Type Directors Club Introduces Gold, Silver and Bronze Awards for Global TDC72 Competition

For the first time in its nearly 80-year history, the global Type Directors Club will now present physical Gold, Silver, and Bronze awards, starting with the newly launched TDC72 competition.  

Previously, all TDC competition winners received the same Certificate of Typographic Excellence.  While each winner is among the world’s best typographic practitioners, the organisation felt it owed it to the profession to acknowledge and elevate the work that stands out above the rest.  

Called the TDC Type-High award, the handsomely designed physical object can now be displayed on desks and bookshelves, representing achievement of creative excellence and serving as a constant visual inspiration for typographers, type designers, and lettering artists.  Gold, Silver, and Bronze Type-High awards and Merit certificates will be presented starting this year.

The new award was designed and named by Graham Clifford, longtime TDC collaborator, life member, and organization Chairman Emeritus.  

Among his primary considerations were that the award should be a statement piece suitable for display, reflect the TDC’s long and rich history, and utilize a manufacturing process that prioritizes sustainable materials to create an environmentally friendly object.

The newly minted piece balances a tip of the hat with a knowing wink.  It’s milled from a single piece of sustainably harvested bamboo, and rests on a plinth.  The award stands a stately 7 inches (or 42 picas) tall and measures exactly 0.918 inches deep, the precise thickness of traditional foundry type. 

In a clever design detail, the Franklin Gothic Condensed lowercase “t” is mirrored, so that it would print correctly if used – as physical type was – to transfer ink to paper. 

“The name Type-High does double duty,” says Clifford, who also designed the TDC Best of Show awards.  “It signals excellence, that TDC winners represent the highest standard of typographic craft.  It also roots the award in the very origins of the field: a nod to the mechanical legacy that shaped the digital future.”

“This new direction brings a touch more personality and permanence to the annual recognition, making it feel less like an abstract accolade and more like a well-earned artifact,” said Joe Newton, TDC Executive Director.  “It’s smart. It’s solid. It belongs on your bookshelf, on your proud parents’ mantelpiece, or perfectly framed behind you in your next video call.”

The TDC competition has a rich, seven-plus decade history of recognizing creative excellence, as determined by the highly qualified expertise of its judges.  Introduction of the Type-High awards allows the organization to elevate meaningful differences in quality and expertise: all winners are great, some of them are greater than the rest.

TDC72 competition details

TDC72, the latest iteration of TDC’s annual competition, consists of three disciplines: Communication Design, Lettering, and Type Design.  Both digital and physical entries are now being accepted, details on each are available on the entry website.

To be eligible, work must have been produced or published in the 2025 calendar year.  Early bird deadline for entry is November 14, 2025, with entry fees increasing for the regular deadline of January 23, 2026, and final deadline on February 27, 2026.

TDC72 Jury Presidents and the full jury will be announced shortly.  Across the three juries, the competition will have native experts for writing systems spanning Arabic, Cyrillic, Indic, CJK, Thai, and African scripts, reflecting TDC’s commitment to have a greater number of the most appropriate experts judging work for which they have a deep knowledge.

The TDC competition regularly receives entries from more than 60 countries.  To make TDC72 as accessible as possible on a global level, the organization is offering significant regional discounts on entry fees.  

Winners will receive TDC Type-High Gold, Silver, Bronze awards or Merit certificates, and a digital seal certifying their work is among the world’s best of the year.  Winning work will also be featured in the highly respected TDC Annual, The World’s Best Typography®, and showcased in a number of exhibitions that travel to museums, schools, and design organizations around the world. 

Best of Show, as well as Best of Discipline winners for best of Communication Design, Type Design, and Lettering, will also be awarded in May 2026 during Creative Week in New York.

TDC72 winners are also part of The One Club’s prestigious Global Creative Rankings, earning points alongside winners in The One Show, ADC Annual Awards, Art Director Club of Europe (ADCE), and ONE Asia Creative Awards, to chart the world’s leading independent creatives, design firms, ad agencies, production companies, and brands.

Please visit the TDC72 entry site for more information and to enter this year’s competition.

Branding for this year’s competition, created by Morcos Key, New York, celebrates the diversity of type and the many geographies, voices, and approaches it offers.

The visual system is built on a 13×13 grid, where each cell can expand, contract, or shift in transition. This shared structure generates letterforms across a spectrum of styles – from high-contrast serif to reverse-contrast sans to blackletter – mirroring the diversity of voices that TDC champions. 

The grid itself becomes alive, embodying the tension between restraint and expression that defines the craft of type design.

The branding features custom animated type, as well as Logic Monoscript typeface by MCKL Type Foundry, and ITC Franklin – the classic TDC branding typeface – by Morris Fuller Benton, Monotype, both provided via the Adobe Type platform. 

Reflecting on the competition, last year’s TDC71 Type Design Jury President Sahar Afshar, type designer and founding partner at Dogray Type Foundryin London, called it a testament to the vitality of typography – not as a static discipline, but as a living conversation between form, function, and cultural moment.

“Every year, a diverse range of entries confronts us with bold experiments, meticulous refinements, and everything in between, each piece speaking in its own distinct voice,” says Afshar.  “Typography, Lettering, and Type Design are not just about shapes on a page, but about intention, context, and the unseen labor behind every curve.  The esteemed panel of judges perform a meticulous evaluation of each entry, and recognition is never given lightly. The submitted work is debated, admired, and sometimes fiercely defended, because it matters. To emerge on top from such a rigorous process is the highest compliment we can offer.”

Client: Type Directors Club for TDC72 competition
Agency: Morcos Key, New York
Fonts: 
Custom type animation by Morcos Key
Logic Monoscript by MCKL Type Foundry
ITC Franklin by Morris Fuller Benton, Monotype