Tag Archives: Installation

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?

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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

Visit the Apothecary of Curiosities


What do you collect?

I’m a sucker for typographic ephemera and you’ve glimpsed the objects I collect in the background at my online events. Maybe you spotted Phrenny the phrenology head, the black lobster, jars of stale Helvetica, bottles for font sniffing, rescued shop sign letters, a zoetrope, or packaged childhood memories. I’m asked about them all the time and each curious object has a story to tell.

Now you can visit the online Apothecary of Curiosities to check out the objects and read their stories.

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Would you like to become an official curiosity sponsor?

Take a look through the collection—which is your favourite curiosity? You can now be its proud sponsor. You’ll receive an official certificate of sponsorship and you’ll be credited here as the sponsor. You’re also amazing because you’ll be supporting my research and writing.

More objects will be added to the virtual collection so if a curiosity catches your eye that isn’t listed yet, just drop me a message and call first dibs on it.

Visit the Apothecary of Curiosities and pick the curiosity from the collection that you’d like to sponsor. Then head to the Sponsor a Curiosity tier on Patreon.

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Curiosities shown: C/13 Phrenny, C/1 Black Lobster, H/5 Jar of Brilliant Ideas, D/14 The H that Ran Away from the Circus, H/11 Caustic Sarcastic Scathing Bitter, G/4 Zoetrope the Analogue Animation Machine, A/18 Matchmaking of Ampersands, F/0 1777 Not-by-Baskerville Prayer Book, H/16 Preserved Scent of Childhood.
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Official sponsor’s certificate.

Visit the Apothecary of Curiosities.

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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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