The Type Directors Club and Parsons The New School for Design present Ruedi Baur: Architectural and Urban Inscriptions, a presentation by this leading European designer on the occasion of his first major U.S. commission, a wayfinding system for The New School’s University Center, a new campus center designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill that will open in January 2014.

Baur will present his approach to the question of orientation and identification of public institutions. He will share his thoughts about information design in a society dominated by commercial signs. He will discuss, based on examples, the necessary synergy between designers, architects, landscape architects and lighting designers to create a city that goes beyond functionality to improve the quality of life for everyone.

Baur will be introduced by Tim Marshall, Provost of The New School, who will speak briefly about the university’s commissioning of Baur and his studio, Intégral Paris, for this landmark project. The firm designed a three-dimensional typeface to work in superposition in the stairwells, which are visible from the street, playing on perspective to indicate a direction or floor level within the building. A custom typeface was created to meet the two-dimensional and three-dimensional requirements, and is inspired by the faceted façade of this significant new work of architecture. The typeface’s perspective evolves with each story of the building, its effect intensifying as it moves from the ground floor to the 17th floor.

“3D typography is not a novelty,” says Baur. “It predates Gutenberg to ancient civilizations that engraved lettering onto blocks of stone. Our design is a contemporary approach to this Greek tradition. The typeface was loosely based on Gotham, then integrated Peter Bilak’s Irma font, superposing Irma Light on Irma Black to create the contoured overlap that produces the three-dimensional perspective effect."

The design concept was also adapted for a newly established academic center for Parsons Paris, which opened this fall in the 1st Arrondissement in a more classic, Haussmann-era building.