South Ribble Borough Council Official Guide

From LCC municipal, a website concerned with “the London County Council, GLC, pre- and post-1965 boroughs in London”. Strictly speaking, South Ribble as a borough of Lancashire in North West England falls outside their focus, but the typeface was too good – or weird – not to post this find to Twitter.

Issued in 1976, the guide uses Countdown on the cover. The futuristic face with the extreme and asymmetrical vertical contrast was made available as rubdown type by Letraset in 1965, as the first published typeface design by Colin Brignall (born in Warwickshire in 1940). “A typeface that says ‘together into the 1980s!’”, as Will Wiles notes in the replies.

Owen O’Doherty adds: “The combination of the two is great. Conjures images of teenage clerk on a mission, making selections from a limited stock at the small print shop round the corner from the town hall. ‘Do you have anything, y’know, trendy?’” The second typeface used for “Official Guide” is indeed quite different, and much older. Granby is an epigone of Edward Johnston’s Railway Type, AKA Johnston (1916), and also shares its distinctive diamond-shaped dots. It was issued by Sheffield-based type foundry Stephenson Blake in 1930.

A similar clash of periods and styles unfolds between the traditional coat of arms and the modernistic SR logo. On a side note, the motto shows lettering that appears to be based on Univers Condensed (at least the caps), a typeface that’s not much older than Countdown. The position of the SR logo with the hyperextended strokes suggests the layout is the outcome of a dogmatic design system. It’s certainly unusual to see an off-center coat of arms. All in all, it’s a wild mix. Thanks for sharing, Ian!