Cabinet designers? Type font?

[hollowstate]

Hi all:
I have heard in the past that the cathedral-shape cabinets (not necessarily Philco) were a creation of none other than Raymond Loewy (before Studebaker days). True/not True? Question: Were there other notable designers involved in radio cabinet design? Here's another question, while we're at it: What is the name of the type font used for many models' dial lettering - it is sans serif, and very orthodox. Thanks in advance for all help!

[exray]

Can't answer about the designers. I know Loewy is often mentioned.

As for fonts. Could you post an example? As for 30s Philco dials PerformaSSK is a fairly good match. One I'd like to have for my 'collection' is the font used in mid-30s RCA literature.

[hollowstate]

Howdy:
Here's a few pix of the font - not hi quality, as good camera is on the fritz, but as good as video cam and lens will do. I've seen it on many older units, but particularly on WW2 era surplus (much of which is still operable now, "MADE IN THE USA"). BTW, I do recognize the performaSSK - a pretty good match. Thanks again!

[exray]

Based mostly on pics 2 and 3 I think you might be looking for a hand-lettered font. Are you familiar with the Leroy lettering sets from the good old days?

I've searched without much success for a good 'electronic' equivalent. I came up with this one (Sublime) thats fairly close but needs work. Like manually straightening up the S ! You can squueze it and get a fairly good replication of that meter lettering. Seen some others but this is as close as I have found.

I fancied at one point dragging out the old lettering set and making my own font from a sample but never got that far.

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[Doug Houston]

I was trying to find how to change fonts or here, but it won't work. The fonts shown above resemble "Arial" quite closely. I must have about 150 different fonts on my computer. There is a great similarity between ao many of them, it's often hard to identify one against another.

I'm under the impression that a lot of advertisers, and manufacturers as well, used special fonts that weren't in standard files.

[exray]

Thats true, Doug. Most of that type of one-off thing was manual 'artwork' back in those days. I remember browsing my Dad's old college font books trying to copy the styles. I wasn't very good at it and TT fonts are a godsend!
Somebody has to sit down and recreate old time styles to make a new electronic font. There's a hobby cult in making fonts but its mostly fancy stuff for little girl's birthday cards and the like. Not many bother with plain old text font (like the RCA text mentioned above) and that also often involves a copyright search.

[Arran]

hollowstate Wrote:Hi all:
I have heard in the past that the cathedral-shape cabinets (not necessarily Philco) were a creation of none other than Raymond Loewy (before Studebaker days). True/not True? Question: Were there other notable designers involved in radio cabinet design? Here's another question, while we're at it: What is the name of the type font used for many models' dial lettering - it is sans serif, and very orthodox. Thanks in advance for all help!

I don't think that Loewy had much to do with the advent of the cathedral style cabinet, I think it was more inspired by earlier clock case designs. As far as I know Loewy didn't have much to do with radio cabinets prior to the late 1930s, much more after the war. Even so the man ran a design studio, with at least a half dozen employees, so it's questionable how many ideas were his and how many were his employees. The radio designs that his company had a hand in were the Hallicrafters sets of the 1940s, the S38, S40, for example, and a series of post war RCA portables, the ones with brushed aluminum cases and a flip down lid over the dial, that isn't inclusive that's just off the top of my head.
Best Regards
Arran