Gerard Unger Scholarship 2022: Ploquine by Emma Marichal
Developed while studying the Type design post diploma course at Esad d’Amiens under the tutoring of Sébastien Morlighem by Emma Marichal, Ploquine is the winning typeface at this year’s Gerard Unger Scholarship 2022 program.
Inspired by wooden typefaces and intended for editorial use Ploquine’s main challenge was “to implement a tribute to wooden typefaces, which are normally intended for display rather than paragraphs within the design and operation of the family” explains the designer.
“This typeface has been thought out to meet graphic needs in a context of exhibitions and events. This type of place presents a good number of different supports and thus important hierarchy needs. In addition, several seasons and exhibitions take place during the year, and the idea was to build a strong typographic identity that could evolve over the seasons.”
“The family consists of a variable display and 5 styles for text. The drawings for the text are directly inspired by the French specimens of E. Ploquin or the French Typographic Foundry. With generous serifs and mechanical shapes, this contrasting but solid typeface is perfectly adapted for long texts in exhibition catalog for example. It is completed with its bold and italic, and also with a small size version for captions or footnotes” writes Marichal.
“Finally, the titling typeface offers a multitude of choices to the graphic designer and reinforces the interactive and creative aspect that engravers used to have in the past. Evolving on the width and with a varied panel of different serifs to play with, the graphic designer will be able to choose what will best suit the current exhibition.”
With Ploquine, Marichal has become the Gerard Unger Scholarship’s eighth recipient: Roxane Gataud (Bely), Juan Bruce (Noort), Quentin Schmerber (Temeraire), Bogidar Mascareñas (Laima), Florian Fecher (Lektorat), Anya Danilova (Rezak), and Nina Faulhaber’s upcoming Aeroplan.
Read Emma Marichal’s interview on TypeTogether here.
Tags/ typography, type design, wood type, gerard unger, scholarship, emma marichal
![Album-spécimens des caractères en bois de E. Ploquin, gendre et successeur de Chabauty-Ploquin, graveur a Bressuire (Deux-Sèvres) .. [Bressuire, ca. 1883?]. Images via Houghton Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass.](assets/original/2022/07/20/e. ploquin specimen 1.png)
