The last couple of years felt like I was living in a bad dream: I witnessed crazy leaders, climate change and now Covid. I usually name my fonts after things that affect me and this one is not different. Dreamworld is a font I made with a cheap marker pen I liberated from my kids’ pencil box (I will put it back, pinky promise…). It is a bit rough, but also very easy to read and distinctive enough to make your work stand out. Of course it comes with extensive language support (let me mention Vietnamese again…) and two sets of alternate glyphs, that cycle as you type.

I have been to Japan many times, but I have to admit that I have not (yet) been to Odaiba, so this font is a reminder that I should go there one day. Odaiba is a large artificial Island in the bay of Tokyo. It is a popular shopping and sightseeing destination and its sights include a copy of the Statue of Liberty and a mega-sized Gundam Robot. Odaiba Script is a handwritten font. I used a Sharpie pen on paper, so it is nice and thick. It comes with double letter ligatures and all diacritics.

Lately I have been experimenting with different foods. At home, we eat a lot of Asian food, but I thought it would be nice to broaden my culinary horizon a bit. So far I have (successfully) added Georgian beef and walnut soup, Tacos (after a suggestion by my friend Stuart), Surinam Roti and various vegetarian dishes to our menu. When I created this font, I had to think of Gumbo - a dish I have never made. Gumbo is a handmade display font that comes in a rotund regular and an obese bold (with Italics). Use it for your book covers, product packaging and sticky notes. Gumbo comes with cute ‘end of word’ ligatures - just type the glyph + space and presto: you have a little swash. As for the dish Gumbo, well, I will make that this weekend!

Some time ago, I read an article about the Kennedy assassination. In that article, a person dubbed ‘the umbrella man’ played a rather bizarre role: apparently an innocent bystander with an opened umbrella was thought to be in cahoots with Kennedy’s killer. I immediately thought that the name ‘Umbrella Man’ was a good title for a horror movie, so when I created this rough brush font, I named it Umbrella Man.

Atonement is a splattery, scratchy font. I made it with a steel nibbed pen, a brush and some Chinese ink. I based it on my fonts Ravenheart, Qilin and American Grunge - mostly because I really like them. Of course, all of these fonts are influenced by the work of the great Ralph Steadman - someone I greatly admire. Atonement comes with ligatures for double letter combinations and a stash of diacritics.

This month I seem to be stuck in the ‘Baked Goods’ section. I released Bloomer earlier and now I present Cookie Supply! Cookie Supply is a handmade display font. It is a bit uneven, a bit rough, yet very friendly, cute and useful. I guess it works best with products or books for children. Or oatmeal cookies by the dozen. Or organic apple juice. Or…

Skeleton Slab brings a new elegance to a classic form. I was thinking of calling it Ozymanidias, after Shelley’s poem, because it evokes memories of ancient runic inscriptions, but then I thought that was maybe a bit pretentious, and I decided I'd keep it simple and descriptive. Besides, I wasn't sure how to spell Ozymandias! Skeleton Slab has small caps in place of lower case.

Bouteilles is French for bottles. No fancy name this time, just bottles. You’re probably wondering why I chose this name… Well, I was taking out the glass (in Holland we recycle just about everything, glass, paper, plastic, metal, garden and kitchen waste, etc.), which included a number of French wine bottles. As I was throwing them into the underground container one block from where I live, I realised that the word Bouteilles actually sounds great and it would be a nice name for a font! Yes, it is that simple! Bouteilles is a nice brush font I made with my trusted Chinese ink and a really worn brush I found. It comes with all the diacritics you need plus two sets of alternates, which you can play with!

Boy, they're everywhere. One of your neighbors is probably one of them, Freaking super-heroes (TM, ©, ®, SM blah blah blah) are more ubiquitous in cities these days than Simon Cowell is on talent shows. Notice how that guy on the subway -- the one with the boy scout haircut? -- see how he keeps his shirt buttoned all the way up? He's not sweating either... that's 'cause he's probably from some dead planet that exploded twenty years ago. His REAL parents wrapped him in blankets and, when he turned 18, his Ma on Earth turned those same blankets into Long Underwear for her foster son. He's probably wearing his long underwear right now. That's why he's smiling at you through his horn rimmed glasses. He thinks you don't know. Thinks he's special. Thinks he's a super-hero (TM, ©, ®, SM blah blah blah). Ain't that Super?

