Tobias Frere-Jones

Frere-Jones's work has been represented in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York since 2000.¹ According to New York Magazine, Hoefler & Co., the type foundry run by Jonathan Hoefler, employed 18 people and was developing an original font family based on a van den Keere alphabet.² According to New York Magazine, the Hoefler & Co. foundry was developing a display face called Surveyor as part of a larger font family inspired by lettering on old maps.²

According to New York Magazine, Jonathan Hoefler started the Hoefler Type Foundry in 1989.² According to AIGA Triad NC, Tobias Frere-Jones is recognized as a leading typeface designer with over 25 years of professional experience.³ According to AIGA Triad NC, Frere-Jones designed type for Martha Stewart Living and GQ.³

According to AIGA Triad NC, “Tobias received a BFA in Graphic Design from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1992”.³ According to AIGA Triad NC, the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague (KABK) awarded him the Gerrit Noordzij Prize in 2006.³ According to AIGA Triad NC, he received the AIGA Medal in 2013.³

According to AIGA Triad NC, Whitney served as a corporate typeface for Visa from 2005 to 2014.³ According to Type365, Tobias Frere-Jones is a typeface designer.^3,4 According to Type365, Frere-Jones designed Interstate.⁴

According to Type365, Frere-Jones designed Gotham.⁴ According to Type365, Frere-Jones designed Tungsten and Retina.⁴ According to Tobias Frere-Jones, Frere-Jones designed Whitney.^4,5

According to New York Magazine, the same magazine framed the central question as whether Hoefler and Frere-Jones had ever been partners at all.² Frere-Jones says Hoefler proposed an equal partnership to him in 1999.² According to New York Magazine, Whether Frere-Jones and Hoefler were genuinely partners is disputed, as the article's title suggests; the evidence pack does not give Hoefler's full account.²

According to New York Magazine, the available excerpts do not establish the legal terms of Frere-Jones's relationship with Hoefler's foundry.² According to New York Magazine, “According to Frere-Jones, in 1999, Hoefler asked him to dinner at the Gotham Bar and Grill and proposed a 50-50 partnership called Tobias and Jonathan’s Excellent Adventure LLC”.² Frere-Jones later said the transferred fonts were worth more than $3 million, yet the written sale price was $10.²

According to Jonathan Hoefler, in a 2002 email, Hoefler described Frere-Jones as a partner at his foundry since 1999.² According to AIGA Triad NC, AIGA Triad describes Frere-Jones as a leading typeface designer.³ According to Type365 / Lucas Czarnecki, a Type365 interview introduction credits him with Interstate, Gotham, Whitney, Tungsten, and Retina, among other faces.⁴

Frere-Jones believes patience is the foundation of type design work.⁴ In a Type365 interview he said patience is the foundation on which the rest of his practice is built.⁴ Frere-Jones states that historical scholarship, drawing techniques, and technical skills are useful in type design.⁴

According to Tobias Frere-Jones, he has studied historical scholarship, drawing techniques, and technical skills as part of his professional development.⁴ According to Tobias Frere-Jones, he describes his design method as starting from H, O and D, to balance weight, width and spacing.⁴ Frere-Jones said his type-design process includes balancing square, round and intermediate letterforms for weight, width and spacing.⁴ According to Tobias Frere-Jones, he recommends Updike's Printing Types as a foundation for understanding the history of type.⁴