I am not a specialist. I am not a typographer, I am not an illustrator, I am not a designer. I am just a generalizer in the field of visual arts, and I like that. I like keeping my definition loose.

(1929-) (Nevertheless) Milton Glaser is an eminent typographer, illustrator, and designer, as well as educator. He is a native of the Bronx, born on June 29, and before he began his career, he wanted to be a comic book artist.

Glaser studied at the High School of Music and Art, and studied typography at The Cooper Union Art School, in New York. He had failed the entrance examination to Pratt, so he in between high school and Cooper Union, he worked in a packaging studio. After graduating Cooper Union, he worked in the promotions department of Vogue Magazine for eight months, and studied with Giorgio Morandi at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Bologna, on a Fulbright Scholarship.

Glaser was founder and president of Pushpin Studios, in conjunction with Reynold Ruffins, Seymour Chwast, and Edward Sorel. The Studio magazine was called Pushpin Graphics, and the Studio's influence on design was acknowledged in The Pushpin Style exhibition at the Mesée des Artes Décoratifs, Paris, in 1970.

I design a lot of magazines but I never want to be, or aspire to be a magazine designer. I'd go nuts if that’s all I would do all the time.

In 1968, Glaser published New York Magazine with the publisher Clay Felker. He parted ways with Pushpin in 1974 to establish Milton Glaser, Inc., and later started WBMG, a New York magazine design firm. In the early 1960s Glaser taught at The Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY, and The School of Visual Arts, NY.

Glaser's design commissions include the I Love NY logo, World Trade Center restaurants, the Observation Deck and Permanent Exhibition for the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in 1975, the Grand Union supermarket chain, et cetera, and the designs of over 300 posters for various clients. Mr. Glaser was the design consultant for the new Windows on the World bar and restaurant in the World Trade Center, New York, I presume up until September 11, 2001.

One of Glaser's well-known typeface designs is Glaser Stencil. He also redesigned the Futura typeface, and designed the Bob Dylan poster with the kaleidoscope hair. He has had one-man shows at the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris (1977) and the Museum of Modern Art in New York (1975). His work is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Israel Museum, Jerusalem; The Chase Manhattan Bank, New York; the National Archive, Smithsonian Institute, Washington, D.C.; and the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum, New York.

(Some) Books he has illustrated:

  • Fish in the Sky, George Mendoza
  • Help, Help, the Globolinks, Gian Carlo Manotti
  • Fierce and Gentle Warriors, Mikhail A. Sholokhov; trans. Miriam Morton
  • The Smallest Elephant in the World, Alvin R. Tresselt
  • The Devil's Pi, Eli Cantor
  • Info from:
    Milton Glaser Posters, www.miltonglaserposters.com
    Boy Beaver Fonts Glaser interview and links,
    http://www.boybeaver.com/biblio/glaser/glaser1.html

    Glaser bio, http://park.org/Japan/Fujitsu/1996igdc/Glaser.html

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