To design a text typeface "at the top with, at the bottom without" serifs was an idea which crossed my mind at the end of the sixties. I started from the fact that what one reads in the Latin alphabet is mainly the upper half of the letters, where good distinguishableness of the individual signs, and therefore, also good legibility, is aided by serifs. The first tests of the design, by which I checked up whether the basic principle could be used also for the then current technology of setting - for double-sign matrices -, were carried out in 1970. During the first half of the seventies I created first the basic design, then also the slanted Roman and the medium types. These drawings were not very successful. My greatest concern during this initial phase was the upper case A. I had to design it in such a way that the basic principle should be adhered to and the new alphabet, at the same time, should not look too complicated. The necessary prerequisite for a design of a new alphabet for double-sign matrices, i.e. to draw each letter of all the three fonts to the same width, did not agree with this typeface. What came to the greatest harm were the two styles used for emphasis: the italics even more than the medium type. That is why I fundamentally remodelled the basic design in 1980. In the course of this work I tried to forget about the previous technological limitations and to respect only the requirements then placed on typefaces intended for photosetting. As a matter of fact, this was not very difficult; this typeface was from the very beginning conceived in such a way as to have a large x-height of lower-case letters and upper serifs that could be joined without any problems in condensed setting. I gave much more thought to the proportional relations of the individual letters, the continuity of their outer and inner silhouettes, than to the requirements of their production. The greatest number of problems arose in the colour balancing of the individual signs, as it was necessary to achieve that the upper half of each letter should have a visual counterbalance in its lower, simpler half. Specifically, this meant to find the correct shape and degree of thickening of the lower parts of the letters. These had to counterbalance the upper parts of the letters emphasized by serifs, yet they should not look too romantic or decorative, for otherwise the typeface might lose its sober character. Also the shape, length and thickness of the upper serifs had to be resolved differently than in the previous design. In the seventies and at the beginning of the eighties a typeface conceived in this way, let alone one intended for setting of common texts in magazines and books, was to all intents and purposes an experiment with an uncertain end. At this time, before typographic postmodernism, it was not the custom to abandon in such typefaces the clear-cut formal categories, let alone to attempt to combine the serif and sans serif principles in a single design. I had already designed the basic, starting, alphabets of lower case and upper case letters with the intention to derive further styles from them, differing in colour and proportions. These fonts were not to serve merely for emphasis in the context of the basic design, but were to function, especially the bold versions, also as independent display alphabets. At this stage of my work it was, for a change, the upper case L that presented the greatest problem. Its lower left part had to counterbalance the symmetrical two-sided serif in the upper half of the letter. The ITC Company submitted this design to text tests, which, in their view, were successful. The director of this company Aaron Burns then invited me to add further styles, in order to create an entire, extensive typeface family. At that time, without the possibility to use a computer and given my other considerable workload, this was a task I could not manage. I tried to come back to this, by then already very large project, several times, but every time some other, at the moment very urgent, work diverted me from it. At the beginning of the nineties several alphabets appeared which were based on the same principle. It seemed to me that to continue working on my semi-finished designs was pointless. They were, therefore, abandoned until the spring of 2005, when František Štorm digitalized the basic design. František gave the typeface the working title Areplos and this name stuck. Then he made me add small capitals and the entire bold type, inducing me at the same time to consider what to do with the italics in order that they might be at least a little italic in character, and not merely slanted Roman alphabets, as was my original intention. In the course of the subsequent summer holidays, when the weather was bad, we met in his little cottage in South Bohemia, between two ponds, and resuscitated this more than twenty-five-years-old typeface. It was like this: We were drinking good tea, František worked on the computer, added accents and some remaining signs, inclined and interpolated, while I was looking over his shoulder. There is hardly any typeface that originated in a more harmonious setting. Solpera, summer 2005 I first encountered this typeface at the exhibition of Contemporary Czech Type Design in 1982. It was there, in the Portheim Summer Palace in Prague, that I, at the age of sixteen, decided to become a typographer. Having no knowledge about the technologies, the rules of construction of an alphabet or about cultural connections, I perceived Jan Solpera's typeface as the acme of excellence. Now, many years after, replete with experience of revitalization of typefaces of both living and deceased Czech type designers, I am able to compare their differing approaches. Jan Solpera put up a fight against the digital technology and exerted creative pressure to counteract my rather loose approach. Jan prepared dozens of fresh pencil drawings on thin sketching paper in which he elaborated in detail all the style-creating elements of the alphabet. I can say with full responsibility that I have never worked on anything as meticulous as the design of the Areplos typeface. I did not invent this name; it is the name of Jan Solpera's miniature publishing house, in which he issued for example an enchanting series of memoirs of a certain shopkeeper of Jindrichuv Hradec. The idea that the publishing house and the typeface might have the same name crossed my mind instinctively as a symbol of the original designation of Areplos - to serve for text setting. What you can see here originated in Trebon and in a cottage outside the village of Domanín - I even wanted to rename my firm to The Trebon Type Foundry. When mists enfold the pond and gloom pervades one's soul, the so-called typographic weather sets in - the time to sit, peer at the monitor and click the mouse, as also our students who were present would attest. Areplos is reminiscent of the essential inspirational period of a whole generation of Czech type designers - of the seventies and eighties, which were, however, at the same time the incubation period of my generation. I believe that this typeface will be received favourably, for it represents the better aspect of the eighties. Today, at the time when the infection by ITC typefaces has not been quite cured yet, it does absolutely no harm to remind ourselves of the high quality and timeless typefaces designed then in this country.In technical terms, this family consists of two times four OpenType designs, with five types of figures, ligatures and small capitals as well as an extensive assortment of both eastern and western diacritics. I can see as a basic text typeface of smaller periodicals and informative job-prints, a typeface usable for posters and programmes of various events, but also for corporate identity. Štorm, summer 2005

