Alfarooq is the most widely known epithet for the Islamic figure Umar ibn al-Khattab (c. 586 - 644) who was a leading companion and an adviser to the Islamic prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) who later became the second Muslim Caliph after Muhammad’s death (pbuh) in 632. Muslims widely know Umar ibn Al-Khattab (may Allah be pleased with him) as Alfarooq (i.e., he who knows and distinguishes between truth and falsehood). Alfarooq is a unique, wide, and headline Arabic display typeface. The main trait of this typeface is the novel design of its letters' tails and its dots which renders it as one of the modern stylish typefaces used for headlines and titles. This can be noticed in different letters such as Ain, Ghain, Jeem, Khah, Seen, Sheen, and others. In addition, Alfarooq font has an Arabic character set which supports Arabic, Persian, Kurdish, and Urdu letters and numerals with a limited range of specific Arabic ligatures. This typeface comes in two ultra-bold styles (i.e., Alfarooq and Alfarooq-Pro) and more than 430 distinctive glyphs with a single weight for each style. Alfarooq typeface effectively offers diverse typographic and digital usages including mainly the very large and wide poster-size works. Due to its strong baseline-stroke, Alfarooq typeface is appropriate for heading and titling works in Arabic, Persian, Kurdish, and Urdu newspapers, magazines, and other printed materials. It is also elegantly suitable for signs, book covers, advertisement light boards, street and city names, products- and services names, and titles of flyers, pamphlets, and posters. The wide style of Alfarooq font’s characters gives it more distinction when it is used in greeting cards, covers, exhibitions' signboards, external or internal walls of malls, and also the exits and entrances of airports and halls.

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.

Silent films evoke a sense of nostalgia that is as timeless as the era itself. While the stars of silent cinema may have faded into the past, their influence is still felt in modern-day art, fashion, and design. Silentina is a typeface that embodies the spirit of the silent film era, inspired by the intertitles that were used to convey crucial information to audiences during these films. Buster Keaton, Mary Pickford, Clara Bow, and Rudolph Valentino all graced the silver screen with their emotive faces during the silent film era. These icons used their expressions to convey a range of emotions that captivated audiences and made them fall in love with the magic of cinema. Intertitles, the brief messages that would appear on-screen during the film, were just as essential in conveying information to moviegoers. Silentina is a typeface that pays homage to the unsung heroes of the silent film era—the intertitles. It channels the glitz and glamour of the roaring twenties, taking us back to a time of flapper dresses, jazz music, and speakeasies. But Silentina isn’t just a typeface—it’s a portal to another era. It transports us to a time when movies were an escape from reality, and each trip to the cinema was a chance to lose ourselves in a world of adventure and romance. With Silentina, you can project your message in the same way that the stars of silent cinema projected theirs. This typeface captures the essence of a bygone era, bringing it to life in the modern world. Use it to convey plot information, set the scene, or add a touch of vintage charm to your design. Whatever your message, Silentina will help you communicate it in the same glitzy way as the intertitles of the silent film era. 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.

Joachim Müller-Lancé's Uppercut is a rather sporting fellow, originally developed for the Krav Maga training center of San Francisco (Krav Maga is a simple and efficient self-defense system that has become equally popular in Hollywood and with law enforcement). Joachim has spent several years training, hitting things and people whenever he needs a break from kerning. Uppercut can be seen on the school's t-shirts and other articles. Despite bearing the same moniker as an upwards punch to the chin, the name actually fell together quite naturally as Uppercut is an all uppercase typeface, and the word "cut" is also historically used to describe a type style in hot metal type. For this slanted look, "Angle" felt just right (with thanks to Mia McHatton). The design idea sprang from pencil sketches for the center's new identity. Uppercut's shapes are not calligraphic or handwritten, more like lettering seen in comics or sports logos. Its brush movements are imaginary, not too literally brushy. During development, details were simplified and reduced until a bit of a cut-paper feel emerged, but more fluid like writing. The shapes are economical and efficient; simplicity makes the font versatile, holding up in small as well as big sizes. Uppercut is decidedly analog, muscular but not bulky, with the fluid but determined movements of a boxer or martial artist - not theatrical but powerful, fast, confident and dynamic. Well... it has punch. In the proportions, there is emphasis on a strong upper edge "keeping its guard up", while several stems protrude downward, giving the impression of leaping or being "light on the feet". Use Uppercut to pick up the pace, add snap, verve and drive - on movie posters for action and adventure, to advertise your dojo, rumble or prizefight, racing team or tuning shop, or invite friends to your barbecue with old time rock'n'roll and homemade hot pepper sauce.

