My mother gave me a copy of the Tao Te Ching a few years back that was, rather intriguingly, a rendition crafted by Ursula K. LeGuin. I was taken with it.

Of late, I have been having deeper thoughts about the meaning of leadership and the empowerment of those lead and found that the 17th verse expressed those sentiments well. As I–and our company, Cloud Four–move into 2009 with great goals and ideas, I felt like this was the perfect letterpress project.

I was able to use my new 10pt Univers font (I got it for $10!). “LAO TZU” was set in 12-on-14pt Caslon. I could have done better letterspacing there. “AO” is too spacy, “ZU” is a bit cramped.

Verse 17 from Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu, Ursula K. LeGuin Rendition

Univers 10pt, which I chose because of its extreme clarity and lack of emotion. I wanted the verse to do the expression, uninterrupted by my letterforms.