Yuge, apparently, is how New Yorkers pronounce huge. I have never been to New York, so I can’t tell if this is a fact. But I often hear a certain New Yorker pronounce it that way, so I guess it’s sort of true. Yuge is a handwritten font - made with a Sharpie pen. Believe me, it is a good font. It is fantastic. It is the best font ever. It is YUGE! ;-)

Technically a crowbar is a straight metal rod used for digging. The tool I had in mind when I named this font is called a jemmy or pry bar, but I guess I liked the name crowbar better. Crowbar font, like its namesake, is a very useful tool: its brush-like appearance fits any design, especially if you are aiming for the ‘scary’ look. Comes with a toolbox full of diacritics too!

QuickType is a typeface I designed for demonstration purposes. I used it to illustrate my first book about type design. It has crooked slab serifs and looks very much like a typewriter font. But in order to make things clear I had to overdo some curves and so QuickType turned out a very distinct typewriter typeface. Since those days I worked on the shapes from time to time, so it got better and I extended it to include several neccessary cuts. Now it is a full fledged very usable font. Yours very quick Gert Wiescher.

Jean Evans' interest in type design dates back to her third-grade fascination with fancy script writing. Years later, work at a sign-painting school she found in the Yellow Pages® cemented her relationship with letterforms. Evans went on to study with master calligraphers and type designers, including the likes of Donald Jackson, Hermann Zapf and Matthew Carter. Evans' designs have been exhibited and collected around the globe, and her distinctive calligraphic style has been lauded by leading trade organizations, annuals and publications. Hatmaker, one of Evans' more popular typefaces, was originally developed for the Boston-based broadcast design firm of the same name. Inspiration for the design came from Ben Shahn's famous hand-constructed alphabet. Shahn's alphabet, however, was limited to capital letters. Daunted by the idea of designing a lowercase that would measure up to Shahn's capitals, I developed a second set of caps-simple, quirky, yet almost classic-to work as 'lowercase' with the Shahn-like caps," explains Evans. Mixing the two in Hatmaker, creates a lively interplay of light and dark."

Body Friend is a cute Display Sans Serif script typeface with a playful look. This type of font is very suitable to be applied especially to logos, and various other formal forms such as invitations, labels, logos, magazines, books, greeting cards, packaging, fashion, make up, stationery, novels, labels, covers or whatever. Features: Uppercase & lowercase Numbers and punctuation Multilingual PUA Encoding Full Character Set !"#$%&()*+,-./:;?@ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ[\]^_abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz{|}~ ¡¢£¤¥§©ª«­®°±²³¹º»¿ÀÂÃÄÅÆÇÈÉÊËÌÍÎÏÑÒÓÔÕÖ×ØÙÛÜÝÞßàáâãäåæçèéêëìíîïñòóôõö÷øùúûüýþÿıŒœŠšŸž–—‘’“”†•‹›€−

Natural Blues is my laid back handwriting font, and it is also the name of a song by Moby. Maybe I was inspired by that song … I can’t tell. But what I can tell is that having the blues is a natural thing!

I remember that my auntie once made a dish called ‘Macaroni and Smac’. It consisted of little ‘elbow’ macaroni, Spam (which in Holland was called Smac), cheese and ketchup. I am sure it didn’t contain on of your five a day, but it was delicious. As far as I know, I have eaten it only once, but it did make a lasting impression! Biscuits & Spam is a handmade ‘Western’ style font, which I found in my ‘unfinished fonts’ folder. It comes with multilingual support, a full set of alternates for the lower case letters and a really happy vibe.

In searching for a Roman to use, I found there were bits of Bembo, Times, Garamond, etc., that I liked and bits that I did not. So I set out to take the best bits of all my favorite Romans and tried to create the ultimate Roman Typeface.

