Throughout our creative lives we have sifted through everything to select what we thought best. We sifted through materials to find those for which we have the closest affinity. We sifted through colors, textures, typefaces, images, and gradually we built a vocabulary of materials and experiences that enable us to express our solutions to given problems - our interpretations of reality. It is imperative to develop your own vocabulary of your own language - a language that attempts to be as objective as possible, knowing very well that even objectivity is subjective.
I love systems and despise happenstance. I love ambiguity because, for me, ambiguity means plurality of meanings. I love contradiction because it keeps things moving, preventing them from assuming a frozen meaning, or becoming a monument to immobility. As much as I love things in flux, I love them within a frame of reference - a consistent reassurance that at least and at last I am the one responsible for every detail.
And that is why I love Design.
Some people are destined to be teachers, others experts in the migration habits of a particular species of moth found in South America. Me? I believe I was destined to be a designer and develop a passion for type. My grandfather, Alf Pausey, was a small business owner and typesetter for 50 years. I grew up playing cubbie houses with my sisters in and around giant stacks of paper and with the sweet smell of fresh, thick ink in my nostrils. Poppa got up early every morning, donned his blue overalls and worked hard all day manually setting lead type and printing it on his big, loud rhythmically thumping letterpress machines. I remember the big guillotines and the women in the shop with their rubber thimbles for collating the pages of client booklets. These pictures are of a letterset collection of his and an opening of one of his favourite type books, which he's given to me. Thanks, Poppa... for a heritage I'm so glad to have.
