Kurt Weidemann – typographer, graphic designer, brand identity consultant, and teacher – passed away one week ago at age 88. Widely accepted as one of the most influential typographers of the 20th century, he leaves behind an indelible mark on the industry, as well as printed communications in general. Yet, perhaps the greatest lesson to be taken from his life is in the manner in which he conducted business – with the courage and conviction to follow his strong morals and ethics.

Weidemann’s spirit is beautifully captured in this video from Gestalten TV, filmed in his home studio in Stuttgart. He shares a bit of his rich experiences, including a decade spent breaking rocks at a Russian prison camp during WWII, his work as an identity consultant for Porsche and Mercedes-Benz, his views on typefaces, the distinction between professional design and art, and at the very end of the interview…the keys to his success! I highly recommend taking 16 minutes to watch this video.

Kurt Weidemann 1922 – 2011: The King Is Dead, Long Live the King! from Gestalten on Vimeo.

Earlier this week, a federal trial judge (Chief Judge Royce C. Lamberth of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia) put a temporary halt to federally funded research on embryonic stem cells. While I certainly respect everyone’s right to their own opinions on this issue, I personally find this news to be deeply unfortunate and disheartening.

As a result, I’d like to push back in my own small way by offering a few like-minded readers a free Support Stem Cell Research bumper sticker (10″ x 3″). If you would like one of these stickers, just be one of the first three people to comment below. I’ll follow-up privately with an email for your mailing address.

For all my fellow word nerds out there… If you haven’t discovered Wordle yet, it’s a must, particularly if you also love typography and layout. Nerd heaven.

From wordle.net:
Wordle is a toy for generating “word clouds” from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, or save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends.

For example, below is a wordle I just created in less than two minutes, using some of my favorite lyrics.

Facebook Fans…Free gift to the first Sproutreach FBF to provide the correct artist and song title (via FB comment).