Rufina was as tall and thin as a reed. Elegant but with that distance that well-defined forms seem to impose. Her voice, however, was sweeter, closer, and when she spoke her name, like a slow whisper, one felt like what she had come to say could be read in her image. Rufina’s story can only be told through a detour because her origin does not coincide with her birth. Rufina was born on a Sunday afternoon while her father was drawing black letters on a white background, and her mother was trying to join those same letters to form words that could tell a story. But her origin goes much further back, and that is why she is pierced by a story that precedes her, even though it is not her own. Maybe her origin can be traced back to that autumn night in which that tall man with that distant demeanor ran into that woman with that sweet smile and elegant aspect. He looked at her in such a way that he was trapped by that gaze, even though they found no words to say to each other, and they stayed in silence. Somehow, some words leaked into that gaze because since that moment they were never apart again. Later, after they started talking, projects started coming up and then coexistence and arguments, routines and mismatches. But in that chaos of crossed words in their life together, something was stable through the silence of the gazes. In those gazes, the silent words sustained that indescribable love that they didn’t even try to understand. And in one of those silences, Rufina appeared, when that man told that woman that he needed a text to try out his new font, and she saw him look at her with that same fascination of the first time, and she started to write something with those forms that he was giving her as a gift. Rufina was as tall and thin as a reed, wrote her mother when Rufina was born. Photo (Fragilité): Karin Topolanski / Post: Raw (www.raw.com.uy) - María Pérez Gutiérrez

The shapes of the f-holes on a violin reminded German designer André Maaßen of an italic letter "f". Maaßen used these captivating contours as the theme for his type family, Varius. The name "Varius" is an homage to the manufacturer of the violin that inspired Maaßen's project, Antonio Stradivarius, the most famous manufacturer of violins in music history. Varius has three separate styles. Varius 1 and its italic are the base style of the family, and are typefaces in the baroque serif manner. Varius 2 and its italic are slab serif egyptiennes, slightly heavier than Varius 1's more classical forms. Varius 3 and its italic are semi serif faces; their characters are serifed, but some of the serifs have been cut off. The family is rounded out with two pi faces: an ornaments font (which can be used in conjunction with the text fonts, or on its own to create beautiful borders or individual decorative elements), and a font of musical symbols and notations. Each of the six text fonts has dozens of supplemental ligatures included in their character sets. When these fonts are used in an OpenType-supporting application, such as Adobe InDesign, these ligatures automatically appear in text when the "Discretionary Ligatures" feature is activated. Additionally, the character sets include added alternate glyphs, such as a swash "m" or "n" to finish off a line of text. These can be inserted manually in applications that include glyph palettes (e.g., Adobe InDesign or Illustrator CS). All of the Varius family's letterforms appear slightly narrow, and traces of the wide-nibbed pen can be seen within their forms. Additionally, the shape of a violin's f-hole is a reminiscent element within all of the family's curves. Varius is particularly suited for use many applications, such as body text, newspaper text, display text, headlines, posters, books, screen design, and corporate identity. Use in sizes ranging from body copy text to display and poster format allow the different facets of the typeface to effectively present themselves. The effects can be as versatile as the possibilities! Due to its special character, the typeface could be used in the design of a logo, or within an appropriate corporate design context, to particularly stress individuality.

The Scriptuale family, which contains eight styles, is a contemporary upright calligraphic face. Designed by German designer Renate Weise in 2003, this family of typefaces speaks to the present, while at the same time reflecting on a lyrical past. The letterforms of the Scriptuale family are romanticized, they reference German calligraphic styles from the 19th and early 20th Centuries. For instance the design of Scriptuale's uppercase strays from the canon of classical proportion into romantic idealism. While the C and O are drawn according to the ancient quadratic proportions - almost twice as wide, optically, as the E or the L - the letter A is wider than would be expected, and the D narrower. These subtle differences introduce a different rhythm into text set in Scriptuale than Italic styles of calligraphy may offer. Scriptuale's Gs merit special notice: both the upper and lower case G lunge slightly forward, further enhancing the dynamic quality of the text. Also unique in Scriptuale's design is the lowercase width: the letterforms appear slightly condensed; they have large x-heights to compensate for this. In a delightful twist, the number 2's beak has been closed by drawing it full-circle, back into the stem: this references a style of letter design that was practiced, among other places, by artists from the old Klingspor foundry in Offenbach Germany. Typefaces constructed there easily captured the zeitgeist of the romantic period, but are less calligraphic than Scriptuale (e.g., Rudolf Koch's Koch Antiqua). A semi-serif face (like Prof. Hermann Zapf's Optima or Otl Aicher's Rotis Semi), some of Scriptuale's letters have serifs (D), and some do not (A). And although both the B and the E normally have the same "structure" on their left side, Weise has drawn them differently in Scriptuale. These strengthen the calligraphic-like quality of the family. Traces of the pen are easy to see in Scriptuale's design; it is a thoroughly calligraphic face. The eight typefaces in the Scriptuale family include Light, Regular, Semi Bold, and Bold weights. Each weight has a companion italic. Scriptuale is similar to one other contemporary calligraphic family in the Linotype portfolio, Anasdair , from British designer

