Matthew Carter has been refining his design for Alisal for so long, he says, that when he was asked to complete the design for the Monotype Library, it was almost as if he were doing a historical revival of his own typeface. The illusion even extended to changes in his work process: although he now does all his preliminary and final drawing on screen, the first trial renderings of Alisal were done as pencil renderings. Alisal is best classified as an Italian old style design. Originally created between the late 15th and mid-16th centuries in northern Italy, the true Italian old styles were some of the first roman types. They tend to be the most calligraphic of serifed faces, with the axis of their curved strokes inclined to the left, as if drawn with a flat-tipped pen or brush. These designs offer sturdy, free-flowing and heavily bracketed serifs, short descenders, and a modest contrast in stroke weight. Alisal has nearly all the classic Italian old style character traits, plus a few quirks of its own. It is calligraphic in nature, with more of a pen-drawn quality than faces like Palatino or Goudy Old Style. It is more rough-hewn than either Goudy's Kennerley or Benton's Cloister, and is generally heavier in weight than most of the other Italian old style designs. One place where Alisal makes a clean break with traditional old style designs is in the serifs. While sturdy and clearly reflecting pen-drawn strokes, Alisal's serifs have no bracketing and appear to be straight strokes crossing the main vertical. Like Caslon or Trajanus, Alisal is a handsome design when viewed as a block of copy. Ascenders are tall and elegant, and serve as a counterpoint to the robust strength of the rest of the design. Alisal is available as a small family of roman and bold with a complementary italic for the basic roman weight, providing all that is needed for the majority of text typography. Alisal is not as well-known as some of Carter's other typefaces, but this lovely and long-incubated design was certainly worth the wait.

Typefaces, like most other works of art, provide a small window into the personalities and sensibilities of the artists who create them. ITC Panache not only provides this window, it is also aptly named. Mr. Edward Benguiat the dreator of ITC Panache, has all the dash, verve (and panache) hinted at in the design, Creative, capable and prolific, Ed Benguiat has drawn hundreds of exciting and popular typeface designs. Benguiat's design goal was to create a sans serif typestyle that is versatile, utilitarian - and distinctive. We think he has succeeded admirably. ITC Panache's three weights mix exceptionally well to complement each other or provide emphasis where necessary. Extensive testing at text sizes and design fine-tuning has produced a typeface family which is remarkably homogenous and consistent in color. Text set in ITC Panache is inviting without dissapointment. It is exceptionally easy to read, even in long text blocks of copy or small point sizes. When set in larger sizes or used for headlines, ITC Panache's character traits becomes more apparent and pronounced to the reader. They help to create graphics with distinction and style. Big or small. a little or a lot. it's hard not to use ITC Panache well. If you could pigeonhole ITC Panache, it would probably be classified as a stressed sans", but this would not completely describe, or do justiceto, the design. There is a slight contrast in stroke weight, which becomes more pronounced as the familiy weight increases; but there is a more to distinguish ITC Panache from ather sans serifs. Perhaps most obvious is its high waist and correspondingly slight condensation of the top half of the "round" capitals. Both of these traits link ITC Panache with the sensuous forms of art nouveau creations. In contrast are the typicall old style "e" found in designs like Cloister and ITC Berkeley Old Style, and the two storied "g" common to the early 20th century sans serif designs. The capital "A" even has the cupped top found in Caslon designs. Part of the beauty of ITC Panache is that all of these seemingly unrelated desig traits are melded into a design of exceptional continuity."