My first font for the summer of 2009, Abrect is a new sans serif font where I try to maximize the x-height and keep the design fresh and personal. It fits in with my continuing objective of designing book fonts that I can really use. Abrect is a tangent for me just taking an idea out to its end. In particular, it is a radical modification of my first font in 1993, Nuevo Litho. The hand-drawn shapes vary a lot, many pushing the boundaries of the normal character. With many of the new releases I see, the digital perfection is getting pretty extreme. It’s looking like a Rococo stage of development for many with decoration taking over from function. I'm consciously trying to head a different direction. This is not a normal font for me in that it has caps, lowercase, with the appropriate figures for each case, no small caps. This is the first time I have skipped small caps in over a decade. This font has all the OpenType features in the display set for 2009 except for the small caps. There are several ligatures for your fun and enjoyment: bb gg ff fi fl ffi ffl ffy fj ft tt ty Wh Th and more and many of them are experimental in form. Enjoy!

This font was created with math teachers in mind. It is hard to represent fractions in a way that can print easily in black and white on worksheets or tests. The extra outlines on these shapes are created just for that purpose- so your student can easily identify how many parts are shaded in the image. Blanks are also included so students can color in parts of a whole.

A classic “American” sans serif with a kink Desphalia belongs to the kind of sans serif fonts that were created in the 19th century. You could also name it “American Gothic”, a sans serif in the style of fonts like Franklin Gothic, News Gothic and similar. Above all, the high x-height characterizes this typeface style, as do the identical heights of uppercase and ascenders. However, I allowed myself a few peculiarities ;-) On the one hand, there is the gently sloping horizontal middle line on letters such as H, E, F, A and e. The M also got gently slanted sides. Some of the lower-case letters have an up- or down-stroke: a d m n p u. This "kink" on the shaft also serves to better distinguish the small l from the capital I — as can be seen clearly with the term »Illinois«. In keeping with the tradition of American typefaces, Desphalia does not have a true italic. Rather, the letters of the “Italic” have the same character forms as the normal upright variant, but in oblique — and so it is not called “Italic” but “Oblique”. Style Set 01: Another American peculiarity is the capital I with dashes above and below. It is included in the Desphalia as an alternate character form. An alternative small l with the “kink” in the ascender is also included — as is a y with the “kink” in the descender. Style Set 02: The corresponding “straight” forms a d l m n p u without the break are included as alternatives in a separate style set. Small caps are uppercase letters that are optically the same size as lowercase letters. They offer a very classy way of emphasis. Desphalia is available in the widths Condensed, Normal and Expanded, the weights include Thin, Light, Book, Bold, Black. Using the variable font, all intermediate levels can be freely selected. The figures are optionally available as tabular figures, proportional lining figures or old style figures.

Giambattista is a long-time project of mine finally come to an end. After redesigning all of Giambattista Bodoni's work and then some additional cuts I started a long time ago with this Non-Bodoni Bodoni. The idea came to me while redesigning the original Chancellerosa (chancery). I thought Bodoni just didn't have the right approach to a chancery, this was just not his cup of tea! Maybe that is why he never used the Chancellerosa very much for his own printshop in Parma. So I thought someone has to design a script, that looks like Bodoni could have designed it but is more lively than his. Over the years I have been working on and off on the face and it turned out to become three typefaces which can be freely mixed. Here is my modern version of a script in the style of Giambattista, meant as an hommage, I called it Giambattista. Your modern scribe Gert Wiescher

Many years ago I created two upside-down typefaces, UpsidedownJJ and UpsidedownTOC. They were based on monospaced or typewriter fonts, and were rotated 180 degrees, which is the same as a vertical flip followed by a horizontal flip. Recently I was reminded that this way of creating an upside-down typeface is not the only way to create an upside-down typeface--a simple vertical flip creates a different one. That is what this typeface is, a simple vertical flip. The unflipped typeface from which VerticalFlipTOC is derived is TiredOfCourier.