Dulcinea is the title of Ramiro Espinoza’s in-depth look at Spanish Baroque calligraphy’s most extreme tendencies, and especially at some of those produced by the writing masters Pedro Díaz Morante and Juan Claudio Aznar de Polanco. These 17th and 18th centuries alphabets with their plentiful calligraphic flourishes represented a marked break with the harmonic and angular Renaissance Cancellaresca style. It was Morante who first introduced and popularized the use of the pointed quill in Spain, and although his famous text entitled “Arte Nueva de escribir” – first volume published in 1616 – contains alphabets that have much in common with traditional broad nib Cancellaresca calligraphy, most of the examples therein are outgrowths of the new models put forward by the Italian master Gianfrancesco Cresci. The writing’s swashes are complex and intricate, but at the same time they feature a profusion of defects. Many of them sometimes come close to ugliness. However, these pages contain an artistic essence that bears a relationship to the ironic and sometimes somber character of Spanish Baroque. That’s why the name of the font pays homage to “Dulcinea del Toboso”, the fictional beauty from Miguel de Cervantes’s ‘Don Quixote’, a work that reveals many of the period’s conflicts, such as the contrast between utopian ideals and reality, uncertainty and madness. But Dulcinea is far from being just a revival. Its forms are not careful tracings of the outlines of Morante and Polanco’s letters, nor are they attempts to reproduce them digitally. In fact, the author of the letters says that had the font been created that way it would have been too archaic to serve as acceptable contemporary typography. However, he believes that there are myriad interesting details that can be rescued and preserved, along with the playful spirit of the original. The work of designing Dulcinea consisted of combining original historical elements with the creativity and calligraphy of the font’s author in order to produce a modern typography that isn’t based on the same traditional sources as many recently created scripts fonts. Dulcinea offers attractive options for the setting of texts and headlines: abundant ligatures and swashes along with intricate alternate characters. It sophisticated forms make it an ideal option for women’s magazines, recipe books, lingerie products or perfume packaging.

After doing this for so many years, one would think my fascination with the old history of writing would have mellowed out by now. The truth is that alongside being a calligraphy history buff, I'm a pop technology freak. Maybe even keener on the tech thing, since I just can't seem to get enough new gadgets. And after working with type technologies for so many years, I'm starting to think that writing and design technologies as we now know them, being about 2.5 post-computer generations, keep becoming more and more detached from what the very old humanity arts/tasks they essentially want to facilitate. In a world where command-z is a frequently used key combination, it’s difficult to justify expecting a Morris-made book or a Zaner-drawn sentence, but accidental artistic “mutations” become welcome, marketable features. When fluid pens were introduced, their liquid saturation influenced type design to a great extent almost overnight an influence professional designers tend to play down. Now round stroke endings are a common sight, and the saturation is so clean and measured, unlike any liquid-paper relationship possible in reality. Some designers even illustrate their work by overlaying perfect circles at stroke ends, in order to illustrate how “geometric” their work was. Because if it’s measured with precise geometry, it’s got to be meaningful design. And once in a while, by a total freak accident, the now-cherished mutations prove to have existed long before the technology that caused them. Rolling Pen was cued by just such a thing: A rounded, circular, roll-flowing calligraphy from the late nineteenth century seemingly one of those experimental takes on what inspired Business Penmanship, another font of mine. Looking at it now it certainly seems to be friendlier, more legible, and maybe even more practical and easier to execute than the standard business penmanship of those days, but I guess friendliness and simplicity were at odds with the stiff manner business liked to present itself back then, so that kind of thing remained buried in the professional penman’s oddities drawer. It would be quite a few years before all this curviness and rounding were thought of as symbolic of graceful movement, which brought such a flow closer to the idea of fine art. Even though in this case the accidental mutation just happens to not be a mutation after all, the whole technology-transforms-application argument still applies here. I'm almost sure “business” will be the last thing on people’s minds when they use this font today. One extreme example of that level of disconnect between origin and current application is shown here, with the so-called business penmanship strutting around in gloss and neon. Rolling Pen is another cup of mine that runneth over with alternates, swashes, ligatures, and other techy perks. To explore its full potential, please use it in a program that supports OpenType features for advanced typography. Enjoy the new Rolling Pen designed by Ale Paul with Neon’s visual poetry by Tomás García.

