On Times New Roman

Previous versions of both my website and resume were set in Times New Roman, the default choice in lots of applications like Microsoft Word. This would probably not be very noteworthy except for the fact that I make my living as a designer.

Graphic designers hate Times New Roman. Making it my choice was an aggressive and contrarian act, a refusal to play nice. I did it knowing I would be shunned by a community whose respect I wanted. I probably made myself unhireable by anyone but the most clueless creative department. And yet, it felt right.

In The Philosophy of Andy Warhol, he writes that “A Coke is a Coke and no amount of money can get you a better Coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking. All the Cokes are the same and all the Cokes are good.”

In a similar vein, Times New Roman derives its beauty from its ubiquity. We like to talk about design so good it’s invisible. Well, good or not, Times New Roman melts away so all we see are words.

Really, it’s the default typeface of dreamers everywhere. It’s what happens before you make a choice. It’s a child’s drawing; an idle thought. It’s the beginning of a poem, or a business plan, or a note to yourself.

In a way, it’s punk. It’s the voice you have, the voice everyone has, the voice of the people. It’s pre-taste.

Times New Roman is not aesthetically ugly, despite what some of my fellow designers say. I think what they mean is that it’s not as beautiful as some typefaces. It certainly is boring, in the sense that it’s been seen a million times before. But is the sky boring?

It feels to me like designers move in packs, and I suppose I have some sort of natural aversion to always following suit. Either that, or I have a need to see myself as uninvited. I think I thrive on feeling like I’m not quite accepted into a group, because it means I have to keep getting better and better at what I do until ignoring my work becomes impossible. Maybe I choose to like Times New Roman to engineer a world in which I can be an outsider.

But I really do like it.

So why don’t I still use the font in my own materials? Look, a rebel can only fight the same fight for so long. New perversions await!