Many typefaces are distinctive or attractive at the expense of legibility and versatility. Not so the Optima® family. Simultaneously standing out and fitting in, there are few projects or imaging environments outside of its range. Although Optima is almost always grouped with sans serif typefaces, it should be considered a serifless roman. True to its Roman heritage, Optima has wide, full-bodied characters – especially in the capitals. Only the E, F and L deviate with narrow forms. Consistent with other Zapf designs, the cap S in Optima appears slightly top-heavy with a slight tilt to the right. The M is splayed, and the N, like a serif design, has light vertical strokes. The lowercase a and g in Optima are high-legibility two-storied designs. Optima can be set within a wide choice of line spacing values – from very tight to very open. In fact, there are few limits to the amount of white space that can be added between lines of text. Optima also benefits from a wide range of letter spacing capability. It can be set quite tight, or even slightly open – especially the capitals. If there are any guidelines, Optima should be set more open than tight. It’s not that readability is affected that much when Optima is set on the snug side; it’s just that the unhurried elegance and light gray typographic color created by the face are disrupted when letters are set too tight. Optima is also about as gregarious as a typeface can be. It mixes well with virtually any serif design and a surprisingly large number of sans serif faces. The Optima family is available in six weights, from roman to extra black, each with an italic counterpart. In addition, the family is available as a suite of OpenType® Pro fonts, providing for the automatic insertion of small caps, ligatures and alternate characters, in addition to offering an extended character set supporting most Central European and many Eastern European languages. When you’re ready to find its perfect pairing, browse these fantastic matches: Monotype Century Old Style™, Dante®, Frutiger® Serif, Joanna® Nova, Malabar™ and Soho®.

Iwan Stencil is a new revival of an old display typeface. Based on type originally designed by Jan Tschichold in 1929, the style was revived by Klaus Sutter in 2008. The letterforms in this peculiar design are very high contrast; all of the thin bits are much thinner than the thick parts. They have a modern, upright axis. All in all, the creation has a bit of a Bodoni-gone-crazy touch. The thin elements are the unique part of the design that binds this face together. They almost naturally fade away in the stencil gaps (or pylons), making you wonder if you are really looking at a stencil face at all. These thins contribute greatly to the typeface's overall serif-style, making the design at least a semi serif typeface, if not a full serif one. The lowercase n, for instance, has no serifs of its own, but many of the other letters have clear ones, or serif-like terminals. A serif stencil face is a peculiar variety, especially in this day and age, but in the past they were much more common, if not the norm, The Iwan Stencil typeface has only one weight. Naturally, this is just for display. Use Iwan Stencil to cut real stencils, or only to create the effect of stenciled type in your design work. Ivan Stencil includes all of the characters that you have come to expect in a font. Just because this design was originally made in 1929 does not mean that is has a 1929 character set. Instead, it includes a 21st century, with extended European language support Jan Tschichold, who we have to thank for today's Iwan Stencil inspiration, was a man of many faces. A trained calligrapher who went on to codify the New Typography, would go on to become a teacher, a classical book designer, and the creator of the Sabon typeface. Like all young designers, he was occasionally in need of money. Before his emigration from Germany in 1933, he took on many kinds of commissions. In the late 1920s, a time full of waves of economic turmoil within Germany and across the world, he began designing a typefaces for different European companies, mostly display things like this. For a time during the mid-1920s, Jan Tschichold went by the name Iwan" "

Lyra is an Italian Renaissance script that might have developed if metal type had not broken the evolution of broad pen calligraphy. It lies in the area between the humanist bookhand and the chancery cursive, combining the fullness and articulation of the Roman letters with a moderate italic slant and condensation. A steep pen-angle allows use of a broader pen relative to the x-height, giving the letters more contrast with light verticals and heavy curves. Lyra embodies the Renaissance spirit of refining technical advances of the late middle ages with reintroduction of ancient classical principles. Based on the moving penstroke with constantly changing pen-angle, it brings the vitality of handwriting to the ordered legibility of type. Lyra is a formal italic, too slow for copying books. By eliminating the element of speed, digital technology opens up a new level of calligraphy, bringing it into the sphere of typography as would naturally have happened if metalworkers had not controlled the process. If classical Western traditions are respected, digital calligraphy has the potential to recapture the work of the past and restart its stalled evolution. There is of course no substitute for the charm of actual writing, with each letter made for its space; but the tradeoff is for the formal harmony of classical calligraphy as every curve resonates in tune with every other. This three-weight font family marks Philip Bouwsma's much-requested return from a three year hiatus. It also reminds us of his solid vision in regards to how calligraphy, typography and technology can interact to produce digital beauty and vesatility. Each of the three Lyra fonts contains almost three character sets in a single file. Aside from the usual wealth of alternates normally built into Bouwsma's work, Lyra offers two unique features for the user who appreciates the availability of handy solutions to subtle design space issues: At least three (and as many as six) length variations on ascending and descending forms, and 65 snap-on swashes which can be attached to either end of the majuscules or minuscules. The series also offers 24 dividers and ornaments built into each weight, and a stand-alone font containing 90 stars/snowflakes/flowers, symmetric contstructs for building frames or separators, masking, watermarking, or just good old psychedelia.

