Ep 35: Business of running a type foundry with Matthieu Salvaggio

In this episode, Mitchell Bernstein (@mitchbernstein) sits down with Matthieu Salvaggio (@BlazeFoundry), CEO and founder of Blaze Foundry, a typography foundry that’s designed tons of impressive typefaces that are actually affordable! We discussed everything from how he chooses which typefaces to sell, to the inner workings of a foundry as a business and how he DOES NOT recommend it.

We’re also doing a contest! 3 lucky listeners will get Matthieu’s latest book on building typefaces for FREE. Instructions on how to win are below:

* Give us a 5-star rating on Apple Podcasts + a review

* Screenshot the review with the rating after it’s been submitted.

* @ me on Twitter/X with the screenshot.

You have 2 weeks for this contest to end. Good luck!

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Mentioned

* Blaze Foundry

* Matthieu’s Twitter

* Matthieu’s book: How to Design Fonts Like a Pro

Socials

* Mitchell Bernstein: Twitter, LinkedIn

* Shaping Design newsletter

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Show notes

(00:00) - Intro

(04:47) - Who is Matthieu

(07:52) - How to run a type foundry

(09:01) - Why create a type foundry

(10:31) - What it takes

(14:03) - Where the name came from

(15:32) - Deciding which typeface to design

(16:21) - Area typeface inspiration

(18:51) - Hi most popular typefaces

(20:42) - Brands and typefaces

(22:35) - Drawing from inspiration

(27:24) - Maintaining typefaces

(30:55) - Variable typefaces

(34:08) - Selling typeface variants

(34:43) - Inspiration for Apoc

(38:48) - How to design a typeface

(46:19) - When are typefaces done?

(50:47) - Least and most favorite typefaces

(51:54) - German type

(55:23) - Why recreate Helvetica

(01:01:00) - How has design shaped you?