The Ampersand Forest has its first book family! Budinger Oldstyle is elegant and approachable at the same time, with five different weights, making it a perfect choice for text or display in situations that require a hint of scholarship, fine arts, craft, erudition, and clarity. Budinger Oldstyle has the legibility of a Garalde (like those of Garamond, Manutius, et al.), with a whiff of Venetian revival (after the fashion of Schneidler & Goudy). The letters are arbitrary, with conventions like cupped serifs and leftward stress. It also has a higher x-height than might be expected, to give it an upright posture and openness in the counters. The italic is more compact, with more clearly calligraphic letterforms and conventions like Swash Caps. Its many features include OpenType alternates (a one-story a and g, and a K, R, and Q with elongated descenders), full and true small caps, both standard and discretionary ligatures, oldstyle and lining numerals, and Swash letterforms in the Italic (all capitals and descenders, plus the ascender of the d). Plus, the most adorable pudge of an ampersand you've ever seen!

The design of Sabon® Next by Jean François Porchez, a revival of a revival, was a double challenge: to try to discern Jan Tschichold´s own schema for the original Sabon, and to interpret the complexity of a design originally made in two versions for different typecasting systems. The first was designed for use on Linotype and Monotype machines, and the second for Stempel hand composition. Because the Stempel version does not have the constraints necessary for types intended for machine composition, it seems closer to a pure interpretation of its Garamond ancestor. Naturally Porchez based Sabon Next on this second version and also referred to original Garamond models, carefully improving the proportions of the existing digital Sabon while matching its alignments. The new family is large and versatile - with Roman and italic in 6 weights from regular to black. Most weights also have small caps, Old style Figures, alternates (swashes, ligatures, etc); and there is one ornament font with many lovely fleurons. The standard versions include revised lining figures that are intentionally designed to be a little smaller than capitals. Featured in: Best Fonts for Resumes, Best Fonts for Websites, Best Fonts for PowerPoints

In the early 1960s, the German Master Printers’ Association requested that a new typeface be designed and produced in identical form on both Linotype and Monotype machines so that text and technical composition would match. Walter Cunz at Stempel responded by commissioning Jan Tschichold to design a new version of Claude Garamond’s serene and classical Roman. Its bold, and particularly its italic styles are limited by the requirements of Linotype casting machines, forcing the character widths of a given letter to match between styles, giving the italic its characteristic narrow f. The family’s name is taken from Jacques Sabon, who introduced Garamond’s Romans to Frankfurt. Sabon has long been a favorite of typographers for setting book text, due to its smooth texture, and in large part because Tschichold’s book typography remains world famous.