Libbie Bischoff Talks Type, Teaching, and Creative Growth

Get ready for the summer semester with insights from Libbie Bischoff to spark your creative practice.

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Looking for creative inspiration? Libbie Bischoff shares her journey into type design, how her process has changed over time, and what teaching has added to her practice. A Minneapolis-based type designer, Libbie graduated from Type West in 2020 and launched her foundry, Type Du Nord, by making 52 fonts in one year. Teaching with Type Electives since the very beginning, she leads both the Type Design Development Workshop and Crash Courses in Type Design.

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Socko was designed by Libbie Bischoff as part of her 52 Fonts project and has now been fully developed into a 2-style, chunky sans.

Why and how did you get started in type design?

I have been interested in lettering and typography as far back as high school! I remember drawing little alphabets in the margins of my notes during class. During my undergrad, I discovered that making fonts is something that you can actually do for work and I’ve been hooked ever since!

Looking back, what advice would you give yourself when you were starting out?

I would tell myself to stop waiting until you know everything and just jump in! You learn so much more by doing things than you do by researching things. And if you can’t figure something out, there will always be a nice type designer friend that will answer your questions!

Odie is a friendly serif with dramatically high ascenders and softened corners. The original source was an inscription in a book from 1916.

What are the most important foundational skills for someone new to type design? Are there specific exercises or projects you suggest for practice?

Mastering the pen tool and plotting points on the extrema is the first and most important part of the type design process. It’s something that can be mastered in Adobe Illustrator or other vector tools before starting in type design software.

After that, it’s important to embrace and understand spacing as part of the drawing process. Drawing and spacing are inextricably linked—you can not have one without the other. It can be challenging for beginner type designers to grasp this but it’s very important!

Beyond that, it’s a matter of developing your eye, your specific type preferences, and getting lots of feedback from other type designers.

What books, blogs, or online resources had the biggest impact on your learning, and are there any “hidden gems” you think more people should know?

For me, it has always been looking at a lot of type! I encourage all my students to get off of Pinterest and look at historical references. There are so many places to find interesting bits of typography! I love looking through archive.org, the Letterform Archive, and seeing what my local library has to offer.

Oftentimes, I find great references and interesting things while exploring my other hobbies and interests. For example, I recently did a filet crochet project and I was looking at historical filet crochet patterns and I found some really interesting lettering examples. Another typeface of mine, Stockinette, was inspired by some lettering I found in a 1950’s knitting magazine. I love revival fonts and when you’re a beginner, you can learn so much from the decisions another person made!

Stockinette is a mid-century script inspired by a 1950s knitting magazine.

It’s so important to get eyes on your work. How did you find your community?

It happened quite naturally for me! I clicked with some of my classmates at Type West and some of the students I TA’d for the year after my class. We started scheduling regular virtual meetings to give each other feedback and hold each other accountable. It’s been a crucial part of my practice and I wouldn’t have made it this far without them!

How do you stay inspired or push your creative boundaries when working in a field that can sometimes feel iterative or technical?

I have two thoughts here! First, I love boundaries and limitations so I guess it’s a great spot for me to be in! I am most inspired about my work when there is a difficult problem to solve. It’s great for my brain and I love finding ways to bend the rules.

Second, staying inspired and creative is a regular practice that’s all-encompassing for me. I spend a lot of my personal time on creative projects (like knitting, sewing, drawing, painting, etc) and that usually influences my type practice and vice versa. Having a diverse range of creative pursuits helps keep things fresh and interesting! I highly recommend it—hobbies are wildly underrated!

How has your process evolved since your first typeface to now? Are there tools, habits, or checkpoints you’ve developed that have become indispensable?

My process is a lot more extensive than it was when I first started out. I do more testing and actually use the typefaces quite a lot before I release them. I have always done it to some degree but when I put on my graphic designer hat, I always find little problems to fix or things I want to add. It has the added benefit of being useful for marketing the typefaces as well!

Weightless is a monospace typeface. It is based on Senatorial, a typewriter typeface from Olympia in the 1960s.

What inspired you to start your own foundry, and how did you navigate the practical challenges of licensing, pricing, and building a sustainable business?

I have always wanted to work for myself and I love type, so running a foundry felt like a natural thing to do. I was a freelancer for many years before I started my foundry so it wasn’t that scary of a transition. The licensing, pricing, and everything else has been figured out along the way (and with a little help from my friends!).

How do you decide which projects are worth turning into a commercial typeface?

It’s a mix of what I am interested in working on, what people respond to, and how useful something may be. The percentages of each might vary for each project but those are the main factors!

To paint a picture, if I am interested in working on a project but seemingly no one would buy it and there aren’t a lot of use cases for it, then I would not move forward. Inversely, if everyone loves it, there is use for it, but I despise working on it, then it is unlikely that it will ever come to fruition. Or if it’s useful, people respond to it, and I like working on it, then I will release it! That’s the ideal situation but it doesn’t always go that way!

You’ve taught multiple Type Electives courses—how has teaching influenced your own design practice or perspective on the field?

I’ve been teaching with Type Electives since their very first term! It’s been a pleasure to share what I know with students from all over the globe. I honestly learn so much from my students! It has influenced me in countless small ways but the most important has been to find my own way of talking about type design and how I explain my process. That is something that has helped me grow in and out of the classroom!

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Be sure to follow Libbie on Instagram @typedunord for updates and inspiration. You can also dive deeper into her work through her recorded lectures, Type Design AMA: Getting Started In Type Design and Designing with Criticality & Love presented as part of the Type Electives virtual lecture series. To explore and license her fonts, visit typedunord.com.