The great enigma There are hidden depths to FS Silas Sans. First impressions are of a functional, multi-purpose typeface with a cool, edgy, angular character. Gaze into its eyes a little longer, though, and you'll detect a more nuanced, colourful personality, with full, open, satisfyingly squarish forms balancing the abruptness of the sharply-angled terminals and ascenders. Authoritative, official and stern on the outside; amiable and welcoming on the inside. You’re so Dane The designers, led by Phil Garnham, were trying to capture something straight-talking, authentic, and a little... Scandinavian. ‘We were thinking about some of the characters in Danish dramas that were on in the early stages of the font’s development, like The Killing and The Bridge,’ says Phil. ‘The police officers, that is, not the psychopathic killers. Smart and a bit cool, but with a warm heart.’ For a good Danish name, we settled on Silas. It was that or Hans-Christian. The finer points Silas Sans rewards close inspection. Study, if you will, its amply squarish forms, the roomy ‘o’ and ‘e’, in particular. Observe the angular ascenders and terminals of, for example, the ‘L’, ‘I’, ‘d’ and ‘i’, inferring the movement and lift of a pen. Consider the cuts to the ‘A’ and ‘v’ that create harmony with adjacent letters. And scrutinise the subtle ink traps set within the ‘A’ and ‘Y’ for reproduction at small sizes. A fine subject, we think you’ll agree, and available in a versatile range of weights to make (with FS Silas Slab) a typographic system with a comprehensive hierarchy.

Now available as Opentype font with extended character set, Coranto 2. It is originally based on Unger’s typeface Paradox, and arose from a desire to transfer the elegance and refinement of that type to newsprint. Coranto 2 has a larger x-height and in many places has been made more robust. Over the past 25 years newspaper production has seen spectacular improvements in paper and print quality, the introduction of colour printing, and vastly better register. Newspaper production still demands a lot of letter forms, but advanced printing brings out details better and makes typography more appealing to readers. For text type the newspaper is no longer an environment in which survival is the chief assignment. Today, newspapers are not merely a matter of cheap grey paper, thin ink and super-fast rotary printing, and type design no longer has to focus on surviving the mechanical technology and providing elementary legibility. Now there is also room to create an ambience, to give a paper a clearer identity of its own; there is scope for precision and refinement. One consequence of this is that newspaper designers can now look beyond the traditional group of newsfaces. Conversely, a newsface can be used outside the newspaper — not an uncommon occurrence. The update to this beautiful font family, Coranto 2, includes the addition of over 250 glyphs featuring full Latin A language support, new ligatures, 4 sets of numerals, arbitrary fractions and superiors/inferiors. Furthermore, kerning was added and fine tuned for better performance.

Holy Dooley! It’s a new Ainslie! Based on the inspiration from Mt. Ainslie and the Ainslie suburb outside Canberra, the original Ainslie adds geometric simplicity with a hint of aboriginal flair to the project. And now the muses of Ainslie are back at work, lending their structure as the foundation of Ainslie Slab. Like its big brothers, the new Ainslie Slab puts together a great mix of influences from Oz for a great looking typeface with some ace new shoes. Slab’s spiffy new slab serifs complement the classic frame, making the result a ripper Aussie typeface that can be used in a great number of applications. Take a look at the trendy typeface’s alternates in action, too. You can access these in any OpenType-enabled application. Alternates, swashes and alternate titling caps allow you to customize your look and feel. Capital swash alternates, old style figures, and compact caps are included to add a bit more flexibility to your work as well. OpenType enabled applications can take complete benefit of your automatic replacing ligatures and alternates, and this font also presents the glyphs to help a wide array of languages. View all of these in the PDF brochure. And then try them out. Combine it with the original Ainslie and Ainslie Sans for more flexibility. Whether you need a good slab for the copy or you want a clean, upbeat look for your headline, Ainslie Slab offers you a unique touch of the Outback that’s anything but out of touch.