Are you looking for a typeface that exudes style and class? Look no further than Rakesly, the zesty compact grotesque headliner that’s sure to add some piquant charm to your message. Rakesly boasts well-balanced, charismatic letterforms that draw inspiration from a variety of late nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century sans-serif metal typefaces. Its upright styles feature tasty, cherry-picked features, while its italics draw upon the unique industrial essence of the Art Deco era. This stunning typeface is available in six weights and italics, including the wispy and delicate Rakesly Ultra-Light. Plus, Rakesly includes OpenType fractions and numeric ordinals, mathematical symbols, and a wide variety of currency symbols. For those who love a bit of texture in their designs, Rakesly also offers four grainy, letterpress texture styles called Rakesly Iron, which are available in Regular, Italic, Bold, and Bold Italic. And if you want to add a little extra spice to your typography, Rakesly even includes OpenType contextual alternates that automatically shuffle three letter/numeral variations for a more convincing effect. And if you’re a typography pro who likes to get hands-on, the Iron styles contain private use (PUA) encoding that lets you manually access alternate characters via a glyph table or character table. So why settle for a boring historical revival when you can add Rakesly’s peppery blend of classical elements to your typographic spice rack? Try Rakesly today and experience the rare flavor that only this typeface can provide. Most Latin-based European writing systems are supported, including the following languages. Afaan Oromo, Afar, Afrikaans, Albanian, Alsatian, Aromanian, Aymara, Bashkir (Latin), Basque, Belarusian (Latin), Bemba, Bikol, Bosnian, Breton, Cape Verdean, Creole, Catalan, Cebuano, Chamorro, Chavacano, Chichewa, Crimean Tatar (Latin), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dawan, Dholuo, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Frisian, Friulian, Gagauz (Latin), Galician, Ganda, Genoese, German, Greenlandic, Guadeloupean Creole, Haitian Creole, Hawaiian, Hiligaynon, Hungarian, Icelandic, Ilocano, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Jamaican, Kaqchikel, Karakalpak (Latin), Kashubian, Kikongo, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi, Kurdish (Latin), Latvian, Lithuanian, Lombard, Low Saxon, Luxembourgish, Maasai, Makhuwa, Malay, Maltese, Māori, Moldovan, Montenegrin, Ndebele, Neapolitan, Norwegian, Novial, Occitan, Ossetian (Latin), Papiamento, Piedmontese, Polish, Portuguese, Quechua, Rarotongan, Romanian, Romansh, Sami, Sango, Saramaccan, Sardinian, Scottish Gaelic, Serbian (Latin), Shona, Sicilian, Silesian, Slovak, Slovenian, Somali, Sorbian, Sotho, Spanish, Swahili, Swazi, Swedish, Tagalog, Tahitian, Tetum, Tongan, Tshiluba, Tsonga, Tswana, Tumbuka, Turkish, Turkmen (Latin), Tuvaluan, Uzbek (Latin), Venetian, Vepsian, Võro, Walloon, Waray-Waray, Wayuu, Welsh, Wolof, Xhosa, Yapese, Zapotec Zulu and Zuni.

Giambattista Bodoni (1740-1813) was called the King of Printers; he was a prolific type designer, a masterful engraver of punches and the most widely admired printer of his time. His books and typefaces were created during the 45 years he was the director of the fine press and publishing house of the Duke of Parma in Italy. He produced the best of what are known as modern" style types, basing them on the finest writing of his time. Modern types represented the ultimate typographic development of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. They have characteristics quite different from the types that preceded them; such as extreme vertical stress, fine hairlines contrasted by bold main strokes, and very subtle, almost non-existent bracketing of sharply defined hairline serifs. Bodoni saw this style as beautiful and harmonious-the natural result of writing done with a well-cut pen, and the look was fashionable and admired. Other punchcutters, such as the Didot family (1689-1853) in France, and J. E. Walbaum (1768-1839) in Germany made their own versions of the modern faces. Even though some nineteenth century critics turned up their noses and called such types shattering and chilly, today the Bodoni moderns are seen in much the same light as they were in his own time. When used with care, the Bodoni types are both romantic and elegant, with a presence that adds tasteful sparkle to headlines and advertising. ITC Bodoni™ was designed by a team of four Americans, after studying Bodoni's steel punches at the Museo Bodoniana in Parma, Italy. They also referred to specimens from the "Manuale Tipografico," a monumental collection of Bodoni's work published by his widow in 1818. The designers sought to do a revival that reflected the subtleties of Bodoni's actual work. They produced three size-specific versions; ITC Bodoni Six for captions and footnotes, ITC Bodoni Twelve for text settings, and ITC Bodoni Seventytwo - a display design modeled on Bodoni's 72-point Papale design. ITC Bodoni includes regular, bold, italics, Old style Figures, small caps, and italic swash fonts. Sumner Stone created the ornaments based on those found in the "Manuale Tipografico." These lovely dingbats can be used as Bodoni did, to separate sections of text or simply accent a page layout or graphic design."

Giambattista Bodoni (1740-1813) was called the King of Printers; he was a prolific type designer, a masterful engraver of punches and the most widely admired printer of his time. His books and typefaces were created during the 45 years he was the director of the fine press and publishing house of the Duke of Parma in Italy. He produced the best of what are known as modern" style types, basing them on the finest writing of his time. Modern types represented the ultimate typographic development of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. They have characteristics quite different from the types that preceded them; such as extreme vertical stress, fine hairlines contrasted by bold main strokes, and very subtle, almost non-existent bracketing of sharply defined hairline serifs. Bodoni saw this style as beautiful and harmonious-the natural result of writing done with a well-cut pen, and the look was fashionable and admired. Other punchcutters, such as the Didot family (1689-1853) in France, and J. E. Walbaum (1768-1839) in Germany made their own versions of the modern faces. Even though some nineteenth century critics turned up their noses and called such types shattering and chilly, today the Bodoni moderns are seen in much the same light as they were in his own time. When used with care, the Bodoni types are both romantic and elegant, with a presence that adds tasteful sparkle to headlines and advertising. ITC Bodoni™ was designed by a team of four Americans, after studying Bodoni's steel punches at the Museo Bodoniana in Parma, Italy. They also referred to specimens from the "Manuale Tipografico," a monumental collection of Bodoni's work published by his widow in 1818. The designers sought to do a revival that reflected the subtleties of Bodoni's actual work. They produced three size-specific versions; ITC Bodoni Six for captions and footnotes, ITC Bodoni Twelve for text settings, and ITC Bodoni Seventytwo - a display design modeled on Bodoni's 72-point Papale design. ITC Bodoni includes regular, bold, italics, Old style Figures, small caps, and italic swash fonts. Sumner Stone created the ornaments based on those found in the "Manuale Tipografico." These lovely dingbats can be used as Bodoni did, to separate sections of text or simply accent a page layout or graphic design."

