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Improve Your Firm's Image and Work Product Through 'Typography for Lawyers'

Ernest Svenson (aka "Ernie the Attorney") writes on his blog today that he has been reading a new book by Matthew Butterick called "Typography for Lawyers" which has helped him transform the style of his federal court pleadings and his letterhead. Svenson writes that the book is particularly helpful because, as suggested in the title, it is geared directly for lawyers and the legal documents they crank out daily.

On Butterick's own blog (which I must say has a nice font), he explains that while he is a practicing lawyer in Los Ange­les, he also has a degree in art from Har­vard focus­ing on graphic design and typog­ra­phy, as well as experience as a dig­i­tal font designer. Butterick says that he finds that legal typog­ra­phy is often poor, which he largely blames on "lack of infor­ma­tion, not lack of will."

As Svenson notes, Butterick's book explains how set up basic documents such as firm letterhead, legal memos, and briefs, but also "goes so far as to explain what font size and color to use in bates-numbering." Svenson provides some great "before and after" examples of what he has done with his own firm's typography based on what he learned in the book. Check these examples out here.

Posted by Bruce Carton on January 3, 2011 at 12:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)