Charles Bigelow (type designer)

Charles Bigelow is an American type designer, historian of typography, and professor. He is known for his contributions to the field of digital typography, particularly his work on the Lucida family of typefaces, co-designed with Kris Holmes.

Bigelow studied at Reed College and Stanford University, where he received a Ph.D. in Statistics. After a period working as a statistician, he returned to his long-standing interest in type and typography.

In 1978, Bigelow and Holmes founded Bigelow & Holmes Inc., a type design firm that created numerous influential typefaces. The Lucida family, designed in the early 1980s, was specifically designed for use with low-resolution laser printers and computer screens. Its clarity and legibility made it a popular choice for technical documentation and user interfaces, and it was eventually adopted by major software companies like Apple and Microsoft.

Beyond typeface design, Bigelow has made significant contributions to the history and theory of typography. He has written and lectured extensively on the subject, exploring the cultural, technological, and aesthetic dimensions of letterforms. He served as a professor at Stanford University, where he taught typography and digital typography.

Bigelow’s work has been recognized with numerous awards and accolades, including the prestigious Prix Charles Peignot from the Association Typographique Internationale (ATypI). He is regarded as a leading figure in the development of digital typography and a major influence on contemporary type design.