Thomas Detrie is an Emeritus Professor, designer and educator, who was with the ASU College of Architecture and Environmental Design (now the Herberger Institute for Design and the Arts). He began his career in 1970 and joined ASU in 1984 as the Graphic Design Program Coordinator and the School of Design Foundation Program Coordinator. He also taught at Louisiana State University and Ohio University, and was been a guest lecturer at Rhode Island School of Design. He presented at Boston University, Microsoft Corporation, and Facultad del Habitat, Universidad Autonoma de San Luis Potosi, Mexico. He also facilitated typography fundamentals workshops for the California State University Summer Arts Program in Fresno.
He is a past board member of American Institute of Graphic Arts Arizona Chapter (AIGAZ). Design Quarterly, Typography: Form and Communication by Carter, Day, and Meggs, publications by Armin Hofmann, and the Swiss Journal of Typography (TM) include his work in letterform, typography, and visual communication. He also performed font design work for the American Mathematical Society, The Font Company, IBM, and the Rocky Mountain Mathematical Consortium.
Detrie's interests include Aesthetics; Cognitive Psychology and Modular Intelligence; Design as Education; Design Fundamentals Education; Design's Cultural and Historical Context; Digital Color and Digital Printing; Font Design; Semiotics; and Human-computer Interaction.