Catskin is a fairytale by The Brothers Grimm. The story is about a king who has a beautiful wife and daughter - you know, the basic fairytale stuff. Long story short: they all live happily ever after (except for the wife, who dies…). Catskin is also a nice, handmade font. I like making fairytale fonts, especially since I have three kids, who love books. And when I see one of my fonts on the cover, I can tell them: ‘daddy made this’. #prouddaddy ;-)

I generally refer to our typefaces as ‘graphic’ rather than typographic. By that I mean their starting points are usually ways of constructing shapes and systems of shapes. As with other Alias typefaces, Sabre has stone and wood cut letterforms as a starting point. What is interesting about lettercutting is the connection between shape and material. These beautifully crafted letterforms have a particular sharpness which reflects, of course, how they were made. The idea of constructing letters from a kit of parts we first explored in early fonts Elephant and Factory. These are different in that they were very much grid-based, with a geometric structure. For Sabre I also had Fred Smeijers’ stencil construction drawings in mind. These show how a set of components can be the basis for a crafted, elegant typeface. Sabre is quite a loose interpretation of this idea. Sabre’s graphic shape means it works well at large sizes, with a dramatic, angular impact. Its aim is to be typographic enough to function for blocks of small-size text too.

This font was a product of self-initiated project I started a while back. It started and finished as a project that I was working on while procrastinating at school, for fun; however, I spent enough time to not give it out for free.

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.

Its open counters and large x height give it excellent performance in small sizes. On the other hand, its curved diagonals, generous width and soft shapes give it a friendly but functional personality for a wide range of messages and voices. We recommend the four most extreme weights (Thin, ExtraLight, Black, and Heavy) for large sizes starting at 18 points, and the five intermediate weights (Light, Book, Regular, Medium, and Bold) for small sizes starting at 7 points.

Between twilight and daybreak it is said that the dark side of the human psyche eclipses the sun that shines from the depths of our souls. Certainty turns to doubt, clarity becomes confusion, man turns into wolf, the dead wake, vampires seduce the young are restless and milk boils over on the stove. Those that seek only to bathe in the light of a romantic new moon often end their tragic lives soaked in nothing other than their own blood, and the milk spilt on the stovetop has no one left to cry over it. There are fifty shades of grey during those hours after sunset and I think just as many in my porridge this morning. Yes, okay, I admit it, I spoiled the milk! This porridge tastes like it was left in a graveyard overnight. Death warmed over. Gothic and lumpy. Just like the Buried weights of this font.

Movie Script is the script that was used in German movie-brochures. Those were small four page leaflets with a lot of sepia-colored pictures about the movie one was about to see. Today those things are collectors items. The script was also used on those hand-painted posters above the cinema entrance. I cleaned up the old script and made it just a little bit more readable, but overall I left it as it was. Of course I added the necessary glyphs for today's world, like Euro and so on. When I was a kid, my grandfather gave me 1 German Mark and I could go to the movies matinee, that was around 10:30 in the morning, the entrance cost something like 60 Pfennig and the rest was for peanuts and a drink. Still today I love my grandfather for that, movies introduced the world to me (no TV then). Your grandfather-loving designer Gert Wiescher

Neo Sans began as an intriguing assignment from a branding agency. The agency’s client wanted an “ultra modern” type family that was "futuristic without being gimmicky or ephemeral.” When a bureaucratic decision cancelled the project, Monotype staff designer Sebastian Lester decided to finish the design on his own. “I was left with a sketchbook full of ideas,” he said, “and thought it would be a shame not to see what came of them.” Lester decided that the principal ingredient of an "ultra modern" typeface was simplicity of character structure: a carefully drawn, monoline form, open letter shapes and smooth, strong curves. By further amplifying these qualities, he crossed the line from modern to futuristic. Two highly functional and versatile typefaces emerged. These are Neo Sans and Neo Tech, designs Lester describes as "legible without being neutral, nuanced without being fussy, and expressive without being distracting." Both the Neo Sans and the more minimalist Neo Tech families are available in six weights, ranging from Light to Ultra, with companion italics. Neo Tech offers a suite of alternate characters.

