A meeting of Byzantine and Art Deco forms, Aphasia began as a series of handwritten captions to accompany drawings in the early 1990s. The drawings were abandoned to allow the lettering to become the real composition. Playfully set in blocks of verse with each line shaped through free-association, the only visual rule was that all the lines of capitals be of equal length. The challenge of the game required extensive abbreviations, ligatures, small caps, and superiors. With the advent of Letraset’s FontStudio program, the project moved into the typographic realm.

The Swiss typewriters were famous for their unique precision. As complex digitalizations and macro shots were a start for the inspiration and studies, each character has been carefully re-crafted from the ultra high def scans of the printouts made on a special bleed-proof paper. Today’s characters such as @, euro sign and most of accents have been crafted according the original alphabet design. The idea was to digitize and keep a saving of the original typewriter including all its functions (e.g. underlining key) . It’s surprisingly very legible at small sizes. Thanks to an x-height tighter and more spaced, a glyph design less detailed and more neutral/simple than other fonts found on american or italian typewriters. The final artwork can be set at very large sizes due to the highly detailed glyph design. Swissa Piccola Regular is loaded with more than 150 glyphs created with the typewriter to avoid letter repetition in a word. This OpenType feature can be accessed through the 'discretionary ligatures' option. Plus it comes with two stylistic sets : one with an original underlining feature, another with a slashed-x feature. In which all characters are unique and also have been originally typed with the typewriter. It contains more 600 glyphs in total. The two features are separated in another two fonts (Swissa Piccola Slashed x and Underlined) in case a non OT-savvy app is used. If you wish to obtain exactly the same prints as the original Swissa Piccola typewriter, you should set your font at 11.3 pt and 19.5 pt of line spacing. The Swissa Piccola font was originally offered in a dedicated limited edition packaging.

An Swish is a unique handwritten font. Crafted in ink to become digital. Initially it was created as a kind of textural filling of spaces - walls, posters, clothes. In the process of creation, it became clear that it can solve different problems. It can become a logo or a great solution for identity. With the apparent density of the set and the negligence of the forms, it remains quite readable. It can work with different spacing options. There is a feature in the font that changes the second character when two identical letters meet. Also added icons (lightning, heart, eye) that can decorate your projects.

Auriol font was the basis for the lettering used by Hector Guimard for the entrance signs to the Paris Metro. Bitstream’s Freeform 721 with his brush stroke look, is well-suited to display settings.

