Introducing Graveblade, the heavy metal typeface that’s sharp as a knife and just as deadly. With its blackletter shapes and brutal angles, Graveblade is the perfect typeface to give your message a sense of forceful aggression that will leave a lasting impression. Featuring blade-like forms and a menacing edge, Graveblade exudes the power and intensity of heavy metal music. This typeface is not for the faint of heart—it’s for those who are bold, daring, and unafraid to make a statement. Whether you’re promoting a metal band, creating a dark and edgy poster, or designing a logo for a horror movie, Graveblade is the typeface that will take your designs to the next level. Its sharp and knifelike design will cut through the noise and make your message stand out from the crowd. So get ready to unleash the power of Graveblade and take your designs to new heights of brutal beauty. You’ve got another thing coming if you think you can ignore the force of Graveblade. Are you ready to embrace the darkness? Then grab Graveblade today and let the heavy metal typeface speak for itself. Most Latin-based European writing systems are supported, including the following languages. Afaan Oromo, Afar, Afrikaans, Albanian, Alsatian, Aromanian, Aymara, Bashkir (Latin), Basque, Belarusian (Latin), Bemba, Bikol, Bosnian, Breton, Cape Verdean, Creole, Catalan, Cebuano, Chamorro, Chavacano, Chichewa, Crimean Tatar (Latin), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dawan, Dholuo, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Frisian, Friulian, Gagauz (Latin), Galician, Ganda, Genoese, German, Greenlandic, Guadeloupean Creole, Haitian Creole, Hawaiian, Hiligaynon, Hungarian, Icelandic, Ilocano, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Jamaican, Kaqchikel, Karakalpak (Latin), Kashubian, Kikongo, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi, Kurdish (Latin), Latvian, Lithuanian, Lombard, Low Saxon, Luxembourgish, Maasai, Makhuwa, Malay, Maltese, Māori, Moldovan, Montenegrin, Ndebele, Neapolitan, Norwegian, Novial, Occitan, Ossetian (Latin), Papiamento, Piedmontese, Polish, Portuguese, Quechua, Rarotongan, Romanian, Romansh, Sami, Sango, Saramaccan, Sardinian, Scottish Gaelic, Serbian (Latin), Shona, Sicilian, Silesian, Slovak, Slovenian, Somali, Sorbian, Sotho, Spanish, Swahili, Swazi, Swedish, Tagalog, Tahitian, Tetum, Tongan, Tshiluba, Tsonga, Tswana, Tumbuka, Turkish, Turkmen (Latin), Tuvaluan, Uzbek (Latin), Venetian, Vepsian, Võro, Walloon, Waray-Waray, Wayuu, Welsh, Wolof, Xhosa, Yapese, Zapotec Zulu and Zuni.

New Lincoln Gothic is an elegant sanserif, generous in width and x-height. There are twelve weights ranging from Hairline to UltraBold and an italic for each weight. At the stroke ends are gentle flares, and some of the round characters possess an interesting and distinctive asymmetry. The character set supports Central Europe, and there are three figure sets, extended fractions, superior and inferior numbers, and a few alternates, all accessible via OpenType features. Back in 1965, Thomas Lincoln had an idea for a new sanserif typeface, a homage of sorts, to ancient Roman artisans. The Trajan Column in Rome, erected in 113 AD, has an inscription that is considered to be the basis for western European lettering. Lincoln admired these beautiful letterforms and so, being inspired, he set out to design a new sanserif typeface based on the proportions and subtleties of the letters found in the Trajan Inscription. Lincoln accomplished what he set out to do by creating Lincoln Gothic. The typeface consisted only of capital letters. Lincoln intentionally omitted a lowercase to keep true his reference to the Trajan Inscription, which contains only magiscule specimens. The design won him the first Visual Graphics Corporation (VGC) National Typeface Competition in 1965. The legendary Herb Lubalin even used it to design a promotional poster! All this was back in the day when typositor film strips and photo type were all the rage in setting headlines. Fast forward now to the next millennium. Thomas Lincoln has had a long, illustrious career as a graphic designer. Still, he has one project that feels incomplete; Lincoln Gothic does not have a lowercase. It is the need to finish the design that drives Lincoln to resurrect his prize winning design and create its digital incarnation. Thus, New Lincoln Gothic was born. Lacking the original drawings, Lincoln had to locate some old typositor strips in order to get started. He had them scanned and imported the data into Freehand where he refined the shapes and sketched out a lowercase. He then imported that data into Fontographer, where he worked the glyphs again and refined the spacing, and started generating additional weights and italics. His enthusiasm went unchecked and he created 14 weights! It was about that time that Lincoln contacted Bitstream about publishing the family. Lincoln worked with Bitstream to narrow down the family (only to twelve weights), interpolate the various weights using three masters, and extend the character set to support CE and some alternate figure sets. Bitstream handled the hinting and all production details and built the final CFF OpenType fonts using FontLab Studio 5.

Shout is a “Hey, Look at ME” font. It is an attention-getting font for posters, flyers and ads. Its lineage includes the Haas Type Foundry’s 19th century advertising font, Kompakte Grotesk, which Jan Tschichold (1902-1974) dryly described as “extended sans serif” and which graphic designer Roland Holst (1868-1938) would have disapprovingly referred to as a “shout,” as opposed to the quiet presentation of information that he believed was the proper function of advertising. In 1963 Letraset released what appears to be an updated variation in multiple weights designed by Frederick Lambert called Compacta. Shout draws heavily on Compacta, as well as other similar fonts of the 50s and 60s like Eurostile Bold Condensed and Permanent Headline. In weight, it falls about halfway between Compacta Bold and Compacta Black, but with a relatively heavier lower case that is not so easily pushed around by the upper case. After all, one can shout while sitting down. Shout is the first font released with our new encoding, as noted in the All_customer_readme.txt. The Euro symbol has been moved to position 128 and the Zcaron/zcaron have been added at positions 142/158 respectively. Otherwise, Shout has our usual idiosyncratic glyph selection, with the German ch/ck instead of braces, a long s instead of the Greek mu and our usual Hand-in-Hand symbol. There are also left and right glyphs of a big mouth ]ing (135/137) and left and right glyphs of an angry man shouting (172/177). Please use Shout with discretion. Folks get tired of being yelled out. After awhile, they stop listening. Shout ML represents a major extension of the original release, with the following changes: 1. Added glyphs for the 1250 Central Europe, the 1252 Turkish and the 1257 Baltic Code Pages. Add glyphs to complete standard 1252 Western Europe Code Page. Special glyphs relocated and assigned Unicode codepoints, some in Private Use area. Total of 355 glyphs. 2. Added OpenType GSUB layout features: pnum, ornm, liga, hist & salt. 3. Added 266 kerning pairs. 4. Revised vertical metrics for improved cross-platform line spacing. 5. Revised hyphen, dashes & math operators. 6. Minor refinements to various glyph outlines. 7. Inclusion of both tabular & proportional numbers. Please note that some older applications may only be able to access the Western Europe character set (approximately 221 glyphs). The zip package includes two versions of the font at no extra charge. There is an OTF version which is in Open PS (Post Script Type 1) format and a TTF version which is in Open TT (True Type)format. Use whichever works best for your applications.

