Editor’s note: This interview was first posted in our online weekly, S. P. A. C. E. We’re talking with leading practitioners of the creative process, and how we work differently, in our series of Q&A stories.
ON PROCESS. ‘I’m not sure about anything,’ he says, shrugging lightly. ‘I just try and see if it works or not.’
Today, the interview I promised with type designer Xavier Dupré.
X had met DK’s AM at an art opening in Phnom Penh.
They connected quickly in a design nerd type of way, and next thing you know, I’m talking with him animatedly about zines, layout, art, design, collage, did I say zines?!, and conversation space. Not a week later I found myself at a draw-up somewhere far from where I live. Was there with X, his friend, and a bunch of borrowed pencils, pens, erasers, sharpeners, and paper. That was fun.
LEARNING AS WE GO. I like people who try things, say yes, show up, and see what happens. (Ergo, ‘16N‘.) But very infrequently have I turned the tables and gone to someone else’s event on their invitation. Why? Conceit, probably. I usually get exceedingly bored (smalltalk, the dichotomy of ‘work’ v. ‘life’ that is tired and ridiculous, etc.) So I said ‘okay’ and went to the DrawUp meetup, which, yeah, had the kinds of people who I probably won’t see again (and would never invite to join me here in S. P. A. C. E.)
Life.
Reality.
Being honest.
But when X offered to help me lay out my next book, The Village Report, I was floored. That was nice of him!, I thought. It was the first time I got to observe someone who actually knows what he or she’s doing with text. I picked a quiet, open-air meeting spot and we sat out by the garden.
I took notes and learned some things about what makes a book design better…
DK: So what you’re saying is that you should put in space.
XD: Space, yes! Space is important.
DK: …
XD: …
DK: …
XD: The right-side margin. You want it to be like this? *indicates ragged right, pointing* Or this? *hits ‘justify text’ button*
DK: Oh, huh. Justified. Is that how it is in books? *picking up Flatland* Oh, yeah. It’s justified here.
XD: This is how it is in books, usually. Yes. *smiles*
DK: I like that. I like how you just added lots of room on the margins, and then you increased the line spacing. Right? And now you are spreading out the letter spacing in the titles.
DK starts daydreaming, abstractedly. It’s reminding me of the chiropractor, she thinks to herself. The feeling of getting your bones to go in a way that opens up the space between them, a bit. And yoga. Yoga class is like that, too. I think that there is something symmetrical here, with the layout you are doing… the design.
XD: Layout isn’t my speciality, but I like to help friends.
DK: Thank you! What is your specialty?
XD: Type.
DK: Right, right. I mean, I knew that. I did. I didn’t know that you could be so zeroed in one thing, and just one thing, like that, though. Well, wait. Maybe I did know that.
DK thinks to herself, Every year or so I meet some kind of a virtuoso. One year it was a violinist… Then, there was this yoga teacher I had—back to yoga, there—and once, there was a joiner, in Ireland. Wow. You should have seen the way he was looking at my photographs, this would’ve been print photos, when I’d come back from a tour of castles in Japan. It was cool. When you watch the way someone who knows a thing deeply studies a thing you are sharing, and does it with an expert eye, it is beautiful to observe. Gosh, those musical ones, conversations in a fresh kind of space!, were so intriguing, and everything…
… Yes, and here, watching you do this now. Sure is nice. I’m lucky! That… the extra pages. There are… yeah. Sixty, I think?, now that you’ve spread it out maybe sixty, yes.
XD: …
DK: You’re really patient.
XD: It used to be much more boring. Before, before there was software… you had to do it by hand. If it wasn’t right you had to do it all again. Yeah.
*examining the number of words per line, and scowling at a lone orphan*
That’s not… that’s not nice.
DK: …
XD: … Hm.
Time. Typesetting. DK watches XD work, thinking about how it reminds her of the concert, far away now, the one with a magnificent violin solo… then reading Duet for One, way later… but the old timing, moment, shared-space feeling… a small, intimate venue. One in which everyone in the audience was raptured, seeing that mastery is a thing, a real thing, and enjoying that it is, and that we were each privy to it. Something human in that… Humanity’s virtue… The feeling that maybe things aren’t so bad, if we have art, we are OK…
XD: Something’s not right here.
*fussing* *squinting*
That should not do like that. See this line? No. It should not do that.
DK: I think that means we’re done for today.
XD: Well, I can work on this and send it to you. The file.
DK: I don’t have InDesign. I used to. I guess I could download a trial version for when it comes time to doing the final edits.
XD: …
DK: *somewhat embarrassed* Actually, well. I’ve been using Word.
XD: *nonjudgmental, but probably cringing inwardly* I don’t know how to use that. Hm. Now, look. This is a great typeface. It has so many things. Old style numbers. Swashes. All these glyphs, see, this is where—sorry, it’s in French—this is where you can find them. Use small caps here at the start of the line, I think? I think it’s nice. Small caps are nice.
DK: Wow, yeah. I… I see what you mean. The page feels better already.
XD: …
DK: Did you see Helvetica?
XD: What?
DK: Helvetica. The movie?
XD: Oh, oh. Helvetica. Yes, of course.
DK: You didn’t like it.
XD: I hate Swiss type.
DK: I’m going to see a movie after this. It’s… *looking around for a sign*… Have you seen it? Any interest in joining me?
XD: Oh, I saw that on the plane. It’s very French, I don’t think you will like this one. It’s very boring. It’s… well…. It’s weird…
DK: Weird is okay. I come here to watch them sometimes. I’m just in the mood to be quiet for a bit, you know, in the cool theater and just watching someone else’s work.
XD: *skeptical*
DK: What?
XD: Well, I saw it and they had censored parts of it on the flight I was on. Really.
DK: That really bothered you, huh. The blurred out lines of the subtitles? Little things. Bug you, don’t they!
XD: Details.
DK: When is it nice? With the books, I mean?
XD: When it’s nice is when there is enough space around, good use of italics, small caps and big caps, a mix of all. Not good to mix different fonts.
DK: Sounds like what you’re saying is when you can use the breadth of potential that’s behind each typeface, right? Like all that it can do… Hm.
XD: …
DK: Thank you for this. I’m learning a lot, just watching. I think I need to revisit my other books now, and make more space in between the letters. But yeah. I get it. Details.
XD: You might have a really nice piece of writing, but if it doesn’t feel good to read it, it can be ignored. People might say, ‘That’s not a good book,’ but really, it’s just badly laid out.
DK: Huh. I spend a lot of time on the start point of things, I think. I just get them going. But here you are, finishing it all. Finishes and flourishes and swashes and ligatures, even.
XD: It makes it more literary. Ligatures. Don’t you think?
DK: Yes. And… yeah, even though… you don’t have to do it. You just want to. Make it better. Hm. That’s kind of you. I think this is going to be the best book, so far, of the lot. Details make the difference, huh.
XD: Of course. Details. Details are important.
Published in S. P. A. C. E.