Giambattista Bodoni (1740-1813) was called the King of Printers; he was a prolific type designer, a masterful engraver of punches and the most widely admired printer of his time. His books and typefaces were created during the 45 years he was the director of the fine press and publishing house of the Duke of Parma in Italy. He produced the best of what are known as modern" style types, basing them on the finest writing of his time. Modern types represented the ultimate typographic development of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. They have characteristics quite different from the types that preceded them; such as extreme vertical stress, fine hairlines contrasted by bold main strokes, and very subtle, almost non-existent bracketing of sharply defined hairline serifs. Bodoni saw this style as beautiful and harmonious-the natural result of writing done with a well-cut pen, and the look was fashionable and admired. Other punchcutters, such as the Didot family (1689-1853) in France, and J. E. Walbaum (1768-1839) in Germany made their own versions of the modern faces. Even though some nineteenth century critics turned up their noses and called such types shattering and chilly, today the Bodoni moderns are seen in much the same light as they were in his own time. When used with care, the Bodoni types are both romantic and elegant, with a presence that adds tasteful sparkle to headlines and advertising. ITC Bodoni™ was designed by a team of four Americans, after studying Bodoni's steel punches at the Museo Bodoniana in Parma, Italy. They also referred to specimens from the "Manuale Tipografico," a monumental collection of Bodoni's work published by his widow in 1818. The designers sought to do a revival that reflected the subtleties of Bodoni's actual work. They produced three size-specific versions; ITC Bodoni Six for captions and footnotes, ITC Bodoni Twelve for text settings, and ITC Bodoni Seventytwo - a display design modeled on Bodoni's 72-point Papale design. ITC Bodoni includes regular, bold, italics, Old style Figures, small caps, and italic swash fonts. Sumner Stone created the ornaments based on those found in the "Manuale Tipografico." These lovely dingbats can be used as Bodoni did, to separate sections of text or simply accent a page layout or graphic design."

A friend once jokingly told me that what I really do is mine extinct arts for parts to use in modern things, like going to the scrapyard to pick up bumpers, quarter-panels and dashboards off of Datsuns and Ponies to build a shiny new Ferrari. I still kind of grin at that, but I certainly do spend a lot of time looking at old things and imagining ways they would work today. This shiny new Ferrari here is called Bibliophile, and it contains scrap heap parts from various pages by Louis Prang, the Prussian-American printer and publisher who inspired my Prangs fonts. This is my second engagement with the late 19th century man, and it’s quite a bit more intricate than just an italic Didone with a connected lowercase. Bibliophile marries Round Hand calligraphy with Italian capitals, two styles not often relayed in the same alphabet, but work together beautifully when combined well. When you combine them well with a few long-practised tricks of the trade, then mix in a few trusted features from my previous work over the years, you get my usual crazy exuberance, like 17 different shapes for the d, 21 different forms for the y, endings, beginnings, swashes, ornaments, and so on. It’s no secret that I can get carried away when I’m so consumed by an idea. — Bibliophile comes in 2 weights, each of them with over 900 glyphs covering all the latin languages. Bibliophile also comes with a bold weight, something I’m always reluctant to do with something as adventurous and complex as the structure of this historical mashup. But I couldn’t chase away the idea of increasing the contrast while maintaining the hairlines in a lowercase this narrow. Part of it was the curiosity about the outcome, and part was the sheer challenge of it. I think it turned out OK. Words set in either weight will show delicateness and elegance, and the more time you spend inside the font and micro-manage the setting, the more ways you will find to magnify either. Bibliophile can be as muted or luxurious as you want it to be. This is the kind of alphabet that fits well in fashion marketing and high-end packaging, from the very subdued to the super-exquisite. Enjoy the gleaming new vehicle made with freshly polished old parts.

Giambattista Bodoni (1740-1813) was called the King of Printers; he was a prolific type designer, a masterful engraver of punches and the most widely admired printer of his time. His books and typefaces were created during the 45 years he was the director of the fine press and publishing house of the Duke of Parma in Italy. He produced the best of what are known as modern" style types, basing them on the finest writing of his time. Modern types represented the ultimate typographic development of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. They have characteristics quite different from the types that preceded them; such as extreme vertical stress, fine hairlines contrasted by bold main strokes, and very subtle, almost non-existent bracketing of sharply defined hairline serifs. Bodoni saw this style as beautiful and harmonious-the natural result of writing done with a well-cut pen, and the look was fashionable and admired. Other punchcutters, such as the Didot family (1689-1853) in France, and J. E. Walbaum (1768-1839) in Germany made their own versions of the modern faces. Even though some nineteenth century critics turned up their noses and called such types shattering and chilly, today the Bodoni moderns are seen in much the same light as they were in his own time. When used with care, the Bodoni types are both romantic and elegant, with a presence that adds tasteful sparkle to headlines and advertising. ITC Bodoni™ was designed by a team of four Americans, after studying Bodoni's steel punches at the Museo Bodoniana in Parma, Italy. They also referred to specimens from the "Manuale Tipografico," a monumental collection of Bodoni's work published by his widow in 1818. The designers sought to do a revival that reflected the subtleties of Bodoni's actual work. They produced three size-specific versions; ITC Bodoni Six for captions and footnotes, ITC Bodoni Twelve for text settings, and ITC Bodoni Seventytwo - a display design modeled on Bodoni's 72-point Papale design. ITC Bodoni includes regular, bold, italics, Old style Figures, small caps, and italic swash fonts. Sumner Stone created the ornaments based on those found in the "Manuale Tipografico." These lovely dingbats can be used as Bodoni did, to separate sections of text or simply accent a page layout or graphic design."

