Erik Spiekermann has been designing typefaces and information systems since the early 70s. He is a founder of the German mega-firm MetaDesign, and FontShop, the first online distributor of digital fonts. If you’ve ever used typefaces such as Officina or Meta, traveled on Berlin transit, or read the Economist, then you know Spiekermann’s work. And if you saw the 2007 documentary, Helvetica, then you surely remember the self-professed typomaniac: “They [letters] are my friends… Some people look at bottles of wine, or whatever – girls’ bottoms – I get kicks out of looking at type.”