I have always had a keen interest in forging; I used to be a silversmith, and I love working with metal. Some time ago I forged my first axe (a skeggøx or bearded axe), sharpened it and fitted it with a handmade ash handle. It isn’t perfect, but it is my first ever forged axe and I’m pretty proud of it. All of this went through my head when I started drawing the glyphs for this font. And to be honest, I couldn’t find a more suitable name for it! Bladesmith is a handmade font, forged in fire (haha). It was actually made with an old sharpie. It is a rough and ready font, quite suited for headlines, book covers and posters.

I love cheese snacks in all kinds of variations. As a kid I even loved having chessy fingers, but as an adult I prefer to wash my hands (instead of licking and sucking each finger "clean") So, as a loving memory of an all time favourite snack, I made this all caps organic looking sans. Obviously handmade, and cleaned up digitally...just a little bit. Furthermore I have made 5 different versions of each letter and made sure that there is plenty of multilingual support!

Noma is a new wide-set display font with a minimal geometric style. I designed Noma because I wanted a tech-inspired font that has plenty of character while remaining legible. Noma is a great choice for high-impact headings and logotypes. I hope you enjoy, thanks for checking it out!

Mandolin is a handmade 'Didone-ish' font with a bit of a rough edge. Mandolin was created using a wonderful (and expensive) pen I found in Canterbury, England. I am aware that this information isn't too relevant, but I thought I'd share it with you nonetheless… Mandolin comes with all diacritics.

Sign Helpers JNL is a collection of silhouette images carefully redrawn from two distinct sources. Prior to their bankruptcy in 1984, the Holes-Webway Company of St. Cloud, MN produced thousands of their "Webway" sign kits that were utilized by merchants, libraries and schools throughout the country. At one point they included in their sales catalog a selection of die-cut images for embellishing sign work. In the late 50s and throughout the 60s, the Joseph Struhl Company (now known as Magic Master Industries) produced cling vinyl sign kits for business, and a home movie titling set for do-it-yourself film makers. This set also featured die-cut embellishments. A generous selection of designs from both kits have been faithfully re-drawn in digital form to pay tribute to two innovative companies. Other fonts based on products from these companies are Sign Kit JNL (Webway® Sign Kit), Cling Vinyl JNL, and Sign Maker JNL (Magic Master® Sign Kits). Trademarked names are used purely for reference purposes.

I have created the brush font named “ BrushType Michiko” in my unique brush style. This is wider than “BrushType Standard ”. I made it for ad designers. I believe this is the only one brush font in the world, so using it will enable them to get easily satisfied on their work. Brush handwriting in Japan has a long and proud Tradition and History. I tried to interject this feeling of Tradition into my font designs for you to comprehend its true meaning. I trust I have succeeded to convey my feelings to you. In addition, I can say each letter of the “ BrushType Michiko” is truly art. I am a pioneer of Brush Art. You are the first person to see and use it in the world.

I love riding English double decker buses! I haven’t been on one lately, but for some reason I had an image of a red double decker bus in my head when I made this font. Doubledecker is a bold, cartoon-like, handmade font. It comes in regular and dots, plus a bonus doodle font called Doubledecker Stuff. Use it for any design that needs a tad of loud, a pinch of unusual and a wee bit of polka.

Crowd Pleaser is a pleasant, handmade font. I hoped its lively looks, slightly crooked glyphs and overall happy appearance would appeal to many people - so I named it Crowd Pleaser. Well… not entirely true, as I have a list of font names and Crowd Pleaser was the next one up… ;-) I do hope, however, that you will like this font!