Allow me to introduce you to Meloche—a typeface that embodies the charm and elegance of the late 19th century. Meloche is not just any sans-serif typeface, it’s a one-of-a-kind grotesque typeface that draws inspiration from the hand-painted French signs of yesteryear. Meloche comes in seven weights and obliques, offering you the freedom to choose the perfect weight for your design needs. It also boasts of numeric ordinals, fractions, old-style numerals, and a simple Q—all possible thanks to its OpenType capabilities. Meloche offers you access to twenty weight-matched fleur-de-lis symbols in OpenType-savvy applications. Simply input the shortcodes [fleur1] [fleur2] [fleur3], and you can add a touch of French royalty to your designs. With Meloche, you can add a vintage French flavor to your message, evoking a sense of nostalgia and history. Let your designs transport your audience to the romantic streets of Paris. If you’re looking to add a touch of history and charm to your designs, Meloche is the perfect typeface for you. Its unique design and advanced OpenType capabilities make it an ideal choice for any project that requires a touch of Parisian elegance. Most Latin-based European, Vietnamese, Greek, and most Cyrillic-based writing systems are supported, including the following languages. Afaan Oromo, Afar, Afrikaans, Albanian, Alsatian, Aromanian, Aymara, Azerbaijani, Bashkir, Bashkir (Latin), Basque, Belarusian, Belarusian (Latin), Bemba, Bikol, Bosnian, Breton, Bulgarian, Buryat, Cape Verdean, Creole, Catalan, Cebuano, Chamorro, Chavacano, Chichewa, Crimean Tatar (Latin), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dawan, Dholuo, Dungan, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Frisian, Friulian, Gagauz (Latin), Galician, Ganda, Genoese, German, Gikuyu, Greenlandic, Guadeloupean Creole, Haitian Creole, Hawaiian, Hiligaynon, Hungarian, Icelandic, Igbo, Ilocano, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Jamaican, Kaingang, Khalkha, Kalmyk, Kanuri, Kaqchikel, Karakalpak (Latin), Kashubian, Kazakh, Kikongo, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi, Komi-Permyak, Kurdish, Kurdish (Latin), Kyrgyz, Latvian, Lithuanian, Lombard, Low Saxon, Luxembourgish, Maasai, Macedonian, Makhuwa, Malay, Maltese, Māori, Moldovan, Montenegrin, Nahuatl, Ndebele, Neapolitan, Norwegian, Novial, Occitan, Ossetian, Ossetian (Latin), Papiamento, Piedmontese, Polish, Portuguese, Quechua, Rarotongan, Romanian, Romansh, Russian, Rusyn, Sami, Sango, Saramaccan, Sardinian, Scottish Gaelic, Serbian, Serbian (Latin), Shona, Sicilian, Silesian, Slovak, Slovenian, Somali, Sorbian, Sotho, Spanish, Swahili, Swazi, Swedish, Tagalog, Tahitian, Tajik, Tatar, Tetum, Tongan, Tshiluba, Tsonga, Tswana, Tumbuka, Turkish, Turkmen (Latin), Tuvaluan, Ukrainian, Uzbek, Uzbek (Latin), Venda, Venetian, Vepsian, Vietnamese, Võro, Walloon, Waray-Waray, Wayuu, Welsh, Wolof, Xavante, Xhosa, Yapese, Zapotec, Zarma, Zazaki, Zulu and Zuni.

Giambattista Bodoni (1740-1813) was called the King of Printers; he was a prolific type designer, a masterful engraver of punches and the most widely admired printer of his time. His books and typefaces were created during the 45 years he was the director of the fine press and publishing house of the Duke of Parma in Italy. He produced the best of what are known as modern" style types, basing them on the finest writing of his time. Modern types represented the ultimate typographic development of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. They have characteristics quite different from the types that preceded them; such as extreme vertical stress, fine hairlines contrasted by bold main strokes, and very subtle, almost non-existent bracketing of sharply defined hairline serifs. Bodoni saw this style as beautiful and harmonious-the natural result of writing done with a well-cut pen, and the look was fashionable and admired. Other punchcutters, such as the Didot family (1689-1853) in France, and J. E. Walbaum (1768-1839) in Germany made their own versions of the modern faces. Even though some nineteenth century critics turned up their noses and called such types shattering and chilly, today the Bodoni moderns are seen in much the same light as they were in his own time. When used with care, the Bodoni types are both romantic and elegant, with a presence that adds tasteful sparkle to headlines and advertising. ITC Bodoni™ was designed by a team of four Americans, after studying Bodoni's steel punches at the Museo Bodoniana in Parma, Italy. They also referred to specimens from the "Manuale Tipografico," a monumental collection of Bodoni's work published by his widow in 1818. The designers sought to do a revival that reflected the subtleties of Bodoni's actual work. They produced three size-specific versions; ITC Bodoni Six for captions and footnotes, ITC Bodoni Twelve for text settings, and ITC Bodoni Seventytwo - a display design modeled on Bodoni's 72-point Papale design. ITC Bodoni includes regular, bold, italics, Old style Figures, small caps, and italic swash fonts. Sumner Stone created the ornaments based on those found in the "Manuale Tipografico." These lovely dingbats can be used as Bodoni did, to separate sections of text or simply accent a page layout or graphic design."

