Design in Typography.
Vignettes.

Much confusion in classifying material is attributable to the arbitrary nomenclature adopted by manufacturers. In the naming of works of art, no less than of natural specimens, the descriptive method is the best. The « Oak » or « Chain » border, the « Shaded Rustic » or « Expanded Latin » founts, are easily remembered; while arbitrary names like « Model, » « Milesian, » and « Philadelphia » convey no idea, and numerical names, like « Style No. 3,072 » and « Border No. 88 » are still more difficult to remember. In every composing-room names have to be invented to identify styles. « The Big Border in the Old Upper Case, » and « The New American Combination » become in time used as proper names. A customer was explaining that he wished a certain line set in a characteristic style—not exactly a plain letter, but not too ornamental, « I think, » said the foreman to the comp, « that you had better set it in that spiky pica. » « Spiky Pica! » said the customer; « I know by the sound that is the style I want. » His idea was probably unlike the reality; but the Spiky Pica was used, and the office name stuck to the fount thenceforth, and was more easily remembered than « Caslon's Two-line Nonpareil Ornamented Number Eleven » could ever have been. It is on grounds like these that we have found it necessary in these articles to adopt our own classification; and under the present heading to treat of ornaments known by different names, and in some cases inaccurately described as « combination borders. »

The term « Vignette, » or « little vine, » was originally applied to the small copper-plate engravings used to embellish title-pages, it being a fashion of the French engravers to surround such designs with a running border of vine-leaves. The term is still specifically applied to the small engraving on a title, though the vine leaf border in such a position has long been abandoned. Generally, it includes any kind of engraving or ornament not inclosed in a definite border. In photography it is applied to such portraits and views as are softened off at the margins. This limitation of meaning is not observed in typography. A title-page ornament is none the less a vignette though it take the form of a shield or medallion, or any other figure sharply defined by a boundary-line. Therefore, in its widest sense, the term may be correctly applied to any small ornament suitable for bookwork, whether it take the form of centre-ornament, side-ornament, head-, or tail-piece. It is limited to ornaments, as distinguished from diagrams or merely illustrative designs, and excludes initial ornaments, page 2which constitute a separate class. Headpieces, though not excluded, are generally described by their own specific title—especially when rectangular, and bounded by sharply-defined lines.

Until very recently, no system was observed in the designing or fabrication of these ornaments. About ten years ago, a new feature began to be introduced into combination borders, in the shape of pieces which might be used independently of the general design. The two statuettes on the preceding page are examples. The advantage of these types—clean-cut and to a definite standard—was quickly appreciated by printers, and the result has been that during the past few years, numerous attractive and systematically-designed series have been placed before the trade, under such titles as « Card, » « Classic, » « Artistic, » « Auxiliary, » and « Élite » Ornaments. The chief defect in these series, so far, has been that they run almost exclusively on corner-ornaments, to the neglect of the equally-useful head-, foot-, side-, and centre-pieces.