Category Archives: Live interactive Zoom events

Fantastical Fonts with Sarah Hyndman: online live events

🔊Listen to the audio version

Not-to-be-missed interactive, funny and fantastical live events. Sarah’s on a mission to make typography exciting for everybody by inviting you to take part in games and demonstrations so you can make the discoveries for yourself.

Come along to this fun and irreverent online event with author Sarah Hyndman. Join in with games from her bestselling book Why Fonts Matter. She’ll answer as many of your questions as possible, no questions are too silly or too strange!

Ideal for beginners, students and anybody curious about reading fonts. We’re all font consumers in our everyday lives. Sarah will show you that you’re already an expert, even if you don’t realise it.

WHO’S THAT FONT?
Tuesday 14th September, 7pm to 8pm (BST)
Do fonts have personalities? Which would you date, ditch or just be friends with? What does a font reveal about your personality?

DO FONTS SMELL?
Tuesday 28th September 7pm to 8pm (BST)
What might different fonts smell like and what memories do they evoke? Can a font make your jellybean taste different? How do fonts interact with all your senses?
Bring a matching pair of jellybeans for an experiment.
ÂŁ1.99 per person, only 25 tickets.
Book here

Once you’ve purchased your ticket you’ll be sent the Zoom details. Please tell your friends, let’s have some fun.

Are you ready to immerse yourself in the fantastical world of fonts?

About your host
Sarah Hyndman demystifies the amazing world of typography. She is the author of Why Fonts Matter. She is a TEDx speaker, a regular on radio (BBC Radio 4’s Word of Mouth with Michael Rosen, Saturday Live, Today.) and TV (Channel 4’s Sunday Brunch). Sarah is a multisensory typography expert and collaborates on studies with Professor Charles Spence of the University of Oxford.

Typography is changing, are you ready?

Typography is changing. Two decades dominated by sans serif typefaces are coming to an end, which type designer Charles Nix describes as “the waning end of a supertrend”. Are you (and your team) ready for this new and exciting typographic landscape?

Find out about workshops / Arrange a 10-minute call

It’s an exciting time to explore how type reflects culture right now. I was delighted to run online workshops recently with the inspiring type designers at international type foundry Monotype. This was such a brilliant opportunity for all of us to compare notes as we explored the themes and trends we’ve been seeing and chatted about what we think is coming next.

“I loved the event. I know we are trying to make do with the pandemic situation, but I truly feel like this event was even more impactful and inspirational with this format than being with a bunch of people in an auditorium. Sarah was amazing.”

I think that looking at what’s changing typographically reveals the wider cultural themes of what people care about today. After a year when so much has changed, what things really matter to you today? What do you really value and/or what no longer seems important?

Are you and your team ready for the new typographic landscape and the fast-paced changes that are happening?

How to spot and decode typography trends

You can spot the trends and themes for yourself by keeping a visual diary and by following the people who are talking about what’s happening. This is a great way to future proof your typographic skills in a time of fast-paced change that trends, foresight and strategy company The Future Laboratory call “the great acceleration”.

  1. Think about what’s important to you, how might this have changed over the last year?
  2. When you look at what’s happening in the world, how are cultural attitudes changing?
  3. Take a look at the typographic landscape of the products and services you interact with today—can you see any styles or themes becoming prominent that you might not have seen a few years ago?
  4. When you think about these in context of changing cultural attitudes, do you think there are any links?
  5. Are there any companies or products that you think are doing this really well (or really badly)?
  6. How can you incorporated what you’ve observed into your own design process?

Want to find out faster?

You can book a highly interactive online workshop wherever you are in the world. Your team will be prepared for this exciting new typographic landscape with the tools they need to make effective typography choices.

Decoding Type Trends (Semiotics) Masterclass

From ÂŁ800 (education discounts are available).
This is a live online workshop, which can be delivered anywhere in the world.
Availability is limited.

Discover how to decode the typography of everyday products. What does it reveal about changing moods and attitudes? How does it motivate your decisions? How can you future-proof your typographic choices? With a formula for making typographic choices that you can use today and into the future.

Ideal for designers, communications and marketing teams, students.

Find out more

Arrange a 10-minute call

Come to a Typographic Swearing Workshop on Valentine’s Day

Would you like an alternative way to spend Valentine’s Day? Come along to an online Typographic Swearing Workshop and get creative.

THIS IS NOT A DATE—everybody’s welcome. This is an antidote to all the gooey cuteness of Valentine’s Day.

This is a typographically fun and rebelliously creative workshop where you can vent some frustration using fonts. Learn about rebellious typography through history. Explore the sounds that make swear words so satisfying. Subvert lettering to create your own typographic profanities. Suitable for all, no experience needed and you can join this virtual session from anywhere in the world.

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Professional development typography masterclasses

Professional development typography masterclasses—not just for designers!

Invest in the professional development of your company with effective Zoom workshops that are engaging and fun with plenty of “aha!” moments.

Typography is the voice of your brand and it’s important for everybody in a company to understand some basics, not just graphic designers.

This is a series of Zoom masterclasses hosted by author, researcher and Type Tasting founder Sarah Hyndman. Sarah’s an expert in making learning fun and is on a mission to make typography exciting for everybody. Each masterclass focuses on an experiential area of typography with enlightening activities, engaging demonstrations and useful how-to guides. These are currently available as live Zoom sessions, which means you can join a masterclass from anywhere in the world.

Ideal for departments across the whole company, not just designers
These are interesting, inspiring and fun workshops with clear and empowering takeaways for people from all roles in a company. They’re ideal as a team-building session or to reinforce the importance of coherent use of language and fonts for your brand.