One menorah that I have long found particularly appealing was named The Tree of Life Menorah, a replica of which I gave as a gift one holiday to a kindly old couple who were neighbors and became friends. It had a simple, organic elegance that I see in the best of Art Nouveau sculpture. To me personally, Judeism is a celebration of life, like the triumph of the flower that blossoms in the crack of the city sidewalk. Just as Hanukkah celebrates the rededication of the temple and the miracle of the oil, it celebrates the victorious quest for freedom of the Hebrew people led by Judah Maccabee. Hanukkah represents determination and courage and faith — and it represents the presence of God in the lives of His people. It is interesting to note that the founding of the Albanian nation in the early twentieth century grew out of the resistance of the Albanian people to the imposition of Greek language and culture in the aftermath of the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. The typeface, HADASSAH, designed by Henri Friedlander (1904-1996), is my favorite Hebrew typeface. Thirty years in the crafting, I believe it is unsurpassed for its shear beauty, combining a subtle modulation of stroke with a simplicity and clarity of form. No doubt, that is why it has become so popular. For me, the Sîyn/Shîyn characters are especially satisfying. For a Hanukkah message in Hebrew, I would choose HADASSAH LIGHT for a headline and print it as large as I could. If, however, you are looking for a friendly, warm face for a seasonal message in a roman-letter based language, may I suggest BETHLEHEM EPHRATH. It will be as comfortable as a bulky, hand-knit sweater on a frosty afternoon and reflects the solid, encompassing, family orientation of this holiday. It was on the way to Ephrath that Jacob’s beloved wife Rachel gave birth to Benjamin and then died from her labor. It was to Ephrath that Naomi and Ruth returned and in Ephrath that we have the wonderful, heart-warming story of the marriage between Ruth and her Redeemer-Kinsman, Boaz. And it was to Ephrath that prophet, Samuel, went to find a new king and there in Ephrath that the prophet annointed a small shepherd boy named David. The Proverbs tell us to seek wisdom. Never underestimate the impact you have on others. Words of kindness can change people’s lives. The Talmud says that the highest form of wisdom is kindness. Be wise this holiday season. The font BETHLEHEM EPHRATH is based on the typeface Accent with the permission of URW++ of Hamburg, Germany. Like most display fonts, it is most effective at 18 points and larger. Like most script fonts, it is most effective when set with both upper and lower case. Although this font is readable in all caps (many scripts are not), that does not make it a good idea. Do so only with caution.

When I was surfing the internet, with rock n 'roll music. I accidentally found a picture of a hotel sign with a very unique style, namely: Mid-century Modern (MCM). It looks very pretty and charming to me. And inspired me to create Font Family. And I am proud to present the Vallery Hills Font Family. This font is in the Retro style of the 50s to 60s. Okay, here are the specifications. 1. Vallery Hills Schrift There is one unique thing about this font. Usually, script fonts with Retro style always have an angled anatomical shape, but I made this font upright. The goal is to make a difference with other script fonts I've seen. By the way, this font comes in two styles, namely: Regular and Bouncy. Why do I make it like that? Because I want to make this font into two different functions, namely: If you want to make it a Display Font, which is usually used for Headings, then use the Bouncy style. And if you want to use it as Bodytext, then use Regular. 2. Vallery Hills Sherift This second font is a font that is very synonymous with the Mid-century Modern (MCM) era. A very distinctive form of the serif font of that era. Similar to the first font, this font also has 2 styles, namely: Regular and Bouncy. You can combine this font with the other two fonts in Vallery Hills. It could be Title, or Bodytext. And you can also combine two styles, namely: Regular and Bouncy. Try! 3. Vallery Hills Suns Sherift This last font is Sans Serif. Also has 2 styles like his two brothers, namely: Regular and Bouncy. The goal is actually the same. I am sure you are cooler to create a design that uses this font family. Well, there is one advantage of this font from its two siblings, which is that it has a feature, namely: SMALLCAPS. Which will be an option when you are bored with the mediocre shape or style of Lowercase. Try combining the Smallcaps with Uppercase or Lowercase. Must be cool! : D Oops, almost forgot. This font consists of several font formats, namely: OTF, TTF, and Webfonts. And of course everything is MULTILANGUAGE. OK, friends. That's all I can describe about the Vallery Hills Family. Hopefully it will please all of you. Cheers!

The Ysobel™ typeface family is not only elegant; it is also exceptionally legible and space economical. A collaborative design effort between Robin Nicholas, as lead designer and project director, Delve Withrington and Alice Savoie of Monotype Imaging, the project had the primary design goal of creating a typeface family for setting text in newspapers and periodicals. The result, however, is also ideal for any application that requires quick and easy assimilation of text. According to Nicholas, “The idea for the design started when I was asked to develop a custom version of Century Schoolbook. I wanted to give the design a more contemporary feel, although the client ultimately decided to keep their typeface closer to the original. The project nevertheless gave me ideas for a new design. Since designing Nimrod, some 30 years ago, I had wanted to make a more modern typeface family for newspapers and magazines – this seemed the ideal candidate.” Ysobel (pronounced “Isabel”) has the soft, inviting letter shapes of Century Schoolbook but contrasts these with more incised serifs and terminals. Its capitals are also narrower than those of Century Schoolbook, and care was taken to ensure that they harmonize perfectly with the lowercase. Ysobel’s x-height is full-bodied without disrupting lowercase proportions. In addition, curved terminals, such as those in the “C,” “c” and “e,” were drawn more open as an aid to legibility and readability in text copy. Weight stress is near vertical, and hairlines are robust to ensure character fidelity in small point sizes. Development began with the text version of the family, which has four weights, each with an italic companion. All weights feature lining and old style numerals, fractions, superiors and extended Latin language coverage. Small caps are also available in the Roman Regular design. Ysobel Display is a completely redrawn version of the typeface; it is narrower, and has a slightly smaller x-height, thinner hairlines and subtle design changes to improve its appearance when set at large sizes. The Display Italic received particular attention to make it ideal for setting headlines, subheads and short blocks of copy. Changes include a slightly greater italic angle and more cursive treatment of some letter shapes. Alternative styles of capital “J” and “Q,” to provide variation, are available in all weights.

