Legibility Is It Important?

Discuss that legibility is an important aspect of typographic design by illustrating the works of some leading type designers.

In most cases we are using typography to communicate information. If that information cannot be read or interpreted the intended message is lost or it looses it’s readability. Most of the time legibility will impact not only interpretation, but also the speed of interpretation. These two flavors, legibility and readability, are the key ingredients to the clarity of typography.

Legibility is referring to the ease of discerning one letter from another. Readability is referring more to how the typeface is used and how easily words, phrases or sections of type can be read.

Claude Garamond, worked as an apprentice punch-cutter / printer in 1510. He was a Frenchman developed his Garamond type off the roman font Griffo. At one point he grew so popular with his successful type designs in Europe that King Francois I, demanded that he develop a Greek typeface, which later was knows as “Grecs du Roi”. Today reading Garamond text on a page still requires little effort. Garamond is well known for his use by book designers for over 450 years.

Garamond is also found in many advertisements today. Here are a few:
Abercrombie & Fitch
Motrin
Neutrogena
Apple
http://www.pointlessart.com/education/loyalist/typeTalk/garamond/present.html

Resources:
http://www.typophile.com/node/30388
http://www.fontbureau.com
http://www.fonts.com/aboutfonts/articles/typography/legibility.htm
http://www.pointlessart.com/education/loyalist/typeTalk/garamond/index2.html