A sturdy workhorse with the grace of a gazelle, the FF Pastoral typeface family marries pure craftsmanship with rapturous excesses of form. With his fifteenth release under the FontFont brand, prolific French designer Xavier Dupré has filled a typographic toolbox with plentiful options ranging from a tender, feathery Thin to a robust, healthy Black. At a glance, FF Pastoral appears deceptively simple, particularly in the middle weights. That surface serenity is intentional and allows for easy reading and quick comprehension of short blocks of copy. Upon closer inspection, FF Pastoral is complex and nuanced, carrying a balanced tension in its forms. This plays particularly well in magazine spreads and corporate logos, where uniqueness is a virtue. In creating his latest design, Dupré drew inspiration from a tasteful mix of references, combining diverse elements with a deft hand. While its letter shapes were informed by humanist-geometric hybrid Gill Sans, FF Pastoral’s proportions have been optimized for contemporary typography. Slightly condensed but generously spaced, FF Pastoral features a tall x-height, open counters, and subtle, sprightly italics slanted at just 5°. Proportional oldstyle figures are the default in the family, with tabular and lining numbers and fractions accessible through OpenType features. Elegant details evocative of calligraphy judiciously pepper the FF Pastoral glyph set. The ‘e’ bears an oblique crossbar, while the right leg of the ‘K’ and the ‘R’ are insouciantly curved in both the upright and italic variants. Further flourishes appear throughout the italics, notably in the ‘T’ and the ‘Z’, the gloriously looped tail of the ‘G’, and an extraordinary ampersand. Sharp-eyed fans of Dupré’s work may feel like they’re in familiar territory, and they would be right. An early version of FF Pastoral sprang to life in 2017 as Malis, a family in four weights on the heavier side of the spectrum. Over time, Dupré refined his original design, expanding it with four lighter styles and including true italics for all. The lightest weights are ethereal, with exquisitely delicate strokes drawing the eye in and across a line of type. The most substantial styles are tremendous in their power, allowing text to make a deep impression in print or on screen. Fully fleshed out, FF Pastoral works sublimely in a vast array of text and display settings. Dupré sees his latest FontFont offering as a ‘cultural’ typeface, perfect for the pages of an oversized coffee-table book or business communications where warmth and informality will win the day. Born in Aubenas, France (1977), Xavier Dupré is a gifted user of type as well as an award-winning type designer and lettering artist. After training in graphic design in Paris, Dupré studied calligraphy and typography at the Scriptorium de Toulouse. Since releasing FF Parango in 2001, Dupré has published such FontFont classics as the FF Absara and FF Sanuk superfamilies, FF Megano, FF Tartine, and FF Yoga. A designer of Khmer fonts as well as Latin typefaces, Dupré splits his time between Europe and Asia.

Malabar is a type family for extensive text. Its design was developed with a nod toward newspapers. Malabar's characters are seriffed and of the Old Style genre. A strong diagonal axis is apparent within the curves. Sturdy serifs help strengthen the line of text in small point sizes, as well as define the overall feeling of the face. Malabar's x-height is very high, a deliberate choice that makes the most important parts of lowercase letters visibly larger in tiny settings. The height of the capital letters is also rather diminutive, allowing for better character fit, as well as eliminating a bit of clumsiness in German, which often includes quite a few uppercase letters. Diacritical marks and additional alphabetic forms required by many Western, Central, and Eastern European languages are naturally a part of the character set, including those needed in the Baltic states, for Romanian, and for Turkish. Malabar's accents are bold and direct, sitting well with their base glyphs. The family includes three weights, each with a companion Italic. Malabar Regular is equipped with small caps, and both it and Malabar Italic include oldstyle figures. All members of the family have both proportional and tabular-width lining figures, as well as special variants of certain punctuation marks vertically adjusted for all-caps text setting. Malabar is informed both by contemporary ideas of typeface design (sheared terminals, the wider-drawn s) as well as by 16th-century masters. Malabar Heavy and Heavy Italic are very loud; their blackness almost shouts out from the page. The Regular's wedge serifs become more slab-ish in nature as the letters' weight increases. Malabar Heavy and Heavy Italic are best relegated to headline use only. Malabar Bold and Bold Italic may be used for text emphasis, a job for which the Heavy is to dark. Malabar received a Certificate of Excellence in Type Design at the Type Directors Club of New York TDC2 competition in 2009.