Introducing Regra: the squared, high-tech typeface designed for the contemporary world. With its unique industrial letterforms, Regra is the perfect choice for cutting-edge technological design. The robust, blocky letters convey strength and precision, infusing your message with a sense of power and style. Whether you’re creating a sleek, modern website or designing a high-tech product, Regra is the perfect choice for conveying a sense of one-of-a-kind style and technological accuracy. The three different weights and italics provide plenty of flexibility for all your design needs, ensuring that your message is conveyed with maximum impact. At the heart of Regra is its distinctive letterforms. Each character is carefully crafted to reflect the latest in contemporary design trends, with sharp angles and clean lines that exude a sense of sophistication and elegance. From its squared-off corners to its bold, geometric shapes, Regra is the typeface of choice for designers who want to create something truly unique. So if you’re looking for a typeface that can take your designs to the next level, look no further than Regra. With its stylish letterforms and high-tech design, Regra is the perfect choice for anyone who wants to make a statement with their typography. Try it out today and see the difference it can make in your designs! Most Latin-based European writing systems are supported, including the following languages. Afaan Oromo, Afar, Afrikaans, Albanian, Alsatian, Aromanian, Aymara, Bashkir (Latin), Basque, Belarusian (Latin), Bemba, Bikol, Bosnian, Breton, Cape Verdean, Creole, Catalan, Cebuano, Chamorro, Chavacano, Chichewa, Crimean Tatar (Latin), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dawan, Dholuo, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Frisian, Friulian, Gagauz (Latin), Galician, Ganda, Genoese, German, Greenlandic, Guadeloupean Creole, Haitian Creole, Hawaiian, Hiligaynon, Hungarian, Icelandic, Ilocano, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Jamaican, Kaqchikel, Karakalpak (Latin), Kashubian, Kikongo, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi, Kurdish (Latin), Latvian, Lithuanian, Lombard, Low Saxon, Luxembourgish, Maasai, Makhuwa, Malay, Maltese, Māori, Moldovan, Montenegrin, Ndebele, Neapolitan, Norwegian, Novial, Occitan, Ossetian (Latin), Papiamento, Piedmontese, Polish, Portuguese, Quechua, Rarotongan, Romanian, Romansh, Sami, Sango, Saramaccan, Sardinian, Scottish Gaelic, Serbian (Latin), Shona, Sicilian, Silesian, Slovak, Slovenian, Somali, Sorbian, Sotho, Spanish, Swahili, Swazi, Swedish, Tagalog, Tahitian, Tetum, Tongan, Tshiluba, Tsonga, Tswana, Tumbuka, Turkish, Turkmen (Latin), Tuvaluan, Uzbek (Latin), Venetian, Vepsian, Võro, Walloon, Waray-Waray, Wayuu, Welsh, Wolof, Xhosa, Yapese, Zapotec Zulu and Zuni.

Picture it: a bustling city street in the 1920s, when the world was changing and women were fighting for their place in it. Billboards line the road, but one catches your eye—it’s Skygirls, a typeface that takes you back to a time when advertising was an art form. This typeface is no ordinary script. It’s a tightly wound, joined design that exudes elegance and urgency. Its steep angle draws the eye up, making your message impossible to miss. Skygirls is inspired by classic metal scripts like Herald, Signal, Hauser, Penflow, Veltro, Kurier, and Bison, so it’s no wonder it feels so timeless. With Skygirls, you’re not just writing a message—you’re making a statement. It’s the perfect typeface to convey the frantic, fast-paced style of the roaring twenties. Your words will flow seamlessly together, creating a sense of movement and momentum. And when you set it on an upward slope, it’s like your message is soaring to new heights. If you want to make an impression that lasts, Skygirls is the typeface for you. It’s a perfect fit for any project that requires a touch of vintage charm, and it will leave your audience with a lasting sense of style. So why settle for the ordinary when you can have something truly extraordinary? Choose Skygirls and let your message take flight. Most Latin-based European writing systems are supported, including the following languages. Afaan Oromo, Afar, Afrikaans, Albanian, Alsatian, Aromanian, Aymara, Bashkir (Latin), Basque, Belarusian (Latin), Bemba, Bikol, Bosnian, Breton, Cape Verdean, Creole, Catalan, Cebuano, Chamorro, Chavacano, Chichewa, Crimean Tatar (Latin), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dawan, Dholuo, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Frisian, Friulian, Gagauz (Latin), Galician, Ganda, Genoese, German, Greenlandic, Guadeloupean Creole, Haitian Creole, Hawaiian, Hiligaynon, Hungarian, Icelandic, Ilocano, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Jamaican, Kaqchikel, Karakalpak (Latin), Kashubian, Kikongo, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi, Kurdish (Latin), Latvian, Lithuanian, Lombard, Low Saxon, Luxembourgish, Maasai, Makhuwa, Malay, Maltese, Māori, Moldovan, Montenegrin, Ndebele, Neapolitan, Norwegian, Novial, Occitan, Ossetian (Latin), Papiamento, Piedmontese, Polish, Portuguese, Quechua, Rarotongan, Romanian, Romansh, Sami, Sango, Saramaccan, Sardinian, Scottish Gaelic, Serbian (Latin), Shona, Sicilian, Silesian, Slovak, Slovenian, Somali, Sorbian, Sotho, Spanish, Swahili, Swazi, Swedish, Tagalog, Tahitian, Tetum, Tongan, Tshiluba, Tsonga, Tswana, Tumbuka, Turkish, Turkmen (Latin), Tuvaluan, Uzbek (Latin), Venetian, Vepsian, Võro, Walloon, Waray-Waray, Wayuu, Welsh, Wolof, Xhosa, Yapese, Zapotec Zulu and Zuni.

The Snasm typeface is a versatile and futuristic typeface that incorporates modular letter shapes from the late twentieth century, with a focus on wide letterforms. This typeface draws inspiration from the instrumental typeface designs of Donald Handel, known for their clean lines and sharp angles. But that’s not all—Snasm also pays homage to the sleek, high-tech design strategy of the late 1970s through the early 1990s, as seen in logos for Pepsi and the Nintendo Super Famicom. The Snasm font is not just visually appealing, but it also includes a range of weights and meticulously constructed obliques, making it a valuable asset in any design project. With its stable, sparse caps and roomy lowercase, Snasm is perfect for conveying concepts of science, technology, and high-tech accuracy. This font keeps pace with the latest digital gadgetry and user interface trends, making it an excellent choice for designers who want to stay ahead of the curve. Using Snasm in your designs can add a futuristic and modern touch to any project, whether you’re creating a new website, designing a mobile app, or working on a digital marketing campaign. Overall, Snasm is a typeface that is as functional as it is aesthetically pleasing, making it a must-have for any designer looking to create high-tech designs that stand out from the crowd. Most Latin-based European writing systems are supported, including the following languages. Afaan Oromo, Afar, Afrikaans, Albanian, Alsatian, Aromanian, Aymara, Bashkir (Latin), Basque, Belarusian (Latin), Bemba, Bikol, Bosnian, Breton, Cape Verdean, Creole, Catalan, Cebuano, Chamorro, Chavacano, Chichewa, Crimean Tatar (Latin), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dawan, Dholuo, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Frisian, Friulian, Gagauz (Latin), Galician, Ganda, Genoese, German, Greenlandic, Guadeloupean Creole, Haitian Creole, Hawaiian, Hiligaynon, Hungarian, Icelandic, Ilocano, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Jamaican, Kaqchikel, Karakalpak (Latin), Kashubian, Kikongo, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi, Kurdish (Latin), Latvian, Lithuanian, Lombard, Low Saxon, Luxembourgish, Maasai, Makhuwa, Malay, Maltese, Māori, Moldovan, Montenegrin, Ndebele, Neapolitan, Norwegian, Novial, Occitan, Ossetian (Latin), Papiamento, Piedmontese, Polish, Portuguese, Quechua, Rarotongan, Romanian, Romansh, Sami, Sango, Saramaccan, Sardinian, Scottish Gaelic, Serbian (Latin), Shona, Sicilian, Silesian, Slovak, Slovenian, Somali, Sorbian, Sotho, Spanish, Swahili, Swazi, Swedish, Tagalog, Tahitian, Tetum, Tongan, Tshiluba, Tsonga, Tswana, Tumbuka, Turkish, Turkmen (Latin), Tuvaluan, Uzbek (Latin), Venetian, Vepsian, Võro, Walloon, Waray-Waray, Wayuu, Welsh, Wolof, Xhosa, Yapese, Zapotec Zulu and Zuni.