In the late 1930s, old Egyptiennes (or Italiennes) returned to the collective consciousness of European printers and type houses — perhaps because political news were front a centre, especially in France where Le Figaro newspaper was seeing record circulation numbers. In 1939 both Monotype and Lettergieterij Amsterdam thought of the same idea: Make a new typeface similar to the reverse stress slab shapes that make up the titles of newspapers like Le Figaro and Le Frondeur. Both foundries intended to call their new type Figaro. Monotype finished theirs first, so they ended up with the name, and their type was already published when Stefan Schlesinger finished his take for the Amsterdam foundry. Schlesinger’s type was renamed Hidalgo (Spanish for a lower nobleman, ‘son of something’) and published in 1940 as ‘a very happy variation on an old motif’. Although it wasn’t a commercial success at the time, it was well received and considered subtler and more refined than the similar types available, Figaro and Playbill. In the Second World War, the Germans banned the use of the type, and Hidalgo never really recovered. Upon closer inspection, Schlesinger’s work on Hidalgo was much more Euro-sophisticated and ahead of its time than the too-wooden cut of Figaro and the thick tightness of Playbill. It has a modern high contrast, a squarer skeleton, contour cuts that work similarly outside and inside, and airy and minimal solutions to the more complicated shapes like G, K, M, N, Q and W. It is also much more aware of, and more accommodating to, the picket-fence effect the thick top slabs create in setting. Basilio (named after the signing teacher in Mozart’s Figaro) is the digital revival and major expansion of Hidalgo. With nearly 600 glyphs, it boasts Pan-European language support (most Latin languages, as well as Cyrillic and Greek), and a few OpenType tricks that gel it all together to make a very useful design tool. Stefan Schlesigner was born in Vienna in 1896. He moved to the Netherlands in 1925, where he worked for Van Houten’s chocolate, Metz department store, printing firm Trio and many other clients. He died in the gas chambers of Auschwitz in 1944. Digital revivals and expansions of two of his other designs, Minuet and Serena, have also been published by Canada Type.

Basenji is a flowing headline typeface influenced by the modular geometric design trend of the 1970s. Herbert Bayer published his highly influential Universal Alphabet in 1924, which was based on circles and straight lines and had a modern, industrial appearance. Jan Tschischold’s typography popularized this simple, unconventional style but by the late 1950s, it had fallen by the wayside. Type designers Joe Taylor and Herb Lubalin inaugurated the 1970s with fresh takes on an old concept. These new typefaces were more practical than the original, and their blend of futuristic curves and funky curls fit the zeitgeist. The popularity of these types spawned a flood of similar designs like Pink Mouse, Bauhaus, Pump, and Harry. These typefaces were popular throughout the decade then fell out of favor by the mid-1980s, making a comeback in the year 2000. Many contemporary font designs have drawn inspiration from the beginnings of the Universal Alphabet, but Basenji is unique. This typeface amplifies of the 1970s elements of Rondo, Pump, Bauhaus and Blippo, and packs them into a practical, versatile design toolset. Basenji comes in nine weights and italics. Most Latin-based European, Vietnamese, Greek, and most Cyrillic-based writing systems are supported, including the following languages. Afaan Oromo, Afar, Afrikaans, Albanian, Alsatian, Aromanian, Aymara, Azerbaijani, Bashkir, Bashkir (Latin), Basque, Belarusian, Belarusian (Latin), Bemba, Bikol, Bosnian, Breton, Bulgarian, Buryat, Cape Verdean, Creole, Catalan, Cebuano, Chamorro, Chavacano, Chichewa, Crimean Tatar (Latin), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dawan, Dholuo, Dungan, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Frisian, Friulian, Gagauz (Latin), Galician, Ganda, Genoese, German, Gikuyu, Greenlandic, Guadeloupean Creole, Haitian Creole, Hawaiian, Hiligaynon, Hungarian, Icelandic, Igbo, Ilocano, Indonesian, Irish, Italian, Jamaican, Kaingang, Khalkha, Kalmyk, Kanuri, Kaqchikel, Karakalpak (Latin), Kashubian, Kazakh, Kikongo, Kinyarwanda, Kirundi, Komi-Permyak, Kurdish, Kurdish (Latin), Kyrgyz, Latvian, Lithuanian, Lombard, Low Saxon, Luxembourgish, Maasai, Macedonian, Makhuwa, Malay, Maltese, Māori, Moldovan, Montenegrin, Nahuatl, Ndebele, Neapolitan, Norwegian, Novial, Occitan, Ossetian, Ossetian (Latin), Papiamento, Piedmontese, Polish, Portuguese, Quechua, Rarotongan, Romanian, Romansh, Russian, Rusyn, Sami, Sango, Saramaccan, Sardinian, Scottish Gaelic, Serbian, Serbian (Latin), Shona, Sicilian, Silesian, Slovak, Slovenian, Somali, Sorbian, Sotho, Spanish, Swahili, Swazi, Swedish, Tagalog, Tahitian, Tajik, Tatar, Tetum, Tongan, Tshiluba, Tsonga, Tswana, Tumbuka, Turkish, Turkmen (Latin), Tuvaluan, Ukrainian, Uzbek, Uzbek (Latin), Venda, Venetian, Vepsian, Vietnamese, Võro, Walloon, Waray-Waray, Wayuu, Welsh, Wolof, Xavante, Xhosa, Yapese, Zapotec, Zarma, Zazaki, Zulu and Zuni.

Sapore is a script font family, mostly monoline, inspired by the elegant handmade signs in the beautiful city of Venice, Italy, where I work and live. Many of these signs were made at the beginning of the 20th century by skillful craftsmen and artists, carrying that distinct vintage Italian flavour, and this is why I named the font Sapore, which means precisely flavour (also, one of the signs is from a pastry shop that makes the most delicious things). The design takes this retro vibe into the 21st century, making it up-to-date and fresh, while keeping it authentic. It is a script font, but I added some stand alone capitals that you can use in all caps words and texts effortlessly, as the open type code is taking care of using the right set of letters at the right time, I could have made two separate fonts, but I wanted to give you the best value I could and ease of use. Make sure contextual alternates are always on! There are also swashes, alternate styles, stylistic sets, small caps, 2 figure sets and decorative elements, all accessible through open type. I think the font is particularly suited for display use, as in logos, packaging design, branding, but it is readable enough for small text blocks. You can access the non-linking caps by clicking on the discretionary ligatures button. You can access the loopy caps by clicking on the titling alternates button. The main version has straight terminals but I included a round version and a calligraphic one, called “classico”. Hope you like it!