Melodi is the result of years of working with hand made types on my designs. Every time I draw the letters and words that I need for every design piece. One day I decided to go serious and make a real type of it and “Melodi” is the result of this work. It’s a calligraphic font, built using a regular stroke, and carefully crafted to have nice joins between all the letters. It has some playful but stylish capitals that brings lot of personality to the font. It work super nice either in lowercase writing as in all-caps texts. It looks specially good on lists of words or small sentences. Melodi is a playful but very versatile font, it can be used in lots of different scenarios. From creating a logo, writing the tittles of a catalogue or use it in a poster combined with other types (it work really well as counter point of more classical types) to motion graphics animations or advertising work. It can be cute but it also can do hard work!

Cacao is another one of my "found fonts". I found this one in an old advertising for a French cocoa drink. Since I am a vervent lover of cocoa, I will give you my recipe for a normal coffee mug full of delicious hot cocoa. Mix three heaped teaspoons of sugar with one and a half to two teaspoons of finest cocoa powder. Then add a little cold milk, stir, add a little cold milk, stir, and so on until you have a mushy creamy consistency. Now slowly add - always stirring - boiling hot water til the cup is almost full. Top with a little liquid cream and enjoy! If you have a package design job, use my Cacao font and stir in some creativity. Your sweet-tooth designer, Gert Wiescher.

Gliners is a simple stylized font that overlies the center of the glyphs bar in the font. Glyphs font doesn’t have too many, it only offers Uppercase and Multilingual, but don’t worry because its simple shape will make your project look interesting. The Gliners font is very suitable for use as movie titles, movie title poster covers like the review image I shared above. how? are you interested in trying it? Thank You, stay the center of attention and classy!

Chunkie is a simple serif experiment going for minimal width and maximum height. I made it into my display version of OpenType Pro, but mainly it was a vehicle for me to try out some more extreme serif ideas and glyph shapes. The solutions for the lowercase a and e are unique, for example. The double g ligature is a fun solution. I like the solution for the @, but I’m not sure how it will be received. That being said, it turned into a useful dark display face with a small x-height.

Nyfors was a sudden idea. I noticed an ad in a magazine, with some handtexted words. I don't recall what the ad was about, neither the words. When I later on tried to remember how the single characters looked like and began to draw them, the result wasn't bad at all. I am not longer sure that they resemble the characters in the ad, but it doesn't matter. Nyfors is a nice handtexted typeface, whatever its origin. There is a small stream in Tyresö where I live and work, called Nyfors. During some centuries there was a center of small scale industries along it, and they used its water to run their machinery. The typeface has its name from that stream. Nyfors was released in 1995.

zt. Bolkit Serif is a typeface with two types of styles, one with an elegant and smooth arch shape, while the other has a type of firmness and the character presents a strong character in it. Being a letter whose concept is very interested in simplicity, the lines present in the elegant and firm zt. Bolkit make you feel it too. zt. Bolkit also comes with two widths that all have two weights (Thin and Bold) Containing characters that include uppercase letters, lowercase letters, numbers, punctuation, 52 ligatures, 25 alternatives and symbols that will make your designs cooler in the future. Do not forget also this supports more than 60 languages derived from Latin, namely Western, Central and Southeastern European languages. I hope you have a blast using zt.Bolkit Thanks for use this font ~ Khaiuns X zelowtype

Update November 2022: ULGA Grid now features an oblique variant. It’s also been expanded into a family of different but related designs with the addition of ULGA Grid Solid and ULGA Grid Rounded typeface families. All variants and new designs are monospaced, sharing the same width as the original ULGA Grid font and matching character sets. The character set has also been enlarged and now supports Western Europe, Vietnamese, Central/Eastern Europe, Baltic, Turkish and Romanian. ULGA Grid is a modular, monospaced typeface reminiscent of the old Letraset LCD & Quartz typefaces from the 1970/80s with lots of alternative characters and ornaments to bring a fresh twist to the genre. The idea’s seed germinated while I was going through a phase of binge watching my favourite 1980/90s sci-fi movies (classics such as Terminator, Total Recall and RoboCop). However, perception and reality don’t always align. Thirty years later, when compared to today’s technology, some visual elements look kind of outdated, almost Retro Futuristic. The initial design process started out in Adobe Illustrator when I constructed letters from a few geometric shapes within a square block. Just playing around with different shapes was so engrossing that it wasn’t long before there were enough characters for a basic typeface. The project grew again as I experimented with designs within the shapes and set paragraphs of text in patterns, resulting in over a hundred alternative characters and ornaments, some of which double up as border designs. This typeface may be square but it’s anything but boring. What it lacks in legibility ULGA Grid makes up for in style and the end result is a surprisingly versatile typeface that you'll have fun using for a wide range of display purposes including CD covers, posters, packaging, advertising, brochures and film titles. Ironically, the fixed grid structure frees the characters to create patterns of text not possible with variable widths.

