco (2015–19) : A new method of analyzing printed type : the case of 15th-century Venetian romans.
Elena Papassissa (2015–19) : Armenian typefaces from 1840 to the present: traditionalism, Latinisation, and the search for identity through changing technologies.
Emanuela Conidi (2013–18) : Early Arabic types in Europe and the Middle East between the XVI and XIX centuries.
Helena Lekka (2012–16) : Linotype’s design of new Greek typefaces for photocomposition in the Greek printing market, 1970-1980.
Matthew Lickiss (2012–15) : Relationships between document instantiations across systems, mediums, and genres. | Book available online
Jeanne-Louise Moys (2009–12) : Typography and reader perceptions of affect in document design.
Research Advisory Group member
Alastair Montgomery (2010–) : Typographic variables on reading processes in dyslexic children.
Androniki Sioki (2008–14) : Reading and the morphology of the page: a historical study of the typographic design of the Greek alphabet book, 1771–1919.
Titus Nemeth (2010–13) : Arabic type making in the machine age: the influence of technology on the form of Arabic type, 1908–1993.
Myra Thiessen (2008–11) : Using visual explanations of complex verbal concepts to aid dyslexic children in literacy acquisition.
Jo De Baerdemaeker (2005–08) : Tibetan Typeforms, from 1738 up to the present day.
Invited teaching
Tsinghua University, Beijing (annually since 2019)
Brawijaya University, Malang (2023)
CAFA, Beijing (2022, 2016)
Hong Kong Design Institute (2021)
University of Ghent (2020)
ALUO, Ljubljana (2020, 2013)
écal, Lausanne (2020)
DHBW, Ravensburg (2015)
Mushashino University, Tokyo (2014)
Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok (2013)
University of Nicosia (2009, 2010, 2011, 2013)
VSUP, Prague (2012)
TDC, New York (2012, 2007)
IStype, Istanbul ( 2012)
Bezalel Academy, Jerusalem (2012)
Die Graphische, Vienna (2010)
Katowice / Cieszyn, Poland (2006, 2009)
University of Macedonia (2007, 2004, 2002)
University of Alberta (2005)
Lahti Institute of Design (2002)
Buenos-Aires (2011, 2001)
Reviewing, organising, and related work
Research evaluation
Member of the International Evaluation Panel for Research in Higher Education
Institutions 2025+ in the Czech Republic
Advisory Board member: Small Performances project (2024–)
Academic reviewer for numerous conference papers, journal articles, and book proposals (ATypI, ICTVC, Encontro de tipografia, PDLP, Grafematik, Digicom, a.o.)
Funding applications reviewer : AHRC, EPSRC, ESF
Review College member, SWW DTP2 (2019–)
Editorial Board member : Grapholinguistics and its applications ; Book 2.0 journal; Hyphen journal
Commercial / legal evaluation
Expert reviewer for typeface evaluations | expert witness in relevant legal cases (proven results; references upon request)
High Education evaluation
Academic promotions reviewer : HEIs in Canada, China, Egypt, Europe, UAE, UK, and the USA
External Examiner : PhDs in the UK, and Netherlands
External Adviser : MA Graphic Communication Design, UAL (2021)
Member of the team conducting the first institutional review for the Visual Communication sector, Israel (2018)
External Examiner : MA Graphic Design, University of Portsmouth (2009–14)
Event organisation
• ICTVC (2002, 2004, 2007, 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, 2022)
• ATypI (annually 2005–2019)
• Granshan Conference (annually 2013–17)
• Signs of the times. Munich (2022)
• Type-Tech Meetup (2020)
• Letterforms & ephemera. Reading (2019)
• Eye magazine Type Tuesday: Out of the Reading box. St Bride Library (2013)
Community leadership
ATypI : President (2017–20), Vice-President (2013–17), Board member (2004–2010, 2013–20)
Founding member: ISTVC (2011–), Granshan Foundation (2016–)
Interviews
Creating new scripts for the world. World Endangered Writing Day (January 2025)
The economics of everyday things: fonts. Freakonomics podcast (December 2024)
How Writing is Shaped: language, culture, and typography. Endangered Alphabets (January 2023)
When Typography met Tech Comms. ISTC podcast (January 2022)
The Role of Individuals and Institutions in Knowledge Production. Type Platform (December 2021)
Ο Έλληνας που διδάσκει τυπογραφία τους Άγγλους. Καθημερινή. (May 2015)
Ο μοναδικός Έλληνας καθηγητής τυπογραφίας. Ημερησία. (April 2015)
On constructive feedback in design. For a book by Mariana Mota on verbal communication and leadership in design. (March 2015) • on YouTube
Джерри Леонидас про учёбу в Университете Рединга. Шрифт. Russia (2014) • English edition (2015) • Unedited version
Etiketa za mleko naj bo nežna, s tipografijo podobno rokopisu. DELO newspaper, Slovenia (2013)
8 Faces magazine, UK (2012)
Haaretz newspaper, Israel (2012)
Design education. TYPO 43 magazine, and longer version online, Czech Republic (2011)
FontClub Korea. Interview by Chang Kim (2011)
Η δύναμη της γραμματοσειράς. Πολίτης της Κυριακής (Politis on Sunday) newspaper, Cyprus (2011)
Εκπαίδευση γραφιστικής στην Ελλάδα. Marketing Week, Greece (2010)
Písmový guru. Font magazine, Czech Republic (2009)
CAP&Design magazine, Sweden (2007)
TypeRadio. New York (2005)
Επιλογές (Epiloges) magazine, Greece (2004)
Ο γητευτής των γραμμάτων. Έψιλον / Ελευθεροτυπία [Epsilon / Eleftherotypia] newspaper, Greece (2002)