Offense is an unyielding rectangular slab-serif face designed with consistently balanced letterforms and a refined finish. It’s extremely angular geometric form commands attention in display settings, yet is also legible in short text blocks. Numerous alternate character sets allow room for customization, while the expanded ligatures push letter combinations to the limit. Stylistically, Offense’s almost crude, sharp-cornered construction is balanced by it’s sophisticated finish and attention to detail, often unrealized in similar faces of this genre. The upright weights are complimented by pairings of true italics, completely rebuilt, slightly narrower in width with modified letterforms, increasing their contrast and flow. Features include: Precision kerning Standard Ligatures set including 'f' ligatures (fi, fl, ff, fh, fj, ffl, ffi, ffj) Discretionary Ligatures set including (ft, rt, ae, oe, st, ft, ct, oc, oo, ry, AE, OE, AL, TH, HE, AK, AN, TT, HD, AM, AP, AR, NF, NE, NH, NL, NB, FL, ND, FE, AB, OB, OD, OF, OG, OH, OK, OL, OM, ON, OO, OP, OQ, OR, OU, AH, UE, UF, UB, UD, UH, UK, UL, UM, UN, UP, UR, UU, MP, XY, YX, KY, WY, VY, AF, FF, FI) Alternate characters (O, o, S, s, a, h circumflex, @, ®, ¶, $, &, _, and various ligature alternates) Case forms (shifts various punctuation marks up to a position that works better with all-capital sequences) Capital Spacing (globally adjusts inter-glyph spacing for all-capital text) Slashed zero Full set of numerators/denominators Automatic fraction feature (supports any fraction combination) Extended language support (Latin-1 and Latin Extended-A) *Requires an application with OpenType and/or Unicode support.

VAROGE SARO NOEST arrives on your computer with OpenType replacement features standard, along with extended language support for Central European, Greek, Cyrillic and Extended Cyrillic. We've even included some nice character options for our German-speaking customers with the uppercase Eszett and a number of alternatives to the standard lowercase eszett. Also included is the new Turkish Lira. VAROGE SARO NOEST is a font with a very funny name. Sometimes it can be a funny font. Or a font that is fun. It looks kinda casual, but also a little bit handwritten--freeform and freehand. Or a form of block lettering with a rough edge. Not too rough. Just enough to break up the visual rigidity. But this is not a face in distress. It's mostly at ease in its surroundings. If it's in text mode, it handles the job comfortably. In headline mode it does well too. It's quite flexible and looking for a home. Give this font a home. See if you can figure out what to use it for. See if you see what we saw when we made it. We saw a font that's cool and elegant with a bit of a tantrum driving the node count. We also found it's impossible to look away from it. Anyone can see that. That's why you're here. That's why you're reading this. And VAROGE will do you a favor if you let it. Revisit your typographic beliefs and head over to the one persistent constant in life: your font list. Is VAROGE SARO NOEST on it? If it were to set up headquarters there, you might discover something ideal. That's the favor I was promising.

Vulpa is a charming serif family in regular, italic and bold, informed by the proportions of a personal favorite, Plantin. The quirky foxtail terminals (inspired in part by my script font, Gelato Script) can be seen across all three styles. These little details make the typeface very expressive at display sizes, but practically disappear at text sizes, making for a very versatile face. Across the three styles there are a number of useful OpenType features which make Vulpa capable of demanding typographic work, even though there are only three styles. Regular, italic and bold are all you really need anyway! The regular and bold weights both include small caps, and the italic features swash capitals for most letters. The italic also features quaint discretionary ligatures, and all styles include standard ligatures, automatic fractions, proportional and tabular, lining and oldstyle figures. If this isn't enough, the Vulpa family also includes Ornaments and Drop-Cap fonts. There is an ornament for A to B, a to b and 0 to 9. These have been carefully designed to match the feel of the text fonts, and many are influenced by ornaments and fleurons from the ATF 1912 Type Specimen book. The drop-caps have an engraved look, and two color versions can be made by overlaying upper and lower case. Despite the lack of weights compared to ‘workhorse’ faces, the charm and versatility of Vulpa make it a really useful typeface, that I hope you'll enjoy using as much as I enjoyed making.

TE Nastaaliq Font It is one of the Persian calligraphy or ta'liq line that appeared in Persia in the seventh century AH (thirteenth century AD), as it was extracted from the lines of naskh, patch and thuluth. It is a beautiful font whose letters are distinguished by precision and extension. It is also characterized by its ease, clarity and lack of complexity. It does not tolerate diacritics, despite its difference with the line of the patch, as it is one of the best fonts in the world and the best without a competitor and admires many Arab calligraphers, and no cultural or literary exhibition is devoid of a painting written in Persian script. It is one of the most beautiful lines that has a special character that distinguishes it from others, as it is characterized by gracefulness in its letters, so it appears as if it descends in one direction, and its beauty is increased by the soft and rounded lines in it, because it is more flexible in drawing and more flexible, especially if it is drawn with precision, elegance and good distribution, and the calligrapher may baptize In his use of decoration to reach strength in expression by taking advantage of arches and circles, in addition to the grace of painting, the artist may link the letters of one word and the two words to reach the composition of a frame or curved and wrapped lines in which he shows his genius in imagination and creativity.

