Born in 1973, Ralf de Jong initially trained as a banker before studying Visual Communication at the Kunsthochschule Kassel and the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague. A passionate typographer, avid book collector, and extensive reader, he is particularly interested in the relationships between textual content and its visual form.
His freelance work as a typographic designer (in book design, corporate communication, and exhibition design) and his publishing activities complement his teaching and ensure that he remains connected to a professional practice.
After completing his studies in Visual Communication, he worked at Bureau Piet Gerards in Heeren and Amsterdam (NL) before co-founding a design studio with Friedrich Forssman. Since 2004, he has been working alongside his wife, Stephanie de Jong, in their studio, de Jong Typografie. The studio's works have been regarded as among the most beautiful books produced in the Netherlands and Germany, and have received awards such as the iF and Red Dot awards. Their designs are also part of various museum collections.
Since 2004, he has been a professor of typography, initially at the Hochschule der bildenden Künste Saar in Saarbrücken, and since 2006 at the University of Duisburg-Essen and the Folkwang University of the Arts. His visiting lectures in cities such as Frankfurt, Hamburg, Munich, Berlin, Amsterdam, Bergen (Norway), and Cape Town (South Africa) continuously refine his perspective on national and international design developments.