“Nusaibah” is the first name of an early convert woman to Islam, and the first female to fight in defense of the Islamic religion. Her full name is Nusaibah bint Kaíab Al-Maziniyyah and she took part in the Battles of Uhud, Hunain, Yamama and the Treaty of Hudaibiyah with Islam’s prophet Muhammad (pbuh). Nusaibah is best known for her brave and heroic feat during the Battle of Uhud - fought on March 19, 625 - when she entered the battle carrying a sword and a shield to protect the prophet Muhammad (pbuh) from the arrows of the enemy, and she accordingly received several wounds while fighting and these wounds were not healed until the following year. The prophet Muhammad (pbuh) mentioned her distinct courage by saying that in whichever direction he turned in the battlefield, he could see her defending and protecting him. "Nusaibah" is a modern, geometric, and headline Arabic display typeface. The main trait of this typeface is the novel symmetrical design of its letters which renders it as one of the modern stylish typefaces used for headlines and titles. This is can be noticed in its letters such as “Theh”, “Jeem”, “Ain”, “Sheen”, and others. Moreover, “Nusaibah” font has a character set which supports Arabic, Persian, Urdu, and Latin letters and numerals with a limited range of specific Arabic and Latin ligatures. This font comes in two weights (i.e., regular and bold) with nearly 643 distinctive glyphs. Due to its geometric and linear design, “Nusaibah” typeface is appropriate for heading and titling in Arabic, Persian, and Urdu magazines, posters, and surfaces of different equipment. It is also elegantly suitable for signs, books’ covers, advertisement light boards, products’ and services’ names, and titles of flyers, pamphlets, novels, and books of children. “Nusaibah” typeface is one of the Arabic typefaces that has a novel and modern-day design which can be used in versatile graphic, typographic, and artistic works in different languages for diverse cultures.

Musical notes and letterforms, silences and white spaces, pentagrams and lines, music and writing have much in common and go beyond time, cultures, styles and locations. This new typeface emerges from the blend between the lyrics and the harmony, rhythm, femininity and luminosity of the traditional musical forms. It`s not about blues or rock, tango or salsa, instead it recovers the neoclassical characteristics of the current musical notation system and revitalize the essence of its signs. Taking care of both the function and the form, Elisetta has been specially designed for the writing of texts and musical sheets considering all its elements and communication needs. This source of inspiration also makes the font really good for extensive texts, since its design is based on situations that require high line performance, great readability and high aesthetic coherence. With 5 variables that vary in weight and style, the typography gathers asymmetry and organic nature in vertical structure, narrow horizontal proportions, high x height and extreme contrast between black and white. Elisetta Book has been created for the writing of clear texts and long lines composed in small sizes inside and outside the pentagram; Elisetta Italic intensifies the organic nature of the musical keys by offering softer signs, contextual alternates and initial caps; finally, Elisetta Display increase and emphasize the contrast between vertical stems and horizontal lines to highlight short texts and titles. For those who love music and for those who like romantic forms, this typography has a lot to offer: Elisetta is the best option to write light words with style, compose clear and rhythmic lines and read comfortable paragraphs with high performance. You can tell everybody this is your font, how wonderful life is while you're in the world! * This typeface was originally designed and supervised as «Elisa», the main project of the Master in Typography at University of Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Barbou was originally cut in 1925 by Monotype as a counterpart to Fournier, siblings that were different in design but both based on the work of Pierre-Simon Fournier. Whether by choice, accident or oversight, Fournier was preserved digitally, and Barbou was lost to history. Barbou was notably used by Stanley Morrison, in particular as the face of The Fleuron. I fell in love with Barbou when I saw it, and knew that I wanted to bring it to a new generation of designers and readers. This is a revival of Barbou, a faithful recutting with new weights, characters and many of the best features that modern font technology brings. Particular attention was paid to the original Monotype Barbou 178 specimen sheet. Originally only available in a single weight, Barbou has been recut with a variable weight, providing a large degree of flexibility between Regular and Bold. Barbou excels as a comfortable reading face for books, and the variable weight allows you to fine tune the darkness and texture of the page in a way never before possible. Barbou has a distinctive softness, and this revival of Barbou preserves much of the effect the medium of metal type had on the letterforms. This results in a subtly rounded yet defined type, elegant not worn, with the utmost attention and respect to the smallest of details. Barbou was originally cut with disparate x-heights for roman and italic, and this revival of Barbou features both the original italic, as well as a new italic redesigned at the same height as the roman. In Fournier’s time, roman and italic would not be mixed on the same line, but the type must change to meet the needs of a new generation. Barbou also features unique ligatures and alternates, old style numbers, small caps and a full Greek alphabet. Barbou is perfect for books and anywhere a comfortable reading face is required, and excels in flexibility.