Irish Penny is based on the lettering from Percy Metcalfe's beautiful and influential pre-decimal coinage of Ireland, the Barnyard Collection. The font is more monoline than is conventional for Irish insular styles, almost giving the feel of a modern soft sans, and perfect for small and large scale display purposes. Irish Penny contains a full complement of Latin Extended-A accented characters, Irish lenited consonants with the dot accent, and the tironian et which is commonly used in Ireland instead of an ampersand. Lowercase characters are provided small caps style, slightly reduced in size and subtly thickened in weight. The licensed font comes with a faux italic, and although obliques are not common among insular typefaces, Irish Penny Italic is a useful smart and sporty extra. Although the insular G/g is usually understood, Irish Penny also includes a more latinised option as an alternate G/g. The supplemental 'Irish Penny Alternate G' font places the latinised G and g characters at the normal G/g keystrokes, and makes the original insular glyphs the alternates. An alternate E/e with an angled crossbar is also included. The font contains a selection of discretionary ligatures, these include the ligatures that were used for pre-decimal coins: AC/ac, AE/ae, AL/al, AO/ao, AU/au, AT/at (halfpenny, half crown), AX/ax, AY/ay CA/ca, CC/cc, CE/ce, CO/co (half crown), CU/cu, CY/cy EA/ea (halfpenny, half crown), EC/ec, EE/ee, ET/et, EU/eu (sixpence), EY/ey FE/fe (farthing), FF/ff, FL/fl (florin) GI/gi (penny), GU/gu KA/ka, KE/ke, KI/ki, KO/ko, KT/kt, KU/ku LA/la, LE/le (halfpenny, half crown), LL/ll (shilling), LO/lo, LT/lt, LU/lu, LY/ly RA/ra, RC/rc, RE/re (three/sixpence), RH/rh, RI/ri (florin), RK/rk, RN/rn, RM/rm, RO/ro (half crown), RR/rr, RT/rt, RU/ru, RY/ry TA/ta, TE/te, TO/to, TU/tu NOTE - Irish Penny contains some characters that are not accessible directly from your keyboard, but which may be copied from a font viewer such as Character Map, Font Book or FontExplorer, and pasted into documents. They can also be accessed from the Glyphs browsers within OpenType-aware applications like Adobe InDesign and Illustrator, and Affinity Photo and Publisher.

Among the countless typefaces available today, the Modern Face style is relatively underrepresented. During the 19th century and then later with the competition from the mechanized hot metal types and film setting, a number of attractive headline types appeared in this style. For text, however, the available types were limited to those based on tried and true classics like Walbaum, Didot and Bodoni, which were created between 1780 and 1830, as well as a few variations from the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries. The demand for new Modern text types remained nonexistant until the 1960s. Such was the situation when the Haas'sche Schriftgiesserei (Haas Type Foundry) commissioned me to come up with a concept and sketches of a new hot metal type. I was able to convince the director of the foundry that there was a niche to be filled with contemporary Modern typography. Another reason for the production of a new type was of a technical nature: the introduction of a new setting technique should not be limited to existing typefaces, but instead should lead to innovative text types suited to the demands of the new applications. André Gürtler, Basilia's designer: I began to work on the concept and initial designs of the new text type in 1968. I wanted to give the type a classical look, expressed above all in the strong stroke contrast between the robust verticals and fine horizontal strokes and serifs. This is one of the main characteristics of Modern typography.""This new typeface, Basilia, is distinguished by its soft, open appearance as well as a number of details which together mark a departure from historical models. For example, it has nothing of Bodoni's round letters and their angular, narrow spacing, and displays instead round forms with a much softer stroke in the curves. It was very important to me to avoid the Modern characteristic of stiff, vertical, grid-like strokes and to create instead a lighter, more transparent type. I retained the Modern style by using straight horizontal serifs at right angles to the strokes to still give the type its sense of rigidity." Three sketches for Basilia (normal, italic, and bold) were finished in 1973. Only the 9-point size was produced at first. In the following years, basic weights were made and adapted to filmsetting."

Introducing Remissis—the sans-serif typeface that’s the perfect balance of casual and refined. With its off-grid letterforms, Remissis has a natural and organic feel that’s hard to come by in other typefaces. It’s not too laid-back to be dismissed as whimsical, but it’s not too rigid either. It strikes the perfect balance of being approachable yet professional. If you’re looking for a typeface that can convey the idea of softness and naturalness without coming off as too playful or zany, then Remissis is the perfect choice. Its delicate horizontal angles add a touch of elegance, making it ideal for projects that require a refined and sophisticated aesthetic. Designed for high-resolution displays and print, Remissis’s unique “lining old-style” numerals are available in OpenType-capable apps, giving you even more design flexibility. And with numerous mathematical symbols, monetary symbols, and diacritical marks, Remissis is versatile and functional. Available in seven weights and italics, Remissis is a typeface that’s sure to elevate any project. So if you’re looking for a typeface that’s both approachable and refined, choose Remissis. Most Latin-based European, Vietnamese, Greek, and most Cyrillic-based writing systems are supported, including the following languages. Afaan Oromo, Afar, Afrikaans, Albanian, Alsatian, Aromanian, Aymara, Azerbaijani, Bashkir, Bashkir (Latin), Basque, Belarusian, Belarusian (Latin), Bemba, Bikol, Bosnian, Breton, Bulgarian, Buryat, Cape Verdean, Creole, Catalan, Cebuano, Chamorro, Chavacano, Chichewa, Crimean Tatar (Latin), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dawan, Dholuo, Dungan, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Frisian, Friulian, Gagauz (Latin), Galician, Ganda, Genoese, German, Gikuyu, Greenlandic, Guadeloupean Creole, Haitian Creole, Hawaiian, Hiligaynon, Hungarian, Icelandic, Igbo, Ilocano, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Jamaican, Kaingang, Khalkha, Kalmyk, Kanuri, Kaqchikel, Karakalpak (Latin), Kashubian, Kazakh, Kikongo, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi, Komi-Permyak, Kurdish, Kurdish (Latin), Kyrgyz, Latvian, Lithuanian, Lombard, Low Saxon, Luxembourgish, Maasai, Macedonian, Makhuwa, Malay, Maltese, Māori, Moldovan, Montenegrin, Nahuatl, Ndebele, Neapolitan, Norwegian, Novial, Occitan, Ossetian, Ossetian (Latin), Papiamento, Piedmontese, Polish, Portuguese, Quechua, Rarotongan, Romanian, Romansh, Russian, Rusyn, Sami, Sango, Saramaccan, Sardinian, Scottish Gaelic, Serbian, Serbian (Latin), Shona, Sicilian, Silesian, Slovak, Slovenian, Somali, Sorbian, Sotho, Spanish, Swahili, Swazi, Swedish, Tagalog, Tahitian, Tajik, Tatar, Tetum, Tongan, Tshiluba, Tsonga, Tswana, Tumbuka, Turkish, Turkmen (Latin), Tuvaluan, Ukrainian, Uzbek, Uzbek (Latin), Venda, Venetian, Vepsian, Vietnamese, Võro, Walloon, Waray-Waray, Wayuu, Welsh, Wolof, Xavante, Xhosa, Yapese, Zapotec, Zarma, Zazaki, Zulu and Zuni.

