Category Archives: Multisensory

Drawing the typography of London with the Google Fonts team

The team from Google Fonts joined me to draw along with a Virtual London Type Safari. We explored the culture and history of a vibrant area in East London, discovering the secrets hidden in the signs over shops, pubs and buildings.

Some of the signs have been hidden for decades and tell stories about the area’s rich history. Many reflect the fashions of different eras—the 1800s, the 1920s, the 1970s and today. Some are practical and utilitarian, others are painted by hand. Look a little closer and many have revealing telltale characteristics for you to spot.

We paused at each sign to do a quick four-minute sketch of its letters. Each sign was paired with a song to bring its atmosphere to life. There were also sniffables and a surprise London-themed snack for one of the participants to try on-camera.

Would you like to book a draw-along Virtual London Type Safari with your team?
Start your journey here

Immerse yourself in the emotional impact of fonts, an experience for all the senses

Join me to explore Mood 1 from the Adobe MAX immersive installation.

Put your headphones on and play this while you look at the photos*
Click here to play the sound.

How does it make you feel? What smells and flavours would you pair with this mood?

**

I first came across this weird looking type style in Rob Roy Kelly’s book of American Wood Type 1828–1900. It’s a crazy mashup of three styles: a gothic (sans serif) + tuscan (fancy bifurcated serifs) + Italienne (reverse contrast).

This is Cottonwood, designed by Barbara Lind, Joy Redick, and Kim Buker Chansler. From Adobe Originals.

These photos are from the large-scale multisensory installation I created at the last in-person Adobe MAX at the L.A. Convention Centre in Los Angeles.

Visitors were immersed in the mood of different typefaces through all of their senses. At each station they were invited to put on headphones, to smell a scent in a jar or by flipping the pages of a book, to eat a small taster and to feel a texture. Each set of stimuli was designed to bring a mood to life in the participant’s imagination. There was curiosity and intrigue as the first visitors arrived and they were soon returning with groups of friends saying “you have to try this”.

“The experience that Type Tasting designed for the Adobe Fonts booth at Adobe MAX was such a fun, intriguing way for people to explore how their reactions to fonts relate to other sensations” Dan Rhatigan, Adobe Fonts

Sound designer Rob Taliesin Owen created bespoke sounds and a bespoke scent was created by 4160 Tuesdays. The installation was produced and run with the wonderful Adobe Fonts team.

“Font ‘tasting’, it was awesome! You could smell, hear and taste the fonts”, “F!ing genius!”.

*If the link doesn’t work listen to Suite Punta Del Este by Astor Piazzolla.

“F!ing genius!” Visitors experienced the emotional impact of fonts with an immersive, multisensory installation in L.A.


I’ve been creating immersive and multisensory installations for a number of years now. They’ve been on hold during Covid but plans are now underway for the future. This is the large-scale multisensory installation I created at Adobe MAX at the L.A. Convention Centre in Los Angeles.

Visitors were immersed in the mood of different typefaces through all of their senses. At each station they were invited to put on headphones, to smell a scent in a jar or by flipping the pages of a book, to eat a small taster and to feel a texture. Each set of stimuli was designed to bring a mood to life in the participant’s imagination. There was curiosity and intrigue as the first visitors arrived and they were soon returning with groups of friends saying “you have to try this”.

“The experience that Type Tasting designed for the Adobe Fonts booth at Adobe MAX was such a fun, intriguing way for people to explore how their reactions to fonts relate to other sensations” Dan Rhatigan, Adobe Fonts

Sound designer Rob Taliesin Owen created bespoke sounds and a bespoke scent was created by 4160 Tuesdays. The installation was produced and run with the wonderful Adobe Fonts team.

“Font ‘tasting’, it was awesome! You could smell, hear and taste the fonts”

  • Type Tasting installation at Adobe MAX in Los Angeles

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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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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Experience the emotional impact of type: Mood at MAX multisensory installation

Type Tasting installation at Adobe MAX in Los Angeles

Type Tasting created a large-scale multisensory installation for Adobe Fonts at the Adobe MAX conference in Los Angeles from 2nd to 6th November 2019.

“F*!*ing genius!”

Visitors were immersed in the mood of different typefaces through all of their senses. At each station they were invited to put on headphones, to smell a scent in a jar or by flipping the pages of a book, to eat a small taster and to feel a texture. Each set of stimuli was designed to bring a mood to life in the participant’s imagination. There was curiosity and intrigue as the first visitors arrived and they were soon returning with groups of friends saying “you have to try this”.

This is a multisensory installation featuring a selection of booths designed for participants to experience the emotional impact of type. Each booth immerses you in the mood of a typeface with sound, smell, texture and taste.

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How designing for all the senses has more impact on mood

We absorb information through all of our senses simultaneously. This speeds up our ability to judge situations and react quickly and is fundamental to our ability to recognise signals and communicate. This played a vital role in human survival when our ancestors needed to respond to danger quickly, often relying on sound or smell when it was dark and a large proportion of our genes are still devoted to detecting odours.

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A brilliant, and absolutely crazy journey into typography

Teaching typography at the Ecole Intuit Lab Mumbai

Sarah Hyndman took Type Tasting to the Ecole Intuit Lab, a design college in Mumbai, India, where she spent a week teaching typography to sixty second and third year students. This is the experience of the week in the words of the students: Neha Godambe, Ruchi Mehta, Shruti Vidyanand, Tvesha Shah and Zahra Dhuliawala.

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Case study: One week typography course, Mumbai, India

mumbai-slideshow

By Sarah Hyndman

Client: Ecole Intuit Lab, Mumbai, India
Duration: One week
Participants: 60 year II and year III students
Read an interview with the students

A week long course for second and third year students at a graphic design institute in Mumbai.

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