Bobbi Bee won't stop popping her bubblegum, even though that's not very ladylike.

 Bobbi Bee is very proud of all of her 361 numbers, letters and alternates - all of which are chock full of summer sunshine and life. The font comes in a single weight (because she's perfect just the way she is.) She's cut out for a very special book title, logotype, or love letter. Keep Bobbi's hand firmly in yours in shopping malls, as she tends to get distracted and wander, and though it's hard, always remember to tell her how smart she is, as well as how beautiful.

Jesus Saves is a font based on the familiar old logo that has “JESUS” hidden within a maze-like set of multi-branched vertical bars. The characters appear to be an alien, cryptic language at first sight, perhaps even a Japanese, Chinese, or Korean language, thanks to the unusual figures created by the combinations of various letters. It is a teaser for the eyes, as well as a visual feast of De Stijl-type art. It is an attention-getting font that is cool to look at, an eye puzzle that is enticing to decipher. It’s a great font to use for striking logos (see Gallery Images) by the judicious use of ligatures, where in word settings ligatures may be used at the beginnings of words, the middle or the endings of words. Jesus Heals is the missing spaces from the Jesus Saves font, sort of like a doughnut hole font! If you use this font to fill in the spaces in the Jesus Saves font, it becomes whole, or healed, thus the name. Jesus Lives is a raised block/3D or three dimensional version of Jesus Heals. For color combinations in apps that support layering, Jesus Lives synchs and has perfect kerning register with Jesus Heals, as Jesus Heals has with Jesus Saves. The digitization was done by fontmeister John Bomparte.

Wakerobin takes its charming swagger from the hand-painted billboard, poster and signage lettering of the mid-19th century. These showy styles did everything they could to stand out from the background cacophony of advertising, with signwriters using sharp and high contrast serif letters, squared block shapes, or art nouveau forms to grab the attention of passersby. Wakerobin embraces the spirit of these letterforms, bringing these various styles together in one typeface - as if users had their own sign painter on hand. Just as lettering artists had to adapt to a variety of sizes - from wide streetcar lettering to compressed forms that squeezed into narrow Victorian windows - the variable version of Wakerobin scales up and down in width to fit whatever environment the user’s working in. The static fonts come in three widths and five weights. As well as its adaptability, Wakerobin is bursting with vintage flavour, making it hard to ignore. Its distinctive, spiky serifs would be right at home on food and drinks packaging, as well as shop windows, adverts, and any other place that calls for some typographic showmanship. It performs particularly well in busy environments, or anywhere with a lot of visual noise - just as its historic predecessors did. And while Wakerobin is first and foremost a display typeface, it’s surprisingly elegant when used at text size, or in the lighter end of the weight spectrum.