A sign of something better When designer Stuart de Rozario surveyed the fonts used in signage on London’s public transport systems, he reached a dead end. They seemed staid, sterile, lacking in personality, and ill-suited to use by modern brands. He was pointed in another direction entirely. ‘The driving force behind my thoughts was to design something more current and fresh without compromising legibility and clarity. A font with both personality and function, that’s versatile and large and small sizes, and effortless to read, but which also says something new.’ Speed reading Late for a meeting and can’t find your way? Trying to catch a flight? Lost in a hospital? Reading signs is a different business to reading a book or a newspaper. Text on signs needs to be deciphered quickly and effortlessly. So the legibility criteria for signage letterforms are different to those for normal reading, too. Throughout FS Millbank’s uppercase and lowercase alphabets, characters have been given features for extra definition, including: wide ink traps on the A, K, M, V, W, X and Y; a serifed i, accentuated spurs on the a, d, l u; and different x-height shapes on the b, g, p and q. Distinctive forms and generous, open internal shapes all help the quick reading of sign text, and wide, open terminals and counters allow similar letter shapes to be distinguished easily when viewed at different angles. Running down a corridor, maybe... Positive/negative Standard type tends to glow on the kind of dark backgrounds often used for signage, and look heavier than its true weight. To correct the imbalance caused by this optical trick, special weights of the typeface have to be drawn for these ‘negative’, light-on-dark applications. These are lighter than their comparable positive weights to overcome the ‘glow’ effect. After extensive tests of the negative weights, at all sizes, we achieved the right optical balance. Glowing, glowing, gone. Icons This wouldn’t be a signage typeface without its own set of icons, or symbols, to help people find what they’re looking for. So, to sit alongside the positive and negative fonts, we’ve created a comprehensive set of 172 icons, covering a wide range of applications from transport and user interface to information and directional. Designed within the typeface capital height, they sit on the baseline and are spaced centrally.

The Joanna® Sans Nova family is the only typeface in the Eric Gill Series that was not initially designed by Gill. Created by Monotype Studio designer Terrance Weinzierl over a three-year period with digital applications at the forefront of the design criteria, Joanna Sans Nova is a humanist sans serif based primarily on Gill’s original Joanna. The design comprises 16 fonts, from thin to black, each with a complementary italic. Joanna Sans Nova has a larger x-height to ensure high levels of legibility – even on small digital screens. Due to its inherent humanist proportions, Joanna Sans Nova is surprisingly comfortable for longer form reading. Its low contrast in character stroke weights also improves imaging in a variety of environments. In addition, the calligraphic and fluid details enable the roman and italic designs to shine in headlines and other display uses. Joanna Sans features a robust range of OpenType features for fine typography, including small caps, old style figures, proportional figures, ligatures, superscript and subscript figures and support for fractions. With over 1000 glyphs per font, Joanna Sans supports more than 50 languages – in Latin, Greek and Cyrillic scripts. “I've always been a fan of Gill’s work, explains Weinzierl, and found the simple, humanist qualities of Joanna really fitting for a sans serif design. I wanted to make something with Gill flavor, but with more harmony in the extreme weights than Gill Sans – and with my twist on it. I went through six or seven different italic designs before landing on the current direction.” “The original Joanna had a very distinct italic, Weinzierl continues. “It’s very condensed, and has a very shallow angle. I wanted to have an italic that stood out, but in a different way. I took a cursive direction for the italic details, which are wider and slanted more, both improving character legibility.” The Joanna Sans Nova typeface family is part of the new Eric Gill series, drawing on Monotype’s heritage to remaster and expand and revitalize Eric Gill’s body of work, with more weights, more characters and more languages to meet a wide range of design requirements. The series also brings to life new elements inspired by some of Gill’s unreleased work, discovered in Monotype’s archive of original typeface drawings and materials of the last century.

The Postea font family is Veronika Burian and José Scaglione’s take on German geometric typefaces, reshaped with the right attributes for setting paragraphs and headings, and perfect for branding and text use. Some typefaces are a rough tool, like a pumice rock: abrasive to the senses, unforgiving, and unhelpful for most reading situations. Postea is an obsidian: smooth and classy, with attractive nuances in any light. The classic curves and purposeful details keep its individuality intact while allowing it to fit an incredible range of geometric font needs. Because of these qualities, Postea makes normal reading in paragraphs a cinch and your branding memorable. Compared to midcentury attributes of restraint and a sparse appearance, Postea’s deliberate play between character widths injects life and distinctiveness into its personality. The default ‘t, f’ have lyrical doses akin to a robust evening drink and are rounded out with a serpentine ‘s’ and rotund ‘o, g, b’. Another nice surprise awaits: spacing for the Hairline weight is tighter for optimal use in large headings and titles, while the regular weights have the expected, slightly looser spacing for text. Setting the test word ‘bogarts’ brings all this together nicely, invoking a balance between a constructed and human feel while brushing away the dust from a century of derivatives. Postea is opinionated and its modern stylistic sets allow it to be accommodating with softer, specially-designed alternative characters. SS01 replaces ‘b, f, M, m, t’, while SS02 changes only the lowercase ‘a’ to the round style, and SS03 swaps out the angled ‘y’ for a straight version. The fourth and sixth stylistic sets are packed with wallpaper-worthy geometric patterns, ornaments, arrows, and symbols aplenty. Postea’s 14 styles (seven upright and italic) and two variable fonts are accompanied by an all-new family of icons in three weights, which we developed a new, easy way to activate. Simply bookend the desired icon name with colons (:arrowUp: :chargingStation: :aid: :firstAid:), making sure to capitalise each word after the first word, then highlight and activate SS05. Icons include wayfinding, social interface, sanitary precautions like face masks, thermometers, and hand washing, and much more. Postea is resilient in the number of ways the family can be used, and its recognisable characters make it a prime selection for branding, signage, corporate typefaces, and magazines. Beginning with midcentury virtues, Postea is the rational response for text — a lyrical take on geometric sans serifs.

