Old Roots, New Energy: A typeface design between two continents
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The 2026 Justin Howes Memorial Lecture was given by Nina Stössinger on 2 April, 2026.
“Twelve years ago, traveling between the Netherlands, Belgium, and Norway, I started drawing a typeface that I have finally finished – in New York City. Cassis took inspiration from the visual environments I found on both sides of the Atlantic; this is its story, and a reflection on how relocating from the orderly visual environment of my native Switzerland to the joyful cacophony of New York City has changed my way of looking at, and thinking about, letterforms.” Nina Stössinger
Nina Stössinger (she/they) is the Senior Typeface Designer at Frere-Jones Type – an independent typeface design studio in Brooklyn – and a Critic for typeface design at Yale School of Art. In addition to several retail typefaces, Nina has designed or co-designed custom type for Microsoft, SAS Institute, the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C., the New York City Football Club, and New York’s Metropolitan Transit Authority, among others. Nina previously served on the Board of Directors of the Type Directors Club and chaired the 22nd TDC Typeface Design Competition. Their work has won various awards and been exhibited internationally. Originally from Basel in Switzerland, they studied multi-media design in Halle/Germany, and typeface design in Zurich and The Hague. Nina enjoys the way type design sits at intersections of form and content, language, history, and technology; she aims to never stop learning.