You can arrange a private session for your group or organisation, or come along as an individual to a public event. Private sessions are modified to suit the participants.

“Such a fun, interesting and inspiring workshop with clear and empowering takeaways. It reinforced the importance of coherent presentation of our brand for colleagues from all parts of our company, in all types of roles.” Nicky Borowiec, Springer Nature

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Calling all freelancers, come to a Christmas creativity lunchtime party

Christmas letter making party

Join me for an online Christmas creativity lunchtime party

Lunchtime Christmas letter making
Painting with fonts (live interactive Zoom)

Join Sarah Hyndman author of the bestselling book Why Fonts Matter live to learn about decorative illuminated manuscript letters or Victorian ‘fishtail’ letters. Draw your own letters to send as Christmas cards or for future creative projects.

3 tickets for the price of 2, why not celebrate with freelance friends!

Secret Santa
You’ll get a gift of a mystery chapter from the book Why Fonts Matter (pdf) and your own lighthearted Christmas cracker fortune prediction!

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8 proven tips for creating brilliant online events

Since April 2020 I’ve created and hosted more than 50 online events and I’ve been joined by so many people from countries around the world. This has given me the opportunity to really find out what works and how to create a brilliant online event. Here are 8 proven tips you can use to transform your online event from average to “magnificent”*.

1. Make the decision to create an event and not a webinar.

Decide at the outset whether you’re creating an event or a webinar. A webinar is a passive experience for viewers as their cameras and microphones are off, whereas an event invites active participation.

2. Embrace the live event experience.

Imagine that you’re gathering a group of people together in real life. Make it clear from the outset that you’d like cameras on and explain that this is because it’s a social event and you’d like everybody to feel like they’re in the same room together.

3. Build interactivity into the event.

I invite people to respond in the chat box and, when appropriate, to turn on their microphones and talk. With a really large audience I find it’s amazing to see the stream of chat comments responding to what I’m saying, or with exclamations like “wow” and “haha”. This really connects me to the ripples of audience reactions so I can gauge the response as I would with an in-person audience.

4. Make the interactivity inclusive.

I think it’s important for everybody to feel seen and heard but not uncomfortable. I’m not a fan of cheesy games that make people feel silly or quizzes that feel more like an exam. I like my audience to feel smart and that they’ve learned something new during an event. For example, I might ask what kind of music a Gothic-style letter on a record cover suggests — everybody then gets to compare their answers with each other and to have fun discovering that there are lots of different associations.

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Online Christmas and New Year office parties

Are you looking for a refreshing virtual Christmas or New Year party for your company?

Are you fed up with Zoom quizzes and cheesy online games? Would you like a smart, fun and memorable office party that “captures peoples imagination and immerses everyone in the whole experience”?

Author Sarah Hyndman creates brilliant events for company Christmas parties & New Year socials, hosted live on Zoom for participants anywhere in the world. Office party events combine booze, storytelling, humour, history, labels, non-cheesy interaction, interesting and useless facts. The G&T event includes a multi-sensory demonstration based on Sarah’s published research.

You’ll get a BYO menu of easy-to-source items so you and your team can drink along together. Events are broadcast live from the Type Tasting studio in an old Victorian chocolate factory in East London.

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Learn in lockdown & meet people around the world

As another lockdown is about to begin here in England I’ve been thinking about ways I can help at a difficult time for so many. I’m creating new Learn in lockdown workshops on Sundays starting this coming weekend (scroll down to see the dates and topics). These are interactive and fun creative sessions, which are suitable for all levels and you can join in from anywhere in the world.

I know from the conversations I have with so many of you that there’s a shared feeling of loneliness and isolation during lockdowns. In response to this, my live Zoom workshops are packed with interactivity and you’re encouraged to keep your cameras on where possible so we all feel like we’re in the same room together.

There’s an option for a small group to join me for a chat after the event. I’ve been finding that this is a wonderful opportunity to talk about the event with people from around the world and to hear how so many of our experiences are shared.

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The psychology of fonts to the language of chocolate

Learn about the psychology of typography & the ‘secret’ messages hidden in plain sight. Learn as you drink at a fun and boozy social event. Learn about the language of chocolate wrappers or the history of type told in 10 record covers…

Did you join me for a virtual Type Safari through East London at Adobe MAX on Tuesday? Amazingly over 10,300 people signed up to join me and it’s now available on catchup here (free with Adobe CC). 

I’m excited to announce that I’ve been busy creating new interactive events for November and December. Check out the calendar of events here. I’m also getting booked up for private and corporate sessions as seasonal socials and professional development events; What’s Your Type? has been proving extremely popular. Please drop me a line if this interests you. 

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Scary letters & frightening fonts (Draw & learn online)



Get spooky creating your own scary words to haunt your social media or to frighten your friends and family.

Come on a chilling tour of frightening fonts—from Victorian book covers and ghostly fairground rides to childhood sweet wrappers and horror movie posters. Draw along and create letters inspired by sounds that will chill you to your core. Learn about fonts and discover the thing that will truly scare the graphic designer in your life.

This is an hour of truly terrifying typography? Do you dare to join in?

Join in live for an hour of spooky fun, with a unique-to-you link to the recording of that session for 24-hours so you can take part on catchup at a time that suits you.

Price per person ÂŁ8 / ÂŁ4 (those financially impacted by Covid-19).
Advance booking essential, the number per session is capped so don’t miss out.

** Book with friends, 20% discount for 3+ tickets (applies to full-price tickets) **

This workshop is designed for adults, older children are welcome to join in if they have an adult with them to help, each child’s ticket is ÂŁ4.

This is a brand new event, I’d appreciate it if you would please click ‘interested’ on the Facebook page here.

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