Morris Sans is a newly revised and extended version of a small geometric family of typefaces originally produced by Morris Fuller Benton in 1930 for ATF. His initial design consisted of an alphabet of squared capital letters with a unique twist that characterized its appearance: corners with rounded exteriors and right-angle interiors. The types were intended for use in the fine print found on business cards, banking or financial forms, and contracts. But over the ensuing decades, this design became a popular element in all sorts of design environments, and several foundries revived the typeface in digital form. Since digital fonts are bicameral, with slots for both upper and lowercase letters, new cuts of the type opted filled the lowercase slots with small caps. In 2006, Linotype commissioned its own version of the typeface-an extension for 21st century use. Under the advisement of Linotype's type director Akira Kobayashi, Dan Reynolds redrew the uppercase and added an original lowercase for the first time. Additionally, a number of extras were brought into the fonts, including six figure styles (tabular and proportional lining figures, tabular and proportional oldstyle figures, and special tabular and proportional small cap" figures). Small caps, which have become an iconic element over time, are accessible in each font as an OpenType feature. To differentiate this version from the original, Linotype's new family is named Morris Sans, in honor of Morris Fuller Benton. All fonts in the Morris Sans family are OpenType Com fonts; they include a character set capable of setting 48 European languages that employ the Roman alphabet, including all Central and Eastern Europe languages, those from the Baltics, and Turkish. This glyph coverage extends to the small caps as well. Morris Sans is a wide typeface, especially in its regular widths; the condensed faces set a more conventional line of text. The new lowercase letters are less geometric than the uppercase, except for those that share the same basic forms (e.g., c, o, and s). Instead of following this geometric trend, the new lowercase tends to strengthen the humanist elements that were present in several characters from the original type, including the uppercase D and the figures 5, 6, and 9. Morris Sans also sports a number of glyphic flares, like the stroke found on the original uppercase Q. Morris Sans is a clean, modern design best suited for headlines, advertising, posters, expressive signage (especially on storefronts), and corporate identity work."

Although Andi AW. Masry designed his Coomeec typeface with one eye on comic books, this is more than just another cartoon font. Even in our short profile of the font below, we're sure you'll find enough to be surprised by the calligraphic aesthetic and the wide range of potential uses of Coomeec. Typography had been one of Andy AW. Masry's hobbies before he turned professional in 2008 and formed his own agency in Jakarta in Indonesia. The former construction engineer had already spent many hours of his leisure time in following his pastimes of designing, photography and Latin typography. Fascinated by the close interaction between text and image in comic books, one of his first projects was the development of his font Coomeec™. The condensed letters of Coomeec seem to have more in common with a calligraphic brush typeface than a more conventional cartoon font. With the characteristic line forms of a brush font, the not unextensive variations in line thickness and numerous small embellishments to the glyphs, Coomeec can be used to enhance your projects with animated effects. You can achieve this not just in the larger font sizes; the font is also very legible in small sizes thanks to its large x-height. There are certain unusual letter forms, such as that of lowercase 'g', 's' and uppercase 'Y', that provide Coomeec with a touch of the exotic. As Coomeec has numerous character alternatives, you can use it not only to create diverse designs but also to ring the changes with the character of the text itself. There are variants for most lowercase letters, some of which exhibit only minor differences, such as the lack of a curlicue on the 'b', a modified downstroke on the 'h' and an elongated base for the 'k'. In the case of other letters, such as the 'q' and the 'r', there are significant disparities between variants. The uppercase characters are also available in a lively swash style with significantly extended terminals. Among the range of characters of Coomeec are oldstyle and lining figures designed for proportional and tabular setting. All alternatives are available in the form of the corresponding OpenType versions. Coomeec comes in two weights; Regular and Bold, each with its Italic version. The form of the slightly inclined Italic characters is identical to that of their upright counterparts with the exception of the lowercase 'f', which has an ascender in its Italic version. As an OpenType Pro font, the glyphs available for Coomeec ensure that it can be used to set not only western European but also central European texts. Coomeec is not just at home when used to set headlines. The excellent legibility of this individual and vibrant typeface means that it's also ideal for setting shorter texts. The various alternative letters provide the designer with the opportunity to vary the textual appearance, and to choose between creating a more formal or more light-hearted effect. Coomeec is not only available in an OpenType version but is also obtainable as a web font, so that you can employ its exotic features to good effect when creating internet pages.

Type designers are crazy people. Not crazy in the sense that they think we are Napoleon, but in the sense that the sky can be falling, wars tearing the world apart, disasters splitting the very ground we walk on, plagues circling continents to pick victims randomly, yet we will still perform our ever optimistic task of making some little spot of the world more appealing to the human eye. We ought to be proud of ourselves, I believe. Optimism is hard to come by these days. Regardless of our own personal reasons for doing what we do, the very thing we do is in itself an act of optimism and belief in the inherent beauty that exists within humanity. As recently as ten years ago, I wouldn't have been able to choose the amazing obscure profession I now have, wouldn't have been able to be humbled by the history that falls into my hands and slides in front of my eyes every day, wouldn't have been able to live and work across previously impenetrable cultural lines as I do now, and wouldn't have been able to raise my glass of Malbeck wine to toast every type designer who was before me, is with me, and will be after me. As recently as ten years ago, I wouldn't have been able to mean these words as I wrote them: It’s a small world. Yes, it is a small world, and a wonderfully complex one too. With so much information drowning our senses by the minute, it has become difficult to find clear meaning in almost anything. Something throughout the day is bound to make us feel even smaller in this small world. Most of us find comfort in a routine. Some of us find extended families. But in the end we are all Eleanor Rigbys, lonely on the inside and waiting for a miracle to come. If a miracle can make the world small, another one can perhaps give us meaning. And sometimes a miracle happens for a split second, then gets buried until a crazy type designer finds it. I was on my honeymoon in New York City when I first stumbled upon the letters that eventually started this Affair. A simple, content tourist walking down the streets formerly unknown to me except through pop music and film references. Browsing the shops of the city that made Bob Dylan, Lou Reed, and a thousand other artists. Trying to chase away the tourist mentality, wondering what it would be like to actually live in the city of a billion tiny lights. Tourists don't go to libraries in foreign cities. So I walked into one. Two hours later I wasn't in New York anymore. I wasn't anywhere substantial. I was the crazy type designer at the apex of insanity. La La Land, alphabet heaven, curves and twirls and loops and swashes, ribbons and bows and naked letters. I'm probably not the very first person on this planet to be seduced into starting an Affair while on his honeymoon, but it is something to tease my better half about once in a while. To this day I can't decide if I actually found the worn book, or if the book itself called for me. Its spine was nothing special, sitting on a shelf, tightly flanked by similar spines on either side. Yet it was the only one I picked off that shelf. And I looked at only one page in it before walking to the photocopier and cheating it with an Argentine coin, since I didn't have the American quarter it wanted. That was the beginning. I am now writing this after the Affair is over. And it was an Affair to remember, to pull a phrase. Right now, long after I have drawn and digitized and tested this alphabet, and long after I saw what some of this generation’s type designers saw in it, I have the luxury to speculate on what Affair really is, what made me begin and finish it, what cultural expressions it has, and so on. But in all honesty it wasn't like that. Much like in my Ministry Script experience, I was a driven man, a lover walking the ledge, an infatuated student following the instructions of his teacher while seeing her as a perfect angel. I am not exaggerating when I say that the letters themselves told me how to extend them. I was exploited by an alphabet, and it felt great. Unlike my experience with Ministry Script, where the objective was to push the technology to its limits, this Affair felt like the most natural and casual sequence of processions in the world – my hand following the grid, the grid following what my hand had already done – a circle of creation contained in one square computer cell, then doing it all over again. By contrast, it was the lousiest feeling in the world when I finally reached the conclusion that the Affair was done. What would I do now? Would any commitment I make from now on constitute a betrayal of these past precious months? I'm largely over all that now, of course. I like to think I'm a better man now because of the experience. Affair is an enormous, intricately calligraphic OpenType font based on a 9x9 photocopy of a page from a 1950s lettering book. In any calligraphic font, the global parameters for developing the characters are usually quite volatile and hard to pin down, but in this case it was particularly difficult because the photocopy was too gray and the letters were of different sizes, very intertwined and scan-impossible. So finishing the first few characters in order to establish the global rhythm was quite a long process, after which the work became a unique soothing, numbing routine by which I will always remember this Affair. The result of all the work, at least to the eyes of this crazy designer, is 1950s American lettering with a very Argentine wrapper. My Affair is infused with the spirit of filete, dulce de leche, yerba mate, and Carlos Gardel. Upon finishing the font I was fortunate enough that a few of my colleagues, great type designers and probably much saner than I am, agreed to show me how they envision my Affair in action. The beauty they showed me makes me feel small and yearn for the world to be even smaller now – at least small enough so that my international colleagues and I can meet and exchange stories over a good parrilla. These people, whose kindness is very deserving of my gratitude, and whose beautiful art is very deserving of your appreciation, are in no particular order: Corey Holms, Mariano Lopez Hiriart, Xavier Dupré, Alejandro Ros, Rebecca Alaccari, Laura Meseguer, Neil Summerour, Eduardo Manso, and the Doma group. You can see how they envisioned using Affair in the section of this booklet entitled A Foreign Affair. The rest of this booklet contains all the obligatory technical details that should come with a font this massive. I hope this Affair can bring you as much peace and satisfaction as it brought me, and I hope it can help your imagination soar like mine did when I was doing my duty for beauty.