As designers, we seek perfection and originality. The more we step back and look at our work, the more changes we tend to find necessary. Drastic modifications are inevitable. The same is true of Grayfel. Grayfel began as an exercise at insigne to explore the crowded space of neutral sans. While the world of sans serifs is admittedly crowded, I still managed to find something new and different. The final Grayfel consists of 42 full-featured OpenType fonts containing three widths: Regular, Condensed, and Extended. Every width consists of 14 fonts--seven weights with matching italics, making it a good companion for setting clear text and headlines for print and screen. OpenType features are also available. There’s figure choices, such as proportional and old style figures. Additionally, Greyfel includes sophisticated typographic attributes: ligatures, fractions, alternate characters, small caps, superscripts and subscripts. Its extended character set supports Central, Western and Eastern European languages. Optical compensations also mean the outcome of this family is a hybrid of humanistic proportions. It’s a well-finished design with optimized kerning gives it a friendly look. If you like sans serifs within the tradition of Futura, Helvetica, Avant Garde and Avenir, then you’ll love Greyfel, too. Grayfel works well in a variety of applications. Subtly neutral yet fun, it’s suitable for headlines of all sizes as well as for text. Put it to the task for marketing, packaging, editorial work, branding and even on-screen projects. Try it out: it’s not just fun and playful; it’s Grayfel.

Kari Display is the product of a long standing idea I had to give the well-received Positype typeface, Kari, plastic surgery. Just referring to giving a typeface plastic surgery, or letter lipo, stuck in the back of my head until I was able to pick the project up. The ultimate objective was to refine Kari Display to a point where each glyph was expressed as simple as possible... and in that simplicity a sexiness would appear. Kari is a beautiful script, but it is very 'controlled' and orderly and I wanted Kari Display to break that mold with much more movement, curviness, greater modulation and a more elegant feel on the page. I did not want to take it too far, limiting the use of the typeface, but rather opted for a delicate balance of thick and thin against the added movement of the glyphs. The wealth of sketches and proposed variants during the concepting phase was encouraging and I really pushed to add as many alternate characters, ligatures, swashes (and more) as I possibly could. Just about every character has at least one or more alternates AND the complete offering of alternates completely covers a wide range of Latin-based language groups including Central European diacritics. If you are using any type of OpenType enabled application, then the Kari Display Pro typefaces are the way to go. They include everything found in the 3 separate variants for each style as well as entirely expanding offering of additional swash and ligature sets.

CA Capoli is a fine script typeface with a vintage touch. Perfect for illustrative titles or logotypes. It comes in two styles, Regular and Stroke. The inspiration came during our trip to Italy, where we took a short rest in a bar during a hot day. We discovered a simple ceramic ashtray on the table. The word “Nido” was inscribed in a typeface that looked like it dated back to the 1950s. We made some investigations about the word, its meaning and origin but it still remains a big mystery. Was it the name of a hotel or a restaurant or some vintage Italian cigarettes? We don’t know. We were so amazed about the design of the logo that we decided to create a typeface out of it. A sophisticated endeavor because we just had four letters. How could the rest of the letters – if it ever existed – have looked like? Our hypothesis is CA Capoli. A typeface with a full Central European character set and some nice alternative letters to chose from. When we thought about “Nido” and its possible derivation of hotel business, we felt like creating a small side project for this typeface, a brand for a fictional hotel called Hotel Capoli with business cards, letterheads, a reception book, key fobs and embroidered patches for the service dress of the hotel service stuff. The Hotel Capoli is located at the wonderful beach of Cape Arcona on the fictional country of Arcona Islands where our type foundry is located.

The typeface Typist originated during an extensive research on the origin and development of typewriter typestyles. The first commercially manufactured typewriter came on the market in 1878 by Remington. The typestyles on these machines were only possible in capitals, the combination of capitals and lowercase came available around the end of the nineteenth century. Apart from a few exceptions, most typestyles had a fixed letter width and a more or less unambiguous design that resembled a thread-like structure. A lot of this mechanical structure was due to the method the typestyles were produced. Looking at type-specimens for print before the first typewriters were good enough to came on the market we can see that in 1853 and in 1882 Bruce’s Type Foundry already had printing type that had a structure of the typewriter typestyles. Of course printing types were proportional designed as typewriter typestyles had a fixed width. So it is possible that except from the method of production for typewriter typestyles, the design of printing types were copied. In the design of the Typist, the purpose was – next to the monospace feature – to include some of the features of the early typewriter typestyles. Features such as the ball terminals and the remarkable design of the letter Q. This new typeface lacks the mechanical and cold look of the early typewriter typestyles. The Typist comes in six weights with matching italics in two versions. One that resembled the early typewriter typestyles (Typist Slab) and a version designed with coding programmers in mind (Typist Code).

The courageous Russian author of the best seller Anastasia, Vladimir Megre, once said that this remarkable woman would inspire creative people around the world to produce their best work. Since I consider myself a creative person who has been deeply touched by her story, I sincerely hope that this will be true for me also. Anastasia talks a lot about God, the wonders of the natural world and how all things have been created so perfectly. This belief in universal perfection, however, is not confined to mystics alone. Many great mathematicians and scientists, including Albert Einstein, were of the same opinion. Having read Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code, I became quite fascinated with the so-called Fibonacci series; "a sequence of integers in which each integer (Fibonacci number) after the second is the sum of the two preceding integers; specif., the series 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, . . ." (Webster’s Dictionary). These mysterious numbers, which are said to give divine proportions, are found throughout nature in everything from a rose to a spiral galaxy. Many believe that this reinforces the argument that there is a divine intelligence back of creation. With that in mind, I thought it would be interesting to see if I could somehow create a font using these numbers in the design process. If I have succeeded - even partially - in attaining these mystical proportions, it will definitely have been worth all the hard work. And, I sincerely hope that many will enjoy using this font in producing their own best work.