Imagine there's an explosion in a comic book, the exclamation that follows is set in PAGODA INTERNATIONAL. This font is inspired by the graphics on one of Honolulu's 1950's skyscrapers - The Pagoda Hotel with the International Ballroom. Created by former wine label designer, Wesley Poole, Pagoda is the opposite of sophisticated elegance. "Big, fat, and horsy, that's what I was after. It's the wacky juxtaposition of these familiar shapes that makes it work. Just try a couple words. You'll be surprised! I'm glad this one's behind me. It's my first pancake."

Bredagh (pronounced Braid-ah) is a happy font! It can bring a smile to your face, yet is at one with science and mathematics and the Arts. The first presentation is in a Poetry book. Overall, it is a strong and capable font. The organic nature of the font Breadgh is in Nature itself, with the roundels as found in the cross-section of a tree, for example, both circular and rounded oblong shapes, influencing. Accordingly, some of the characters are of a condensed nature and some are not. The lower case does not have the condensed aspects but the numerals do. In the creation of Bredagh, it was the dynamic between all of these that was part of the challenge. And to make them all work together subtly to be in overall harmony—was the ultimate challenge.

This font has been developed based on the engraving by the German artist Daniel Hopfer (1470-1536) listing the Latin ABC. While creating the font I tried to preserve the archaism and certain imperfection characteristic for the prototype to accentuate its charm. Fanciful convolution on the serif make it a bit fairy-tale like and cheerful. The font is also available with decorated dots as in the original version. All the letters in the font are capital.

Adis Ababa is a font based on an ancient Ge'ez script. The Ge'ez alphabet is the written language of the ancient ancestors of the Ethiopian and Eritrean nation. It is not a Latin or Greek based alphabet and I have striven in this font to present a readable Latin alphabet that visually reminds me of some of the examples of the writing that I have seen.

Chenko is a nod to Alexander Rodchenko the Russian Constructivist artist and designer whose poster work is characterised by its stark, stripped down typography and bold, geometric graphics. It was truly revolutionary in its day, and continues to be influential in ours. Chenko is my own take on his deceptively simple letterforms, and designing a font without a curve or a diagonal (okay I cheated on a few details like the O-slash and A ring characters) presented some interesting design challenges!

A reminder of the days of flower power, Satron is quite a bit different, slightly hippy and slightly grungy. Although it is not in any way an attempt to emulate the fonts used in that era, it evokes the mood of the time. There's two different shapes making up each character, with a grungy black one in front of a hippy white one. The combined effect however is quite novel and modern. There's also a jumbled version with the letters rotated and whacked around, in case you want it funky-flavored. There's all the main characters plus lots of extra accented letters as well. The package contains both OTF and TTF versions - install either OTF or TTF, not both versions on the same machine.

ITC Johann Sparkling is the work of Austrian designer Viktor Solt, a perfect imitation of the handwriting of an educated person of the 18th century. ITC Johann Sparkling is intended to close the gap between highly formal copperplate scripts and the scribbled look of 'true' handwriting," says Solt. "I am not very interested in highly formal and perfect calligraphy, but rather in quick, personal-looking scripts. Usually I start with some historical samples in mind, but I do not try to copy these sources. Instead, I incorporate them into my own handwriting. It takes up to two weeks, and many sheet of paper, before the respective script becomes my own. Of course, this would not be an economic approach for individual lettering jobs, but I can conserve the custom script for future use by digitizing it." ITC Johann Sparkling should be used in fairly large point sizes and its capitals only as initials.