The Englishman William Caslon punchcut many roman, italic, and non-Latin typefaces from 1720 until his death in 1766. At that time most types were being imported to England from Dutch sources, so Caslon was influenced by the characteristics of Dutch types. He did, however, achieve a level of craft that enabled his recognition as the first great English punchcutter. Caslon's roman became so popular that it was known as the script of kings, although on the other side of the political spectrum (and the ocean), the Americans used it for their Declaration of Independence in 1776. The original Caslon specimen sheets and punches have long provided a fertile source for the range of types bearing his name. Identifying characteristics of most Caslons include a cap A with a scooped-out apex; a cap C with two full serifs; and in the italic, a swashed lowercase v and w. Caslon's types have achieved legendary status among printers and typographers, and are considered safe, solid, and dependable. ITC Founder's Caslon® was created in 1998 by Justin Howes, an English designer who used the resources of the St. Bride Printing Library in London to thoroughly research William Caslon and his types. As was common in the eighteenth century, Caslon had punchcut several different sizes of his types, and each size had a slightly different design. Howes digitized every size of type that Caslon cast, keeping their peculiarities and irregularities and reproducing them as they appeared on the printed page. This family has the 12 point, 30 point, 42 point, and Poster styles, as well as a full set of bona fide ornaments. In keeping with the original Caslon types, none of the sizes have bold weights, the numerals are all old style figures, and a full set of ligatures (some with quaint forms) are included. ITC Founder's Caslon® is a remarkable revival in the true sense of the word, and works beautifully in graphic designs or texts that require an authentic English or historical flavor.

Padraig Nua is a font conceptualized and designed by Tony Fahy. It is a European Celtic font, contemporary to many languages, not just of Europe but of the world. It’s origin is influenced by events in Ireland in the 1960s when it was decided that the uncial letterform should not be used further in Irish schools for the Irish language—Gaelic—and that it should be replaced by the Roman letterform—the Cló Romhanach as it was called afterwards. This happened overnight without any apparent discussion. It probably had a lot to do with Ireland joining the EEC, as the EU was called then. It had a massive effect on the Irish language and culture, in that the distinguishing factor that gave the language it’s identity—the half uncial/uncial fonts that were in use in all school, government and society documentation and merchandise—were lost overnight. No one said how or why. It was just done. To this day, all documentation is bi-lingual in government and Gaelic is taught in schools and universities—and decreed so by the European Union—but the presentation for both languages is the Roman letterform. Throughout the world, there are millions of Irish Americans and Irish Canadians, Irish Europeans, Australian Irish, African Irish and many living in the Middle East and Asia—and this new font—Padraig Nua, will appeal to many of them, visually recalling their roots. No one had thought, in those days, of commissioning a design that might update the Gaelic language to a more contemporary appearance that would keep the cultural nature of it intact with a revised and updated font—at one with Europe, the US and the world. Tony Fahy designed Padraig Nua (New Patrick) to address the problem. It keeps an appearance that lends towards the Gaelic language but steers it in the direction of Roman fonts. Some characters reflect letterforms from the Irish/Gaelic manuscripts and uncial fonts.

What do you imagine the ideal casual invitation font would look like? It has to be cheerful, inviting, legible, creative, and loads of fun. But first and foremost, it has to look like real handwriting. Fonts seeming like real handwriting are always a major task, and although Canada Type already has plenty of fonts that solve the “looks like handwriting” issue in a variety of ways, we're once again raising the bar a little higher with this one. Birthday is a massive package that crosses the traditional font/handwriting solution of 2-letter ligatures and waltzes into the land of 3-letter combinations. Plenty of them, too! The complete Postscript and True Type versions of Birthday ship with no less than five separate fonts full of nothing but ligatures. And for even more realism, an alternates font is also included in the package, for a total of seven fonts of happy handwriting that can be used anywhere and everywhere personalization is of importance to a layout. For layout artists with advanced typography tools that take advantage of the power of OpenType, Birthday Pro is a wunderkind. All the individual letter alternates are accessible through the Stylistic Alternates feature, the 2-letter ligatures through the standard Ligatures feature, and the 3-letter ligatures via the Discretionary Ligatures feature (for the technically inclined: this includes a nice liga-to-dlig crossover, where the maximum number of possible ligated letters is automatically chosen at the push of a button). If you enjoy using OpenType, Birthday Pro is definitely for you. If on the other hand you like your fonts in Postsript or True Type, it is advisable to keep a character map handy while using Birthday. You will need it to take advantage of the many, many alternates and ligatures distributed over the fonts. The next time someone asks you for the perfect casual invitation font is, look no further. And as usually is with Canada Type, quality fonts are more affordable than ever.