Here in the heart of Santa Monica, in the disused 1940s aircraft hangar we like to call the Comicraft Studios, we know that times are tough. As we were driving to “work” in the back of our chauffeur driven Humvee limo, sipping martinis out of the navels of Playboy bunnies and wondering what font we should release next, we decided it was time to reach out to the poor people. Yes, we felt it was time to create a font for the huddled masses yearning to breathe free, for the wretched refuse of our teeming shores. A font, if you will, for the tempest-tossed. It’s a little skinny and might be described as pinched and starved, but it’s guaranteed to see you through this current economic crisis as only the 26 letters of the alphabet can. It was a tall order, but Jazzy JG Roshell created this one while he was in line at the bank, waiting for his personal bailout. Meticulously crafted using one of those ballpoint pens attached to the cashier’s station by elastic, Credit Crunch is the Hamburger Helper of comic book fonts. It’s kind of a hybrid -- just like the Priuses our trophy wives drive to their personal plastic surgeons -- and it’s solar powered and also comes with a tank full of good old fashioned Biro ink. The Recession, Climate Change AND Global Hunger will probably end mere minutes after you crack open your life’s savings to buy this font. How can you afford NOT to...? See the families related to Credit Crunch: Credit Extension.

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.

Metron is so far the most ambitious typeface made to order in the Czech Republic. Despite the fact that for a number of years it has not been used for the purpose for which it was designed, every inhabitant of Prague is still well aware of its typical features. Metron Pro was commissioned by the Transport Company of the Capital City of Prague in 1970 to be used in the information system of the Prague Metro. It was first published in the manual of the Metroprojekt company in 1973 and then used to the full, under the author’s supervision, for lines “A” and “C”. Since 1985 Rathouský's system has been disappearing from the Prague Metro; it survives only in the form of metal letters at its stations and at some stations of the Czechoslovak Railways. In 2014 we're mentioning the 90th birthday of Jiří Rathouský. It’s a good opportunity for updating and re-introducing his Metron. Extended was the choice of figures and fractions, new currency signs added, diacritics revised, etc., but above all the newly designed Cyrillics including true SmallCaps. Now we have six weights plus italics, where the tone of the basic style is even closer to the original. Ten years back we've had the feeling that this typeface should again take a part of Prague’s traffic system and today, when revisiting of all the fonts, the feeling turned to certainty. The main feature of this typeface is namely a noticeability a property above all welcomed in rush of platforms.

Dolsáb was designed from scratch with uniqueness in mind. The subtle movement from thick to thin and the variants of sharp to rounded make this cutting edge san serif a must have. The inspiration for Dolsab was a simple pairing of a rhombus and calligraphy. While neither of those two elements can be seen in their entirety in any instance, the influence of both is strong. The rhombus can be notice on most ascenders like on the lowercase t & l, for example. And the calligraphy inspiration is most easily captured on the descenders such as the lowercase y & g. The most beautiful characteristics of Dolsab is definitely the calligraphy-influenced movement. These features really stand out on the lowercase a & e. It's almost amusing to let your eye follow the contours of those two letter forms as they travel from thick to thin, sharp to rounded and back again. Users are welcomed to try all font styles of Dolsab in any applique of their choosing. However, it will be quickly noticeable that only Dolsab Air & Demi (the thiner of the styles) will be best suited for body copy. Personally I like to see these letterforms as large as they can be to really showcase the subtle movement, especially in Dolsab Heavy where these movements become much more dramatic. You'll never know what really works best unless you experiment. Dolsab surely isn't the answer to all projects, but it's certainly worth trying. No other typeface moves quite like Dolsáb.

Burford is a font family that I sketched while traveling through Europe. I was mesmerized by all the unique typography that was showcased throughout the five countries I visited. Inspired by all that I had seen, I found myself spending 4-5 hours per day in Amsterdam’s Vondel Park drawing characters. Once back in the states I digitalized Burford, deciding it would make for a beautiful layer-based font. Burford Pro package comes with all 18 layering fonts including 5 base layers, 3 top layers, 5 bottom layers and 2 sets of graphic elements. They are strategically made to build on top of each other, creating a cohesive and easy to use layer-based family. Each font also comes with a set of Stylistic Alternatives for letters A C E F G H P Q R. Burford Basic package is created for users who don’t have access to premiere design programs (such as Illustrator, InDesign, Photoshop, etc) and are unable to use the layering effect. Burford can still be a powerful tool as each font can also be used on its own. It includes every font file not needed for the layering effect. (Include 13 fonts - Burford Basic, Dots, DropShadow, Extras Set A, Extras Set B, Extrude B, Extrude C, Inline, Line, Marquee, Outline, Stripes A and Stripes B). The Burford Extras set uses all basic keyboard characters - around 100 total elements per set. They are designed to go specifically with Burford and complement its varying styles perfectly. The set includes: banners, borders, corners, arrows, line breaks, catchwords, anchors and many more!

This is Floral Decay, your seasonal autumn font with jaded, weathered, and earthy contours of rustic lettering. As they blend into words, the characters evoke floral arrangements of a decaying beauty. It is versatile, playful, and perfect for Graphic Design decorations! This font is unique because, in order to create it, I had to answer some tricky questions: What makes autumn… autumn? Capturing the essence of the other seasons into your letters comes easier. For instance, in order to suggest summer, you only need to draw a few flowers. How about autumn? You could garnish your letters with a few grapes, you might think, but it would only result in a grape-themed font. The notion that is more directly associated with autumn is the image of falling and withering leaves, which brought me to the second question. How exactly are you going to create something beautiful out of a somewhat morbid premise, like wilted leaves? Well, I soon realized that by creating a handwritten font and preserving the right imperfections, you can actually portray collateral beauty. In this context, asymmetry is important because it suggests decay. Further on, the design concept required the letters to come very close together, so that every typed word can be regarded as a floral arrangement. How close together, though? As much as possible without confusing one with the other, risking a lack of legibility. Therefore, in contrast with the demo version of this font, this actual version provides the ideal kerning.