Leftfield - stylish vintage font collection. Leftfield collection includes following: •Leftfield Brush -a bold baseball style script with Clean and Rough version •Leftfield Swoosh -a set of swooshes designed to go with Leftfield Brush. Clean and Rough version. •Leftfield Sans -a sturdy all caps sans serif with Regular and Bold weight and Clean and Rough version of both •Leftfield Serif -a sturdy all caps serif with Regular and Bold weight and Clean and Rough version of both Leftfield Brush is a bold and strong sports team style vintage connected script. It’s great for any kind of display use from impressive logos to packaging and headlines. Brush is equipped with automatic Contextual Alternates that keep the connections smooth. In addition there is Swash, Titling and Stylistic alternates for standard characters. Try combining Leftfield Swoosh to make stunning compositions. Leftfield Sans and Serif work great as themselves, they make striking word blocks and they are designed to go with the Brush. Try Leftfield Serif in large sizes to make the best out of the subtle serif’s. Leftfield Rough versions simulate a printed version of the font for authentic vintage look. They’re otherwise the same font but with a rugged outline and print texture inside the characters. Leftfield has a wide language support including West European, Central European, Baltic, Turkish and Romanian character sets.

Add some old fashioned charm to your designs with the distressed alphabets in the new BLINCtype Letterpress Fontpak, a brand new font collection containing 8 letterpress-inspired fonts from the creative minds at Blinc Publishing in St. Paul, MN. The BLINCtype Letterpress Fontpak contains a handy concise assortment of old-school display fonts. From the old Western "WANTED" poster look of Prospect Modern, to the no-nonsense all-caps classic Goshen and its lowercase companion Gideon, these fonts are inspired by wooden letterpress blocks and other archaic technologies. It's like having your own letterpress print studio! Except it's all instantly downloadable right now as easy-to-use fonts! Designers love working with the Cheltenham-esque Gomorrah and its grittier, grungier counterpart, Sodom. The bouncy Golgotha has a rough and tumble readiness that exudes a hand-made charm, while Hamilton Offset has a cryptic, experimental look and feel that gives the impression of double-vision. You also get the newest member of the Blinc font family, Player Piano, which was based on punch-cut stencil letters on an old player piano paper song roll. Purchase the BLINCtype Letterpress Fontpak today and you'll be able to download and start using these 8 great fonts right away! The BLINCtype Letterpress Fontpak contains the fonts: Gideon, Golgotha, Gomorrah, Goshen, Hamilton Offset, Player Piano, Prospect Modern and Sodom.

Anna Clara can be dressed up or down, as fancy as you wanna be. On its own, it’s an organic script, with the fine hairlines, thick swells, and slightly undulating baseline found in modern casual calligraphy. Add swashes, and Anna Clara becomes a bit more playful and festive. Each capital letter has a flourished alternate—great for displays or headings, or to add emphasis to a particular section of text. For OpenType-aware software users, Anna Clara also features ten pairs of swashes that can be added to the beginning or end of any lowercase letter, for a custom flourished look. Illustrator and InDesign users can access extra swashes and banners by using the glyph panel. Photoshop users: These characters can be accessed via the “Ornaments” feature in your OpenType panel - try non-numeric punctuation marks and accents for swashes. For banners, type catchwords followed by an asterisk. “Asterisk asterisk” will produce a blank banner that you can use to create your own. Included catchwords are “and”, “at”, “by”, “for”, “from”, “of”, “the”, “to”, “with”, "l'", “le”, “la”, “el”, “et”, and “y”. Roman numerals can be used in the “Ornaments” feature by typing their respective keyboard characters “I”, “II”, “III”, etc. - followed by an asterisk. An ampersand (&) followed by one or two asterisks produces two special “and” characters.

Wakerobin takes its charming swagger from the hand-painted billboard, poster and signage lettering of the mid-19th century. These showy styles did everything they could to stand out from the background cacophony of advertising, with signwriters using sharp and high contrast serif letters, squared block shapes, or art nouveau forms to grab the attention of passersby. Wakerobin embraces the spirit of these letterforms, bringing these various styles together in one typeface - as if users had their own sign painter on hand. Just as lettering artists had to adapt to a variety of sizes - from wide streetcar lettering to compressed forms that squeezed into narrow Victorian windows - the variable version of Wakerobin scales up and down in width to fit whatever environment the user’s working in. The static fonts come in three widths and five weights. As well as its adaptability, Wakerobin is bursting with vintage flavour, making it hard to ignore. Its distinctive, spiky serifs would be right at home on food and drinks packaging, as well as shop windows, adverts, and any other place that calls for some typographic showmanship. It performs particularly well in busy environments, or anywhere with a lot of visual noise - just as its historic predecessors did. And while Wakerobin is first and foremost a display typeface, it’s surprisingly elegant when used at text size, or in the lighter end of the weight spectrum.