New-Yorker-Type was one of the first typefaces I tried my hand at in 1985. I meant it as a revival of the typeface used by the New Yorker magazine. I did not scan it. I just looked at the type and redrew it completely by hand. Only much later did I come to know, that there is a bundle of similar typefaces of that period. Rea Irvin's design for New-Yorker magazine was just one of them, maybe the best. In the next step I repaired some of the mistakes that I made more than thirty years ago. Now on the eve of 2020 I gave the font a complete overhaul and added a set of Swash Initials, Cyrillic and Greek glyphs and many ligatures. The font now has 1075 glyphs and is all set for most latin writing systems. On top of that I made two versions, a Classic one with rounded corners and a pointed Pro version for a more up-to-date look. Take your pick. Yours sincerely, honoring Rea Irvin a great type- and magazine-designer, Gert Wiescher

New-Yorker-Type was one of the first typefaces I tried my hand at in 1985. I meant it as a revival of the typeface used by the New Yorker magazine. I did not scan it. I just looked at the type and redrew it completely by hand. Only much later did I come to know, that there is a bundle of similar typefaces of that period. Rea Irvin's design for New-Yorker magazine was just one of them, maybe the best. In the next step I repaired some of the mistakes that I made more than thirty years ago. Now on the eve of 2020 I gave the font a complete overhaul and added a set of Swash Initials, Cyrillic and Greek glyphs and many ligatures. The font now has 1075 glyphs and is all set for most latin writing systems. On top of that I made two versions, a Classic one with rounded corners and a pointed Pro version for a more up-to-date look. Take your pick. Yours sincerely, honoring Rea Irvin a great type- and magazine-designer, Gert Wiescher

Brainstroke is a collection of twelve variations on a typeface. This release was supposed to be a much larger set, but due to a medical issue, where I recently suffered a stroke, I am releasing only those that I managed to complete. The name is a reminder to me to take care of my health.

I don't know what other typedesigners call those long swirling embellishment, but I call them "Monkeytails". So when I decided on this version of my good old Royal Bavarian, I decided to call the new font "Monkeytails". I just fell in love with this name. Monkeytails and Royal Bavarian should be used together, in order not to have too many embellishments. That's why I offer the two together for a good price. Your swinging typedesigner Gert Wiescher

The Engraver’s Square Gothic—like its rounder cousin, the engraver’s sans serif, Sweet® Sans,has been one of the more widely used stationer’s lettering styles since about 1900. Its minimal forms, made without curves, were popularized long ago by bankers and others seeking a serious, established feel to their stationery. One might argue that the design is a possible precursor to Morris Fuller Benton’s Bank Gothic® typeface. Sweet® Square is based on antique engraver’s lettering templates called “masterplates.” Professional stationers use a pantograph to manually transfer letters from these masterplates to a piece of copper or steel that is then etched to serve as a plate or die. This demanding technique is rare today given that most engravers now use a photographic process to make plates, where just about any font will do. But the lettering styles engravers popularized during the first half of the twentieth century remain both familiar and appealing. Referencing various masterplates, Mark van Bronkhorst has drawn Sweet Square in nine weights. The sources offered just uppercase, small caps, and figures, yet similar, condensed examples had a lowercase, making it possible to interpret a full character set for Sweet Square. Italics were also added to give the family greater versatility. The fonts are available as basic, “Standard” character sets, and as “Pro” character sets offering special characters, a variety of typographic features, and full support for Western and Central European languages. Sweet Square gives new life to an uncommon class of typeface: an early twentieth-century commercial invention that brings a singular verve to modern design. Its unique style is as useful as it is novel. Bank Gothic is a registered trademark of Grosse Pointe Group LLC.

The Engraver’s Square Gothic—like its rounder cousin, the engraver’s sans serif, Sweet® Sans,has been one of the more widely used stationer’s lettering styles since about 1900. Its minimal forms, made without curves, were popularized long ago by bankers and others seeking a serious, established feel to their stationery. One might argue that the design is a possible precursor to Morris Fuller Benton’s Bank Gothic® typeface. Sweet® Square is based on antique engraver’s lettering templates called “masterplates.” Professional stationers use a pantograph to manually transfer letters from these masterplates to a piece of copper or steel that is then etched to serve as a plate or die. This demanding technique is rare today given that most engravers now use a photographic process to make plates, where just about any font will do. But the lettering styles engravers popularized during the first half of the twentieth century remain both familiar and appealing. Referencing various masterplates, Mark van Bronkhorst has drawn Sweet Square in nine weights. The sources offered just uppercase, small caps, and figures, yet similar, condensed examples had a lowercase, making it possible to interpret a full character set for Sweet Square. Italics were also added to give the family greater versatility. The fonts are available as basic, “/fonts/sweet/square/” character sets, and as “Pro” character sets offering special characters, a variety of typographic features, and full support for Western and Central European languages. Sweet Square gives new life to an uncommon class of typeface: an early twentieth-century commercial invention that brings a singular verve to modern design. Its unique style is as useful as it is novel. Bank Gothic is a registered trademark of Grosse Pointe Group LLC.

