Resources for amateur architects

At the weekend, I was clearing out a pile stuff I'd been hoarding for years and came across this sheet of Letraset transfers for architects.

Can't remember why I bought them. Perhaps I was going to design a shopping centre.

But did real architects actually use these things? I bought them in 1999, I think. But they're clearly from a time before computers and CAD. It says it was copyrighted in 1982 on the top. But it seems like the characters have stepped out of the sixties. Or fifties, even. Look at the bowler-hatted dude: Can't stop, I'm brimming with post-war optimism. Just like Alec Guinness on the poster for The Man in the White Suit.

As a spotty kid who was vaguely interested in art and design, I used to get sheets of rub-on type to make birthday cards (yes, they looked horrible). And I remember thinking of these architecture bits of the Letraset range as the epitome of cool, urban, design sophistication (Yeah, all right, I know. But I did grow up in the sticks).

Perhaps it never was the design leader that I remember. Perhaps I was too young to appreciate good design. All I know is that today, the Letraset website makes the company look like, like...well, like Hobbycraft. Or was it always like that?
 

Comments

[Rob]

Great post! I have some of these with guys on wearing huge flares. I'll have to dig them out and share the wealth.

[Patrick]

Share the flares, dude. Share the flares.