This is the first instalment of a review of 2017—a busy and exciting year in which Type Tasting has popped up in prestigious locations both in the UK and abroad (read part 2 here).

Type Tasting founder Sarah Hyndman is on a mission to make typography relevant and engaging for all, she also believes that design can create positive change. Sarah specialises in making a complex topic accessible with originality, humour, a dash of theatre and lashings of audience participation. This year she has spoken at the launch of a new watch, a fragrance conference, she has been interviewed by The Times and on Channel 4’s Sunday Brunch. She has created an immersive exhibition for the British Academy, and run workshops for adidas, BumbleBizz, Wellcome and WGSN. The Type Tasting pop-up lab also gathered data for the latest collaborative study with the team from the University of Oxford, and her latest book was published.

Public speaking
Sarah’s interactive talks are packed with games and demonstrations that inform, entertain and challenge preconceptions. She has been a guest speaker at events such as the recent Mondaine watch press launch, the Fragrance Forum conference, and has spoken in Canada, Denmark, and India.

• Design Thinkers Toronto
• Fragrance forum, London
• Glug Birmingham
• Mondaine watch press launch pre-dinner talk
• Northern Design Symposium, Newcastle
• We Love Graphic Design, Copenhagen
• W.I. Fulham & Chelsea, London
• University of Wolverhampton

“Sarah is a fantastic speaker – she engages audiences with a brilliant mix of warmth, good humour and real insight into her subject matter – in which she is expert. She quickly warmed up a noisy crowd and had them eating out of her hand, everyone taking part (almost unheard of) and I only heard good things about her talk afterwards” Luke Tonge, Glug curator

“Insightful and entertaining…a tricky synergy to pull off – bravo!” Laura Piche, Design Thinkers Toronto

“It was great!! The audience erupted with laughter during your talk” Lisa Hassell, Glug organiser

“Just loved your typography karaoke” Amelia Roblin, Design Thinkers Toronto

Exhibitions
Sarah collaborates with exciting and innovative people such as Tasha Marks of AVM Curiosities, as well as perfumers, composers, chefs and scientists. Together they create interactive exhibitions and experiential events that take participants on a multisensory journey, immersing them in typography and culture.

British Academy ‘Pride, Prejudice & Perceptions’; an interactive exhibition and Lates event held in May. This is an interactive sensory exploration of Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice, created by AVM Curiosities & Type Tasting for the British Academy’s Literature Week. Taking inspiration from the typography found in three editions of this classic novel, Pride, Prejudice & Perceptions uses type, sound, sight and scent to serve one story three ways.

“A thoughtful and contemporary way of deconstructing Pride and Prejudice” Marisa Smith, The British Academy

“Beautiful and so original, I could have spent hours looking (and hearing and smelling)” Tora Orde-Powlett, Penguin Books

“Black lobster and Jane Austen—of course! And the aroma of the printing press mingled with violet and patchouli oil scented books, it is a sensory delight” Rosalind Freeborn

Would you like to commission a talk, workshop or event?
Get in touch with Sarah Hyndman

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Photos by Jonathan Cherry (main public speaking photo taken at Glug Birmingham); Pride, Prejudice & Perceptions by the British Academy.