ALS Direct is an open and dynamic typeface with clear-cut letterforms that make it instantly readable. It lends text a neutral, yet agreeable and modern feel. Direct has nine font styles convenient for the purposes of navigation signage. Regular-style letterforms are rather wide, because direction signs are likely to appear before readers at an angle, so the type needs to withstand perspective distortions. And as signs and boards may vary in size, Direct was developed to include several width variations. Condensed fonts can be used where horizontal space is limited, allowing you to keep proper height and readability of the characters. A signage typeface must be easily readable from some distance away and have simple letterfoms with clear-cut features to quickly identify characters. Designing a type for a potentially wide range of purposes calls for a universal approach. If not destined to be used for navigation in a particular building, it shouldn’t incorporate any peculiar elements to agree with certain design or architecture. All of the above determined our choice of a sans serif with large apertures and definite features allowing readers to instantly recognize letters. Descenders are made compact not to interfere with the line below. And the low contrast between thick and thin strokes renders all elements equally perceptible. The x-height is significant, close to the cap height, which inhances readability of the lowercase type. There are two reasons why directions must not be set in all caps. Firstly, lowercase letters are more diverse and include ascenders and descenders identifying some of the letters in the line. And secondly, having learned to read, people recognize word shapes rather than individual letters, which makes lowercase text more readable. With Direct being a signage typeface, first to be developed were its width variations, and different weight styles and italics were added later. Another thing to be kept in mind was that signs often use dark background colors, and black type on a white background appears smaller than white type on a black background. Direct is the first Cyrillic typeface created for navigation purposes. Before that, designers could use the Cyrillic version of Frutiger (Freeset) developed by Adrian Frutiger for the Paris Charles de Gaulle International Airport, and a number of other, mostly body copy, neutral sans serif types. However, signs and boards were dominated by Arial, which Direct would be glad to replace offering elegance and lucidity of form instead of type bluntess. Direct was designed as a signage typeface, but its neutral style and clear-cut letterforms suggest various other ways of application.

Paneuropa 1931™ is a faithful recreation of XX-century Polish classic, made by Idzikowski foundry in Warsaw, 1931. Original Paneuropa was a renowned and highly popular typeface in XX-century Poland, and was widely used in all kinds of design, editorial use and printed materials for decades. Paneuropa is a geometric, clean and versatile font family inspired by Paul Renner's famous Futura - it is a bit narrower, with different proportions and details in drawing, completely different figures and punctuation shapes than Futura. It is an interesting and refreshing alternative to Futura with its own distinct personality and a subtle authentic vintage flavour. Paneuropa 1931 contains separate styles for display and large sizes as well as styles for small text sizes - differing in spacing and the softness of letterforms. The family features an original Paneuropa Double font - a beautiful inline style for headlines and display use. The whole family is completed with added missing inbetween styles as well as italics. The original subfamily set is available for purchase and it contains solely the original Paneuropa styles (Thin, Regular, Bold, Text Regular, Text Italic, Double). Paneuropa 1931 characteristics: letter shapes and proportions are very faithful to the original, keeping its idiosycrasies and inconsistencies spacing and kerning are carefully adjusted in order to achieve the colour of the original fonts, keeping maximum possible consistency - a compromise between authentic vintage feel and legible consistent text colour (for hardcore users: just turn off the kerning) weights precisely matching the original (Thin, Regular, Bold, Text Regular, Text Italic, Double), inbetween weights were added (Light, Demi Bold, as well as missing italic styles) italic angle faithful to the original (8 degrees) softened corners help achieving the character of old imprecise printed display styles for big sizes are sharper and have tight spacing, text styles have softer shapes (recreating small print imperfect print) and broader spacing for use in paragraph text (spacing in both display and text styles matches the original as well) original style names in Polish for devices with Polish set as their primary language The family is very versatile. The Inline style as well as bold and thin weights are perfect for headlines and display use, other styles works wonderfully as paragraph text. Paneuropa 1931 consists of 18 fonts - 5 display weights with corresponding italics + 3 text weights with corresponding italics + 2 inline styles (for big and small print sizes). It has extended support for latin languages, as well as broad number of OpenType features, such as case sensitive forms, fractions, superscript and subscript, ordinals, currencies and symbols.

