Vienna Method · 1925
Four rules that make a number readable across the room.
Measured value
Carrier ink
01
Count, never stretch.
One figure stands for one thousand people. Five thousand is five figures, side by side — not one figure made taller.
02
Reduce to the silhouette.
Cut every figure to its essential contour — a profile a child can name in half a second. No shading, no faces, no internal detail.
03
Reserve the red.
Saturated red marks the thing being measured — the headline, the bar, the call to act. Everywhere else, deep black on cream paper.
04
Snap to the 8px grid.
Every pictogram, hairline, and caption sits on the same Bauhaus rhythm. Nothing floats; the page is ruled paper, not pixels.