Monotype Collection.

The Type Archive in South London is a working hot metal mechanical casting workshop. The collection was acquired by the Science Museum in 1992. During 2019 and 2020 I was involved in the documentation of the collection and premisses. This project has provided online access to the Monotype Collection for the first time, with more than 5,800 records, including new photographs and insights published online. Monotype hot-metal mechanical casting and typesetting approach was invented in America by Tolbert Lanston in 1887. For the previous 400 years type had been composed by hand, so this mechanisation was a momentous development in the history of printing. Not long after, UK investors were found for the Monotype machine in 1897 and a London office and Surrey factory were started soon after under the name of Lanston Monotype Company. The factory manufactured the patterns, punches and matrices needed to cast single pieces of metal type, and they received casting machines from the American Monotype company. After 1924 the factory also started making and assembling its own machines and in 1931 it was renamed The Monotype Corporation Limited. The corporation went on to supply the means to mechanically cast metal type to customers around the world, transforming access to the printed word and creating notable typefaces such as Gill Sans and Times New Roman. ©Science Museum Group