Steven Heller lets us in on the history of a wall of 1,450 letters:
The Gastrotypographicalassemblage was the 11-meter-wide, handmade, wooden typographic wall that hung in the CBS cafeteria in New York designed by Lou Dorfsman. The custom type created by Herb Lubalin and Tom Carnase and containing almost 1500 individual characters.
Over at Speak Up, more on the wall that Lou Dorfsman built:
The Gastrotypographicalassemblage, commonly referred to as “the wall,” is enormous; it is 33 feet in length and 8 feet in height, give or take a few inches. The piece is a mélange of food-related words and objects, a perfectly orchestrated collage of appetite. At last count, more than 1,450 letters converge to create this experience. No doubt, you have seen similar orchestrations, walls of words in restaurants or shops that were composed with vinyl letters; yet, the Gastrotypographicalassemblage is the first of its kind. It is the icon to which others owe their existence.
You have just a few more days before it exhibits to practice saying “Gastrotypographicalassemblage” out loud.