In B-movie awesomeness, Air began as Grotesk vs. Grotesque. I was trying to unify the prevailing traits of German and English Grotes(que/k)s in order to make something different but familiar. I am NOT trying to reinvent Helvetica (snore), so get that out of your system. From the onset, I intended this typeface to be a true workhorse that offers infinite options and flexibility for the user. At its core, it is the maturation of the Aaux Next skeleton I developed years ago. I worked out Aaux Next to settle my issues and love for Akzidenz. With Aaux Next, I strove to be mechanical, cold and unforgiving with it. I was single, young, cocky and it fit. Now I'm married, kids, dog and have found that I've turned into a big softy. When I look at Aaux Next (and have for the past few years) I see another typeface trying to eek out. I wanted it to avoid the trappings of robotic sans, quick tricks and compromises. The typeface’s DNA needed to be drawn and not just generated on a screen — so I set aside a year. I love type. I love working with type. I hate when my options for a slanted complement is only oblique or italic. I set out to produce both to balance usage — there are more than enough reasons to prepare both and I want the user to feel free to consciously choose (and have the option to choose) the appropriate typeface for print, web, etc. That flexibility was central to my decision-making process. The Oblique is immediate and aggressive. The Italic was redrawn at a less severe angle with far more movement and, as a result, is far more congenial when paired with the Uprights. Condensed and Compressed. Yep, why not? I know I would use them. There are nine weights currently available. The logical progression of weights and the intended flexibility demanded I explore a number of light weights and their potential uses — this has produced a number of ‘light without being too light’ options that really work based on the size. The result is a robust 81-font superfamily that is functional, professional, and highly legible without compromising its personality. Pair that with over 900 characters per font that includes ligatures, discretionary ligatures, stylistic alternates, fractions, proportional/tabular lining and proportional/tabular oldstyle figures, numerators, denominators, ordinals, superiors, inferiors, small caps, case-sensitive functionality and extensive language support and you have a versatile superfamily well-suited for any project.

Maestrale is a paradigm-breaking new take on calligraphy, built around a compact, serif-style core and outrageously long, flamboyant extenders. At large sizes, its confident, charismatic lettershapes are ideally suited for branding and decorative uses, whereas longer texts at smaller sizes naturally weave themselves into a flowing texture. The font comprises 1299 glyphs, including many stylistic alternates, ligatures, small capitals, and initial, terminal, and linking forms, and offers extensive OpenType programming to support them. The calligraphic form of Maestrale is complemented by a matching text font (Maestrale Text) with short extenders, available in three cuts (a serif-style Roman, an upright Cursive, and a tilted Italic). Maestrale is all about the lowercase; its capitals are deliberately understated so as not to steal the limelight. In fact, the font works very well when set exclusively in lowercase. Maestrale�s small capitals are fitted into the core space of the lowercase, allowing them to be freely interspersed with lowercase characters. Alternately, an OpenType feature is available to replace a and e in small-caps text with their lowercase equivalents for a fresh unicase look. Since alternates and ligatures play such an important role, Maestrale offers three different modes of use. The most straightforward approach is simply to start typing using Maestrale Pro � the extensive OpenType programming will ensure that collisions between extenders are avoided and attractive ligatures are substituted for common glyph combinations. A more interactive approach is provided by the font Maestrale Manual, which allows the user to manually select alternate forms and ligatures even in typographically unsavvy applications, such as PowerPoint (as long as standard ligatures are supported). Stylistic alternates are simply represented as ligatures of their base forms with one or more instances of the rarely-used by easily-accessed characters "~" (ASCII tilde) and "`" (spacing grave accent); linking forms are built with �_� (underscore), multi-character ligatures with "|" (pipe), and initial and terminal forms with the �less than� and �greater than� characters. For instance, the Maestrale wordmark in the posters above was simply typeset with the string (`ma`est|r_a```l```e)| in Maestrale Manual (The parentheses represent �less than� and �greater than� characters here.) Feel free to type this string into the test line below and see what happens! Make sure Standard Ligatures are enabled. An instruction sheet listing all alternate forms and their accessibility is available from the Gallery tab on this page. The third mode of usage is aimed at professional designers, who make use of sophisticated software with extensive OpenType support. These power users are advised to use the font Maestrale Pro again, where all glyphs are accessible as stylistic alternates. Maestrale Text is a less extravagant but more versatile variation on the design of Maestrale, replacing Maestrale�s swashes with efficiently compact extenders. It is intended to serve as a perfectly matching text companion to Maestrale calligraphy, but constitutes a full-fledged typeface in its own right. It is equally at home at display sizes as it is in pull quotes, titles, and high-impact blocks of text. Maestrale Text comes in three complementary faces: A serif-style Roman, an upright Cursive, and a tilted Italic. Maestrale is the Italian word for �masterful�. It is also the traditional Italian name for the northwesterly mediterranean wind, better known by its French name, Mistral. Acknowledgements: I am grateful to the helpful souls on the Typophile forums for extensive feedback and encouragement on Maestrale, and to the TypeDrawers forum for feedback on Maestrale Text. This font is dedicated to Simone.

Helvetica’s 50-year anniversary celebrations in 2007 were overwhelming and contagious. We saw the movie. Twice. We bought the shirts and the buttons. We dug out the homage books and re-read the hate articles. We mourned the fading non-color of an old black shirt proudly exclaiming that “HELVETICA IS NOT AN ADOBE FONT”. We took part in long conversations discussing the merits of the Swiss classic, that most sacred of typographic dreamboats, outlasting its builder and tenants to go on alone and saturate the world with the fundamental truth of its perfect logarithm. We swooned again over its subtleties (“Ah, that mermaid of an R!”). We rehashed decades-old debates about “Hakzidenz,” “improvement in mind” and “less is more.” We dutifully cursed every single one of Helvetica’s knockoffs. We breathed deeply and closed our eyes on perfect Shakti Gawain-style visualizations of David Carson hack'n'slashing Arial — using a Swiss Army knife, no less — with all the infernal post-brutality of his creative disturbance and disturbed creativity. We then sailed without hesitation into the absurdities of analyzing Helvetica’s role in globalization and upcoming world blandness (China beware! Helvetica will invade you as silently and transparently as a sheet of rice paper!). And at the end of a perfect celebratory day, we positively affirmed à la Shakti, and solemnly whispered the energy of our affirmation unto the universal mind: “We appreciate Helvetica for getting us this far. We are now ready for release and await the arrival of the next head snatcher.” The great hype of Swisspalooza '07 prompted a look at Max Miedinger, the designer of Neue Haas Grotesk (later renamed to Helvetica). Surprisingly, what little biographical information available about Miedinger indicates that he was a typography consultant and type sales rep for the Haas foundry until 1956, after which time he was a freelance graphic designer — rather than the full-time type designer most Helvetica enthusiasts presume him to have been. It was under that freelance capacity that he was commissioned to design the regular and bold weights of Neue Haas Grotesk typeface. His role in designing Helvetica was never really trumpeted until long after the typeface attained global popularity. And, again surprisingly, Miedinger designed two more typefaces that seem to have been lost to the dust of film type history. One is called Pro Arte (1954), a very condensed Playbill-like slab serif that is similar to many of its genre. The other, made in 1964, is much more interesting. Its original name was Horizontal. Here it is, lest it becomes a Haas-been, presented to you in digital form by Canada Type under the name of its original designer, Miedinger, the Helvetica King. The original film face was a simple set of bold, panoramically wide caps and figures that give off a first impression of being an ultra wide Gothic incarnation of Microgramma. Upon a second look, they are clearly more than that. This face is a quirky, very non-Akzidental take on the vernacular, mostly an exercise in geometric modularity, but also includes some unconventional solutions to typical problems (like thinning the midline strokes across the board to minimize clogging in three-storey forms). This digital version introduces four new weights, ranging from Thin to Medium, alongside the bold original. The Miedinger package comes in all popular font formats, and supports Western, Central and Eastern European languages, as well as Esperanto, Maltese, Turkish and Celtic/Welsh. A few counter-less alternates are included in the fonts.