Ed Benguiat

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Ed Benguiat (born Ephram Edward Benguiat, October 27, 1927) is an influential American typographer. He has crafted over 600 typefaces including Tiffany, Bookman, Panache, Edwardian Script, and the self-titled typefaces Benguiat and Benguiat Gothic. He also designed logotypes for The New York Times, Playboy, Sports Illustrated, the original Planet of the Apes film, Super Fly, and countless others.

Benguiat grew up in Brooklyn, NY and attended Canarsie High School. He was once a very prominent jazz percussionist playing in several big bands with the likes of Stan Kenton and Woody Herman. In an interview Benguait stated this of his chosen career as a designer: "I’m really a musician, a jazz percussionist. One day I went to the musician’s union to pay dues and I saw all these old people who were playing bar mitzvahs and Greek weddings. It occurred to me that one day that’s going to be me, so I decided to become an illustrator."

Benguait is an avid pilot and enjoys flying his personal plane. Benguiat teaches at the School of Visual Arts in his native New York.^[1] On November 2, 2000, he was inducted into the Art Directors Club Hall of Fame.

[edit] References

^ Bruckner, D. J. R. "DESIGN VIEW; How the Alphabet Is Shaping Up In a Computer Age", The New York Times, September 10, 1989. Accessed November 27, 2007. "This autumn he will receive the Type Directors Club award, and two retrospectives of his work are scheduled for early next year, one at the School of Visual Arts, where he teaches, and one at the International Typeface Corporation's gallery on Hammarskjold Plaza."