The Englishman William Caslon punchcut many roman, italic, and non-Latin typefaces from 1720 until his death in 1766. At that time most types were being imported to England from Dutch sources, so Caslon was influenced by the characteristics of Dutch types. He did, however, achieve a level of craft that enabled his recognition as the first great English punchcutter. Caslon's roman became so popular that it was known as the script of kings, although on the other side of the political spectrum (and the ocean), the Americans used it for their Declaration of Independence in 1776. The original Caslon specimen sheets and punches have long provided a fertile source for the range of types bearing his name. Identifying characteristics of most Caslons include a cap A with a scooped-out apex; a cap C with two full serifs; and in the italic, a swashed lowercase v and w. Caslon's types have achieved legendary status among printers and typographers, and are considered safe, solid, and dependable. Caslon Antique was designed by Berne Nadall and brought out by the American type foundry Barnhart Bros & Spindler in 1896 to 1898. It doesn't bear any resemblance to Caslon, but has the quaint crudeness of what people imagine type looked like in the eighteenth century. Use Caslon Antique for that old-timey" effect in graphic designs. It looks best in large sizes for titles or initials. Caslon Black was designed by David Farey in the 1990s, and consists of one relatively narrow and very black weight. It is intended exclusively for titles or headlines. Caslon Black has a hint of the original Caslon lurking in the shadows of its shapes, but has taken on its own robust expression. Caslon Graphique was designed by Leslie Usherwood in the 1980s. The basic forms are close to the original Caslon, but this version has wide heavy forms with very high contrast between the hairline thin strokes and the fat main strokes. This precisely drawn and stylized Caslon has verve; it's ideal for headlines or initials in large sizes."

A Venetian serif in 6 styles The Apolline typeface family was created by Jean François Porchez as a means to study the transition from Renaissance writing into the first printing types. Rather than sticking to the method commonly used these days for the creation of revivals of Jenson or Bembo types, it seemed more interesting to try and get in the same mindset as those exceptional designers during this pivotal period in the history of typography. Thus Apolline is an exploration of the design methods used by people like Nicolas Jenson and his contemporaries for adapting handwriting with its multiple occurrences (a, a, a, b, b, b…) into single, unique signs (a, b…). Initially Jean François made drawings modelled after his own calligraphy. They were done at a very small size on tracing paper (2 cm high for the capitals) to preserve the irregularity of human handwriting. Besides emphasising the horizontal parts of the letter forms, the serifs were designed asymmetrically to reinforce the rhythm of the writing. The final drawings were produced at a large size (10 cm high for the capitals) to allow for subtle optimisation of specific details. The very narrow and fluid Apolline italic Influenced by various concepts for an ideal italic by Van Krimpen, Gill, etc. Apolline italic was designed at 8° degrees. Although the structure of the letterforms were informed by chancery scripts, the italic has full serifs like the roman. Very narrow and fluid, its unique design creates a good contrast when used in combination with its upright counterparts. Thanks to the presence of the serifs similar to roman typefaces it sets very neatly in large sizes. The next step was digitising the drawings with Ikarus (the pre-Bézier-curves era) to create the final roman and italic fonts. Two years later, when the family was expanded to six series the same method was used, this time with Fontographer. This was necessary for correcting a few problems caused by the conversion to Bézier outlines, and to add intermediate weights. Before the advent of feature-rich OpenType, quality type families consisted of several separate fonts for each weight to provide users with various sets of numerals, an extended ligature set and alternates, ornaments, and so on. Introducing Apolline Morisawa Awards 1993

TT Nooks useful links: Specimen | Graphic presentation | Customization options TT Nooks is an experimental font family that includes a high contrast serif, TT Nooks, and an upright italic, TT Nooks Script. Despite the difference in style, both subfamilies get along well, which is partially thanks to their similar proportions. Each of the subfamilies includes 4 weights: Light, Regular, Bold and Black. The main subfamily is TT Nooks—a stylish high-contrast serif with a light touch of self-centeredness. If TT Nooks were a person, it would be an elegant lady with an independent and firm personality. In the original sketches of TT Nooks there were traces of a broad pen, but in the course of further evolution the typeface moved away from this style, retaining only the high contrast of strokes. In addition, in the process of design searches TT Nooks has obtained a touch of geometricity. The serifs in TT Nooks stand out especially visibly thanks to their geometric shape that resembles slippers. In addition to their peculiarity, such serifs add stability to the font and allow better compensation of the black and white ratio within the letters. TT Nooks has small capitals for Latin and Cyrillic alphabets, as well as a set of stylistic alternates (including some figures) that makes the typeface a bit more geometric. In addition, we have drawn more than 25 ligatures, including ligatures for capital letters, slashed zero and many other useful OpenType features. TT Nooks Script is a complementary family designed to harmoniously extend the main family and expand its scope. The forms of the characters in bold and light fonts of TT Nooks Script are quite different. For example, Black & Bold have high contrast strokes and an open aperture, and in Regular & Light the aperture of the characters is closed. TT Nooks also has small capitals for Latin and Cyrillic alphabets, ligatures, oldstyle figures and other OpenType features. In light faces, TT Nooks Script is more humanist and has artifacts inherent to the continuous movement of a flat pen. In bold faces, TT Nooks Script has a very dense and dynamic typing rhythm, and the shape of the letters begins to geometrize. We had had the difficult task of preserving the continuity of forms between bold and light faces, and we have managed to solve it thanks to the found rhythm, which united different fonts, and proximate stylistic solutions.

