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.

Jan Tschichold designed Sabon in 1964, and it was produced jointly by three foundries: D. Stempel AG, Linotype and Monotype. This was in response to a request from German master printers to make a font family that was the same design for the three metal type technologies of the time: foundry type for hand composition, linecasting, and single-type machine composition. Tschichold turned to the sixteenth century for inspiration, and the story has a complicated family thread that connects his Sabon design to the Garamond lineage. Jakob Sabon, who the type is named for, was a student of the great French punchcutter Claude Garamond. He completed a set of his teacher's punches after Garamond's death in 1561. Sabon became owner of a German foundry when he married the granddaughter of the Frankfurt printer, Christian Egenolff. Sabon died in 1580, and his widow married Konrad Berner, who took over the foundry. Tschichold loosely based his design on types from the 1592 specimen sheet issued by the Egenolff-Berner foundry: a 14-point roman attributed to Claude Garamond, and an italic attributed to Robert Granjon. Sabon was the typeface name chosen for this twentieth century revival and joint venture in production; this name avoided confusion with other fonts connected with the names of Garamond and Granjon. Classic, elegant, and extremely legible, Sabon is one of the most beautiful Garamond variations. Always a good choice for book typography, the Sabon family is also particularly good for text and headlines in magazines, advertisements, documentation, business reports, corporate design, multimedia, and correspondence. Sabon combines well with: Sans serif fonts such as Frutiger, Syntax. Slab serif fonts such as PMN Caecilia, Clairvaux. Fun fonts such as Grafilone, Animalia, Araby Rafique. See also the new revised version Sabon Next from the Platinum Collection."

Mario De Libero designed Swanstone while investigating XIX Century Old Style typefaces. Designs like Theophile Beaudoire’s Romana (1860) or Miller & Richard’s Modernized Old Style, that re-imagined the classical “Venetian” letterforms adding flared serifs and early Art Nouveau influences. In Italy, one of these fonts was Raffaello Bertieri’s Raffaello, which De Libero used as the starting point of his research in a contemporary retelling of these exuberant and sexily unsettling letterforms.

Valecia is a calligraphic script font that presents exquisite vogue characters, a form of classic ornamental copper script infused with a modern touch. It has been intricately designed with 715 glyphs to convey a stylish and elegant flair. Valecia possesses an alluring quality characterized by refinement, cleanliness, femininity, sensuality, glamour, simplicity, and remarkable readability due to the abundance of lavish letter connections.

This font family is based on the letterforms of a fin-de-siècle sans serifs, and comes in two versions - Roman and Shadow.

Ciseaux was inspired and is dedicated to the art of paper cutting. Early paper cutting artists were often royalty, but it soon became a folk art practiced by commoners whose cutouts decorated their homes. By the seventeenth century it had spread throughout the world. The Japanese called it Mon-kiri, the German's Scherenschnitte and Turkey even boasted a guild devoted to the art form. In Poland the designs were traditionally symmetrical and often used layers of colors to form pictorial collages. When Russian invaders confiscated scissors, villagers were found to cut their intricate designs with sheep shears! The art form later developed into cutting out elaborate designs of nature scenes and people, celebrating special occasions and even decorating legal documents. Ciseaux letterforms mimic paper cutting art in its shapes with a rather loose and almost joyous rhythm. The overall effect is somewhat earthy and natural yet it has an element of sophistication that cannot be ignored. Just like paper cutting, Ciseaux can be used for special occasions like invitations, brochures, identities, restaurant menus, and if you dare, some awesome looking paper graffiti. Available in TT, PS and Opentype for Mac and Windows.

Agafia handwriting script is based on the hand of Agafia Karpovna Lykova - the last member of the Old Believer family lived like an hermit in the Khakass taiga. The face is developed for the new book on the history of Lykov's family by Lev Cherepanov. It's built in OpenType format with a contextual substitution of letterforms and specific ligatures. Designer - Gennady Fridman. Released by ParaType in 2009.

In the 1670s, Christopher Plantin was the largest publisher of his day. Hendrik van den Keere cut for him an astounding series of romans. As Stanley Morison once observed, such types adopted features of Flemish blackletter to strengthen elegant French romans. Large on the body, strong in color, economical in fit, widely (if anonymously) distributed, they established effective standards for all that followed; FB 1997–2000