Winners from 42 Countries Announced In Type Directors Club TDC69 Competition

The Type Directors Club, the world’s leading typography organization, announced the winners from 42 countries in its prestigious TDC69 Competition.

Leading the way with five TDC69 Certificates of Typographic Excellence is Morcos Key New York.  The wins included “Greenwood One Hundred” on behalf of The Black Wallstreet Times, typography for Mizna, and “Wildflowers” in the Typography discipline, and “Arabic Lettering Workshop” for Minneapolis College of Art and Design and lettering for MyKali, both in Lettering.

Three entrants had four wins each.  Studio Dumbar/DEPT Rotterdam was awarded certificates for typography for the Utah Jazz, “Next Step 22” for Outsystems, “DEMO 22”, and “Be Part of More” for D&AD, all in Typography.

With four wins in Typography is The New York Times Magazine New York.  Three are for “The Health Issue”, “Grab a book. Find a nook.” and “The Secrets Issue” for the magazine, and one is for “The Games Issue” in The New York Times for Kids.

Typotheque The Hague also received four certificates, one each for “TPTQ Sans CJK”, “November South Asia”, “November Georgian” and “Lava Georgian”, all in Type Design.

They are followed by entrants with three TDC69 Certificates each.  Laura Coombs New York won two for “Cyberfeminism Index”, and one for “New York Review of Architecture”, all in Typography.  Frontline Typo Doha/Tehran picked up one in Type Design for “Zhian Typeface”, and two in Lettering: “Numerals of Injustice Daily Planner 2022”, and “Farsi Alternative Type Design Yearbook 2022”.

Type Together Prague was awarded three, all in Type Design, for “Atlante”, “Rezak”, “Portada Arabic”.  Students at Class Tao Chengdu also picked up three awards: Shiya Yuan for “Coral Typography Tool”, and ZuHeng Zhang for both “Shin-Yi Martial Art Club” and “Embryo Vinyl Album”.

Twelve entrants were awarded two certificates each: Apple Design Team Cupertino, Bleed Design Studio Oslo and Vienna, collect Stuttgart, Ek Type Mumbai, students from Hongik University Seoul, House Industries Wilmington (US), studio fnt Seoul, Studio Saber The Hague, Studio Woork Jakarta, Thinking*Room Jakarta, Universal Thirst in Bangalore and Reykjavík, and YiFei Hu Chengdu.

A showcase of all TDC69 certificate winners can be viewed here.  TDC69 Best of Discipline and Judges Choice recipients will be announced on May 16 during Creative Week.

Entries were received from 77 countries this year, the most in TDC’s 77-year history, with winners from 42.  The top five countries for winners are the United States with 52, followed by Germany with 24, China with 23, Netherlands with 11, and Ukraine with nine. 

“The TDC competition has always been a treasure trove of diverse works, and welcoming in new practitioners,” said Ksenya Samarskaya, who serves as the organization’s managing director.  “We’re thrilled that the competition is representing more countries and regions than ever before, and grateful to the judges for their thoughtful and considered — though definitely not easy — deliberations.”

Previously divided into two competitions, one each for Communications Design and Typeface Design, the program is now a single competition under TDC69, consisting of three disciplines: Type Design, Typography, and, for the first time, Lettering.

Across the three disciplines, TDC69 had native experts on the jury for writing systems spanning Arabic, Cyrillic, Han, Indic, Latin, Thai, select African scripts, and more. While the competition always accepted international and multilingual entries, last year’s addition of an expanded jury was a reflection of TDC’s commitment to have a greater number of the most appropriate experts judging designs for which they have deep knowledge.

All winners of TDC69 receive a Certificate of Typographic Excellence certifying their work is among the world’s best of the year.  Winning work will also be featured in the highly respected TDC Annual, The World’s Best Typography®, and showcased in eight exhibitions that travel to museums, schools, and design organizations around the world. 

Lettering for the TDC69 branding campaign, with elements in both English and Japanese, was created by designer Ryu Mieno, based in Kyoto, and brought to life with animations by Federica Caso, in Madrid and Sara Mehta, in New York.  The website was developed by Eric Jacobsen, based in Brooklyn, and paired with The One Club’s entry system.

The One Club for Creativity, producer of The One Show, ADC Annual Awards, ONE Asia Creative Awards, Type Directors Club competition, TDC Ascenders, Young Guns, and more, is the world’s foremost non-profit organization whose mission is to support and celebrate the global creative community.  Revenue generated from entries to its global awards shows goes back into the industry to fund programming under the organization’s four pillars: Education, Inclusion & Diversity, Gender Equality, and Creative Development.