Duddy is a “friendly” sans-serif typography designed by Eleonora Lana and the Letritas team. The shape of Duddy was created based on sketches that looked after carrying the concept of kindness as far as possible, keeping always in mind the readability and functionality of the font. In the stage of brainstorming, the team started listing things that were friendly to the touch or sight, such as a candy gum, or marshmallow, to become acquainted with the intended goal. Although slowly, as the letters were being created, the objects associated with the forms were not satisfactory, since when forming words a special personality of its own appeared. By reconceptualizing everything, the personality of the letter the team wanted to work with had to be redefined. Thus it went from "caramel" to "teddy bear", from "teddy bear" to "puppy" and from "puppy" to "dolphin". And Duddy is the perfect name for a dolphin. Duddy was a sound idea: friendly, intelligent, social. Once the concept was nailed, the design of graceful and “soft” shapes started. Almost chewable, almost huggable, as if composing words was a game. Duddy has a slanted version with "real italics". These italics are slightly more condensed than the regular version, in order to give it a different text texture. The typeface has 9 weights, ranging from “thin” to “heavy”, and two versions: "regular" and "italic". Its 18 files contain 729 characters with ligatures, alternates, small caps, oldstyle and tabular numbers, fractions, case sensitive, and unicase figures. It supports 219 Latin-based languages, spanning through 212 different countries. Duddy supports this languages: Abenaki, Afaan Oromo, Afar, Afrikaans, Albanian, Alsatian, Amis, Anuta, Aragonese, Aranese, Aromanian, Arrernte, Arvanitic (Latin), Asturian, Atayal, Aymara, Bashkir (Latin), Basque, Bemba, Bikol, Bislama, Bosnian, Breton, Cape Verdean Creole, Catalan, Cebuano, Chamorro, Chavacano, Chichewa, Chickasaw, Cimbrian, Cofán, Corsican Creek,Crimean Tatar (Latin),Croatian, Czech, Dawan, Delaware, Dholuo, Drehu, Dutch, English, Estonian, Faroese, Fijian Filipino, Finnish, Folkspraak, French, Frisian, Friulian, Gagauz (Latin), Galician, Ganda, Genoese, German, Gikuyu, Gooniyandi, Greenlandic (Kalaallisut)Guadeloupean, Creole, Gwich’in, Haitian, Creole, Hän, Hawaiian, Hiligaynon, Hopi, Hotc?k (Latin), Hungarian, Icelandic, Ido, IgboI, locano, Indonesian, Interglossa, Interlingua, Irish, Istro-Romanian, Italian, Jamaican, Javanese (Latin), Jèrriais, Kala Lagaw Ya, Kapampangan (Latin), Kaqchikel, Karakalpak (Latin), Karelian (Latin), Kashubian, Kikongo, Kinyarwanda, Kiribati, Kirundi, Klingon, Ladin, Latin, Latino sine Flexione, Latvian, Lithuanian, Lojban, Lombard, Low Saxon, Luxembourgish, Maasai, Makhuwa, Malay, Maltese, Manx, M?ori, Marquesan, Megleno-Romanian, Meriam Mir, Mirandese, Mohawk, Moldovan, Montagnais, Montenegrin, Murrinh-Patha, Nagamese Creole, Ndebele, Neapolitan, Ngiyambaa, Niuean, Noongar, Norwegian, Novial, Occidental, Occitan, Old Icelandic, Old Norse, Oshiwambo, Ossetian (Latin), Palauan, Papiamento, Piedmontese, Polish, Portuguese, Potawatomi, Q’eqchi’, Quechua, Rarotongan, Romanian, Romansh, Rotokas, Sami (Inari Sami), Sami (Lule Sami), Sami (Northern Sami), Sami (Southern Sami), Samoan, Sango, Saramaccan, Sardinian, Scottish Gaelic, Serbian (Latin), Seri, Seychellois Creole, Shawnee, Shona, Sicilian, Silesian, Slovak, Slovenian, Slovio (Latin), Somali, Sorbian (Lower Sorbian), Sorbian (Upper Sorbian), Sotho (Northern), Sotho (Southern), Spanish, Sranan, Sundanese (Latin), Swahili, Swazi, Swedish, Tagalog, Tahitian, Tetum, Tok Pisin, Tokelauan, Tongan, Tshiluba, Tsonga, Tswana, Tumbuka, Turkish, Turkmen (Latin), Tuvaluan, Tzotzil, Uzbek (Latin), Venetian, Vepsian, Volapük, Võro, Wallisian, Walloon, Waray-Waray, Warlpiri, Wayuu, Welsh, Wik-Mungkan, Wiradjuri, Wolof, Xavante, Xhosa, Yapese, Yindjibarndi, Zapotec, Zulu, Zuni.