‘Cockney Slang’ Cooper & Beatty poster – Jim Donoahue and Al Elliott, c1970

The Cockney Slang poster focuses mainly on Lettergraphics faces although Donoahue and Elliott did manage to sneak in one Headliners face. ‘Bubble & Squeak’ is set in neo-Charade outline shadow, one of Elliott’s recent additions to the Headliners library.
The title lettering for Cockney Slang is composed using two separate outlines, with an inside shadow, all hand drawn on illustration board. The first outline is a thin line around the actual lettering, that outline is surrounded by a white space which is defined by a slightly heavier outline. Finally, the first inner thin line is also part of a shadow inside the base letter that, at its thickest, is the same weight as the heavy outside line. The two words form a deliberately complex composition that cleverly depicts the convoluted nature of cockney slang.
Main image for this archive item. Click to enlarge the image.
Main image for this archive item. Click to enlarge the image.
Main image for this archive item. Click to enlarge the image.
Main image for this archive item. Click to enlarge the image.
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Notes

We feel justified in giving this piece a shared credit. The poster itself was designed by Jim Donoahue, Cooper & Beatty Art Director. The title was hand lettered by Al Elliott who at the time, was with Headliners, the photo lettering division of C&B. We are fortunate to have both the poster and the original artwork for the title. This poster is a little unusual in that it was designed to promote Cooper & Beatty’s other photo lettering services.

Photo lettering was charged by the word and Headliners, Cooper & Beatty’s primary lettering studio, was quite expensive, so the type shops also offered less expensive photo lettering services. These secondary services would typically supply ‘galley’ strips of lettering that the client would assemble into jobs or headlines themselves. The libraries for this type of lettering also used 2-inch film fonts from a variety of sources including; Film-o-type, Visual Graphics Corporation (VGC) and Lettergraphics.

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Artifact Data

Article Data

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Date

c
1970

Title

Cockney Slang

Description

Two-colour poster Hand lettering: ink on illustration board

15 × 12 inches lettering :10.5 inches wide

Publication

Publisher

Credits

Agency:
Studio:
Creative_Director:
Art_Director:
Design: Jim Donoahue
Typography:
Hand_Lettering: Al Elliott
Calligraphy:
Illustration:
Art:
Author:
Writing:
Printing:
Biography:

Principal Typefaces

Display: Hand lettering, various photo lettering faces
Text: Bookman (Monotype)
Find more:

Region

Ontario

Language

Holding

Poster: Private collection of Jeffery Elliott Lettering: Canadian Typography Archives

Related Documents & Links

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Copyright Status

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We will be posting more like this. If you have work or insights that you would be willing to share with the CTA we would like to hear from you. Please contact us to contribute.