An authentic script from the tip of the ball point pen. This hasn’t been seen yet: A typeface which truly looks as if it were handwritten. Calligraphy is, actually, the art of fine writing. And actually, written scripts as typeface for the computer are 100% nonsense. And yet, an obvious thought: Create a typeface which truly derives from everyday handwriting. And since we, if we write at all, utilize practically only a ball point pen anymore, then a modern cursive writing form must look like just that. As a counterpart to the artistic ”handwritings“ which have long been available as typeface, the thought of digitalizing a truly ”ugly“ handwriting is appealing. After all, time and again there is the need for a text to look ”handwritten“. Biró Script is written freehand with a ball point pen. Finally a truly individual script! Biró Script includes more than 300 authentic ligatures in addition to the customary alphabet. By the way, the most convincing effect is obtained with a font size of about 18 to 22 points, at which the thickness of the stroke is now about the same as that of a real ball point pen. There's a difference between the anglo-american forms of some characters (esp. the numerals 1 and 7, but also capitals I and F) and how it's written in the rest of the world. For those of us who aren’t used to the world-wide usual forms, Biró Script includes a US version with the appropriate characters.

"LFT Etica, the moralist type family by Leftloft, began at the end of 2000, but its development is ongoing as it expands to fill the astute designer’s needs. The starting point was the common, cold grotesque sans typefaces — ubiquitous and often badly applied in their everyday visual environment. The challenge was to obtain the same force, versatility, and colour, but with a much warmer feel. LFT Etica resides aesthetically somewhere between a grotesque and a humanist sans serif, resulting from a design of soft strokes with open counters and terminals. LFT Etica successfully combines forcefulness and delicacy, wrapping both with sober charm. Milan-based Leftloft studio teamed up with Octavio Pardo to develop 24 additional styles for the very successful LFT Etica type family. This expansion is a direct response to type users’ requests who found in LFT Etica a de facto choice for web design. The new styles come in two series — 12 condensed widths and 12 compressed ones — and have proven versatile in applications where the ratio between information and space becomes an important challenge. Each letter was scrutinised to ensure durability throughout time and adaptability within circumstance, so LFT Etica meets the challenge of balance head-on. With its wide current range of 40 styles and many OpenType features (four sets of numerals, fractions, arrows, and dingbats, as well as stylistic alternates), LFT Etica is a versatile typeface suitable for corporate or casual use, for printed publications as well as web design. The complete LFT Etica family, along with our entire catalogue, has been optimised for today’s varied screen uses."

Patches is a multi-faceted, victorian-era serif typeface for when you need something more than plain text. Get that extra attention while adding a genuine, original appearance to your message. Patches was designed from scratch to give a sense quality and depth. Its designer Mans Greback has created a typeface with a complex structure, yet one that will be easy to master. This work will suit every style, taste and skill level. It is a decorative and completely hand-drawn design in vintage lettering, with the perks and flexibility of present-day technology, which is exactly what you'd expect from a modern typeface. Whether you are making a decorative floral headline, drawing a cowboy logo, or creating a unique design based on this ornamental font, the hopes are that Patches can give you a set of tools and inspiration to bring out the best of your artistry. Standing on the shoulders of giants, it was inspired by a wide range of works, and will hopefully be able to continue to teach and inspire future artists. Or at least help you become a better designer when you're designing an elegant and classic headline. Set the coloring of Patches to light gold and cream tones to apply a luxurious look, or in dark tones for a more rugged impression. Bold, bright colors will make it appear In the mid-1800s, decorative design flourished in the Western major cities. Victorian style thrived and encouraged techniques such as enamelling, embroidery and calligraphy. From the 1880s onwards, there were a series of reactions to higher Victorian tastes, with Art Deco reaching the heights of the 20th century. However, the Victorian art persisted popularity, as it changed to more sophisticated designs which made it more attractive to specific professions and groups. The evolution of the Victorian style in the mid-20th century was a key factor in the succession of the movement. Classic shops and salons, sport designs and traditional festivals, and later Rock'n'Roll and Harley Davidson-themed graphics ​inspired the continued development of the art. Aspiring to carry on this tradition, this typeface family consists twelve different high-quality variations. The main ones are Patched and Patched In – an outlined variation – and each one provided in five weights: Thin, Light, Medium, Bold and Black. Additionally, the two rough fonts Hangaround and Prospects, that tries to grasp the rough, earthy atmosphere of a shady motorcycle club. The font is built with advanced OpenType functionality and has a guaranteed top-notch quality, containing stylistic and contextual alternates, ligatures and more features; all to give you full control and customizability. It has extensive lingual support, covering all Latin-based languages, from North Europa to South Africa, from America to South-East Asia. It contains all characters and symbols you'll ever need, including all punctuation and numbers.