MacFadden & Thorpe is the studio of Brett MacFadden & Scott Thorpe who, while demonstrating a particular focus on expressive typography, collaborate with a variety of clients on many different types of projects.
Location Downtown San Francisco
Year the studio was started 2008
Square footage The landlord says it’s 1000, but it seems smaller than that.
Number of principal designers TwoSpecialty Our practice is fairly broad. We both used to work at Chronicle Books, and still do a fair amount of publishing, but part of our decision to leave our in-house gigs was to work on a wider range of projects. We get the most attention for our custom type work, and teach experimental typography at California College of the Arts. One word that best describes your space Freeeeeeeeeezing
Best thing in the studio Perhaps the location. As a small studio, it’s good being downtown among the hum of big business—and where there are lots of places to eat.
Can’t design without We are loyal to Uni-ball pens, and constantly steal them from each other.
Current projects Two projects with the wonderful artist Allison Smith: a book on animation for Chronicle and another for the Anaheim Angels baseball team; an annual report for the Bay Citizen, a new non-profit news organization; a suite of typographic illustrations for Wired magazine; and an as-yet-undetermined art object for The Thing Quarterly. Most fortuitous mistake you’ve ever made We’ve made all kinds of mistakes, but sadly none stand out as particularly fortuitous.