Decalcomania JNL is based on examples of gold and black water-applied initial decals made by the Transfer Monogram Company of Chicago circa the 1940s. It is presumed the patterns for the letters were hand cut, possibly explaining the variations in line widths and character shapes. These eccentricities were left intact and followed through to the other characters in order to represent a more "authentic" digital version of these vintage decals. Decalcomania JNL is available in both the regular (outline) version, and a solid black version, as well as obliques of both styles.

The Wright-Regan Instrument Company (Wrico) was one of the leading manufacturers of lettering templates for many years. Aside from their own line of products, they also did custom manufacturing. A series of lettering guides called “Mimeostyle” for the A. B. Dick Company of Chicago (produced for use in making mimeograph machine printing stencils) featured an art Deco squared letter design with rounded corners. This is now available digitally as Template Sans JNL, in both regular and oblique versions.

Do It Yourself JNL was modeled after self-adhesive vinyl letters and numbers manufactured by Duro Art Industries of Chicago - formerly the Duro Decal Company. The hand-drawn look of the original lettering was retained by Jeff Levine to stay true to the design, and the rectangles that border each glyph represent the pieces of self-adhesive vinyl onto which the characters were silk screened. Limited character set.

White Rose is an original hand-drawn typeface that was made for the White Rose Catholic Worker house in Chicago. White Rose (the Catholic Worker house) follows a long tradition of providing hospitality, being active and involved in the community and living a sustainable lifestyle. In the same way, White Rose (the typeface) follows a long tradition of typefaces, mimicking Old Style and Transitional forms while retaining an element of style.

Featuring condensed, block hand lettering, Informational Sans JNL was modeled from a selection of water applied sign decals once made by the Duro Decal Company of Chicago and is available in both regular and oblique versions. About fifty different small decal signs covered a wide range of general purpose information such as “Open”, Closed”, “Please Pay When Served”, etc.

Plastic Display JNL was sketched from photo examples in an old sales promotion sheet for the Movitex Do-It-Yourself Plastic Sign Kit. The set was manufactured by Pryor Marking Products of Chicago, and featured a board with pre-spaced holes in a grid to which the letters and numbers would be inserted to form the sign.

A vintage matchbook advertising the New York Liquor Mart – oddly enough, located in Chicago, Illinois – featured a pen and ink line drawing of the store’s exterior. The Art Deco lettering on the mansard was portrayed with a straight left shadow (as opposed to drop cast or extruded), making for an interesting multi-line typeface design. This is now digitally available as Packaged Goods JNL.

Kansas Casual offers a more upright, gothic, and modern alternative to the conventional sign painter's one stroke. Kansas provides a completely unique take on a overdone classic with proportions and crossbar heights inspired by the more friendly Chicago style. This all-caps set provides six weights so that you can adjust size with weight to maintain that authentic single brush weighted look. The proofing process included projecting, tracing, and then painting the letters out to see how true the small details were to the medium. The set also includes wide language support, opentype fractions, and arrows. You can learn more about its development here.

A 1931 poster for the film The Man from Chicago provided the pattern for this quirky Deco delight. Although the fonts is all uppercase, tasty variants have been added in the lowercase positions, and all possible letter combinations have been kerned, so you can mix the forms freely. This font contains the complete Latin language character set (Unicode 1252) plus support for Central European (Unicode 1250) languages as well.

NoExit is an industrial vernacular type system with multiple widths. Originally designed for the Chicago Athletic Association Hotel, its inspiration was an old sign that said “STAIRWAY” found the hotel’s old building. A pointed uppercase letter A stood up against the mechanic aspect of the rest of the letters, and that discrepancy was love at first sight. From that, we developed a type system in multiple widths and weights that looks best at large sizes. It’s an ideal typeface for signage systems, magazine headlines, posters and packaging.

The simple, square-shaped font that is Boat Decals JNL was loosely based on water-applied decals made by the Duro Decal Company (now Duro Art Industries) of Chicago, Illinois.