Abagail Jackson is a wild-looking face that was one of my early designs. I had no particular use in mind when I designed it and I no longer remember what inspired this whimsical font.

Hexide JNL was modeled and modified from an original design created by the late sign artist Alf R. Becker for Signs of the Times® Magazine. Thanks to Tod Swormstedt of ST Publications, Inc. and the American Sign Museum of Cincinnati, Ohio for providing the reference material used to make this font.

I never needed to digitize this early design from 1988. I found it in a drawer underneath layers of dozens of other type designs. The drawings were made with ink on paper, about 15 cm high, meticulously executed and retouched separate glyphs for a primitive photo-lettering. I used a photographic magnifier to set words and lines in my darkroom. In 2018 I decided to make a font out of it just for fun...

I love learning new words. I stumbled upon the term Gingerline after I named an older font Gamboge. Like Gamboge, Gingerline is a name for a shade of orange - the color of ripe kumquats to be precise. Didn’t know that! Gingerline font is a handmade calligraphy font; nice and even, thick and thin and quite elegant if I may say so. Comes with an abundance of diacritics as well.

The year 2022 went and 2023 came. I can honestly say that last year was a horrible year and I am happy it ended a couple of days ago. The first week after New Year’s Eve always fills my head with the U2 song ‘New Year’s Day’ - so I named this font after a line from the lyrics. I also happened to watch a fantastic movie called ‘Im Westen Nights Neues’, directed by Edward Berger, but based on a book by Erich Maria Remarque, which, in English, was published as ‘All Quiet On The Western Front’. So there you have it: naming a font in 2 easy steps! ;-) All Is Quiet is a lovely brush font, which I created using my father in law’s Chinese pencil and ink. I can suggest some uses here, but I am convinced you can come up with that yourself.

This typeface came out as a side idea while I was working on one logotype. Suddenly I came up with an idea of creating “tuned” version of the typeface, based on that logo. The “tuning” turned me in a completely different direction and in a few hours of haste I was looking at a completely different typeface. A few days later I made this font available for free, since it wasn't meant to be at all :-). A few months later, I saw my typeface used in the menu in one pizzeria. I was amazed and glad and happy and proud, all at the same time. Oh, by the way: the logo I was working on was of different style and even of another stem’s widths. So, this is truly a font of it’s own design. Naftalin has both Latin and Cyrillic sets, since it was used with both.

When I was a kid, I loved the story of The Boy Who Cried Wolf. I thought it was pretty stupid of the boy to trick the villagers into believing wolves are attacking his flock of sheep. But I also thought it was a bit sad that the sheep are eaten by a wolf in the end. I didn’t really feel sorry for the boy (he really was stupid), nor the wolf (he just does what he is supposed to do in life), but I did feel sorry for those poor sheep. I guess this is what disinformation leads to in the end. Cry Wolf is a bit of a scary font: it was made with a really old and battered brush, using Chinese ink and some quality French paper. It has a slight tilt to the right and I added some inky splatter for dramatic effect. Use Cry Wolf for your book covers, product packaging and headlines; use if to spice up you invitations and your halloween posters. Comes in a slightly tilted Regular style and an outright Italic style.

Wasty Pudding was made by drawing a lot of letters, over and over again - and not caring so much about the looks, but focusing more on the speed of drawing, because I wanted a font that represented the way I write, when I am taking notes for myself. It’s not pretty, but it’s legible and scribbeliciously beautiful! :) Anyway, I think the purpose of this font is massive amounts of text. Song lyrics, novels, stories, diaries, manuscripts, books, etc. I bet you can fool someone with them thinking that this is not a font, because I have added 6 different versions of each lowercase letter!!!