Composition and layout

Member lesson

The Swiss grid tradition

Lesson 15 of 27 in Composition and layout.

The Swiss Grid | Presented by Angelina Lippert · SoDA Baltimore (Society of Design Arts)
Lesson

The style that formed in Switzerland in the 1950s, around Basel and Zurich, is the source of most of what design schools still teach about grids. Josef Müller-Brockmann's writing on grid systems became the standard text, and Emil Ruder and Armin Hofmann taught a generation.

12 columns · 8px gutterspans 5spans 6
A twelve-column grid with gutters, and a block spanning five columns.
A designer at a drafting table ruling a pencil grid on a poster sheet with a T-square, with a photograph and text blocks placed on the grid.
A designer in a 1950s studio rules a grid with a T-square and places a photograph on it. The Swiss style built each page on a measured grid and kept personal flourishes out.
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  1. Question 1, locked

    Which of these words means this? “The Swiss school. Grids, sans-serif type, ranged left, photography over illustration.”

    • Module
    • International Typographic Style
    • One idea
    • Apophenia
  2. Question 2, locked

    Which of these words means this? “The claim that design should present information rather than express the designer.”

    • Negative space
    • Fold
    • Objectivity
    • Repetition
  3. Question 3, locked

    Which of these words means this? “Flush left, ragged right. A Swiss default, and a rejection of justified type.”

    • Ground
    • White space
    • Ranged left
    • Spread

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