Rian Hughes’ 15th collection of fonts, “112 Hours”, is entirely dedicated to numbers. Culled from a myriad of sources – clock faces, tickets, watches house numbers – it is an eclectic and wide-ranging set. Each font contains only numerals and related punctuation – no letters. A new book has been designed by Hughes to show the collection, and includes sample settings, complete character sets, source material and an introduction. This is available print-to-order on Blurb in paperback and hardback: http://www.blurb.com/b/5539073-112-hours-hardback http://www.blurb.com/b/5539045-112-hours-paperback From the introduction: The idea for this, the fifteenth Device Fonts collection, began when I came across an online auction site dedicated to antique clocks. I was mesmerized by the inventive and bizarre numerals on their faces. Shorn of the need to extend the internal logic of a typeface through the entire alphabet, the designers of these treasures were free to explore interesting forms and shapes that would otherwise be denied them. Given this horological starting point, I decided to produce 12 fonts, each featuring just the numbers from 1 to 12 and, where appropriate, a small set of supporting characters — in most cases, the international currency symbols, a colon, full stop, hyphen, slash and the number sign. 10, 11 and 12 I opted to place in the capital A, B and C slots. Each font is shown in its entirety here. I soon passed 12, so the next logical finish line was 24. Like a typographic Jack Bauer, I soon passed that too -— the more I researched, the more I came across interesting and unique examples that insisted on digitization, or that inspired me to explore some new design direction. The sources broadened to include tickets, numbering machines, ecclesiastical brass plates and more. Though not derived from clock faces, I opted to keep the 1-12 conceit for consistency, which allowed me to design what are effectively numerical ligatures. I finally concluded one hundred fonts over my original estimate at 112. Even though it’s not strictly divisible by 12, the number has a certain symmetry, I reasoned, and was as good a place as any to round off the project. An overview reveals a broad range that nonetheless fall into several loose categories. There are fairly faithful revivals, only diverging from their source material to even out inconsistencies and regularize weighting or shape to make them more functional in a modern context; designs taken directly from the source material, preserving all the inky grit and character of the original; designs that are loosely based on a couple of numbers from the source material but diverge dramatically for reasons of improved aesthetics or mere whim; and entirely new designs with no historical precedent. As projects like this evolve (and, to be frank, get out of hand), they can take you in directions and to places you didn’t envisage when you first set out. Along the way, I corresponded with experts in railway livery, and now know about the history of cab side and smokebox plates; I travelled to the Musée de l’imprimerie in Nantes, France, to examine their numbering machines; I photographed house numbers in Paris, Florence, Venice, Amsterdam and here in the UK; I delved into my collection of tickets, passes and printed ephemera; I visited the Science Museum in London, the Royal Signals Museum in Dorset, and the Museum of London to source early adding machines, war-time telegraphs and post-war ration books. I photographed watches at Worthing Museum, weighing scales large enough to stand on in a Brick Lane pub, and digital station clocks at Baker Street tube station. I went to the London Under-ground archive at Acton Depot, where you can see all manner of vintage enamel signs and woodblock type; I photographed grocer’s stalls in East End street markets; I dug out old clocks I recalled from childhood at my parents’ place, examined old manual typewriters and cash tills, and crouched down with a torch to look at my electricity meter. I found out that Jane Fonda kicked a policeman, and unusually for someone with a lifelong aversion to sport, picked up some horse-racing jargon. I share some of that research here. In many cases I have not been slavish about staying close to the source material if I didn’t think it warranted it, so a close comparison will reveal differences. These changes could be made for aesthetic reasons, functional reasons (the originals didn’t need to be set in any combination, for example), or just reasons of personal taste. Where reference for the additional characters were not available — which was always the case with fonts derived from clock faces — I have endeavored to design them in a sympathetic style. I may even extend some of these to the full alphabet in the future. If I do, these number-only fonts could be considered as experimental design exercises: forays into form to probe interesting new graphic possibilities.

Chianti was designed at Bitstream by senior designer Dennis Pasternak in 1991 and initially released in 1995. The intent behind the design was to provide a humanist sanserif of high readability at a wide range of sizes and weights. Humanist sanserifs (others that fall into this category are Linotype’s Frutiger and Optima, and Monotype’s Gill Sans) are an attempt to improve the readability of sanserifs by applying classical roman structure to the letterforms. To enhance its versatility, Mr. Pasternak designed a wide variety of alternate characters, rare ligatures, ornaments and swashes. Chianti is a friendly sanserif useful for a broad range of typographic needs.

British designer Thomas Oldfield, who brought you Hombre BT and Reaper, has scratched out another typeface, this one called Jerk Chicken BT. I guess, if you can imagine a quill tip pen somehow wedged 'tween a scrawny chicken's toes, you'd end up with the scrawl, blobs, blotches and bleeds that would make most type designers run for the hen house. Not Thomas; he saw only commercial potential. So lay down some scratch and order up some Jerk Chicken BT. Hey, while you're at it, why not extend the license to a dozen users? Available as an OpenType font, Jerk Chicken BT includes of a couple of ornaments, well parts, namely a drumstick and a whole fryer, and its extended character set supports Baltic and Central European languages.

Adrian Frutiger’s distinguished and successful 1966 design for the European Computer Manufacturers’ Association improving readability of letters for both machines and humans. OCR-B is replacing OCR-A.

This freeform exercise in typographic design echoes the looseness of early 1960's advertising. Brian breaks almost every typographic rule we can think of — but so what? The bold letterforms of Big Limbo are anything but stuck!

Ray Cruz releases another typeface family, this time inspired by 1970's pop culture. Fat Albert Regular, Outline and Shadow are bold poster types that evoke the fun and funk of an era gone by. Go on bro, get Fat Albert and get down.

Bitstream developed Ang Thong for the Microsoft Windows operating system. The font is encoded with a Microsoft defined Thai character set, Thai Code Page 874. The font includes Thai glyphs and Latin glyphs from Dutch 801. Ang Thong (basin of gold) is a province in central Thailand which consists mostly of flat agricultural land used for growing rice.

The unusual name for this Deco style typeface comes from the playful and pun-laden 1960s Rocky & Bullwinkle TV show. It is the name of the newspaper in the mythical town of Frostbite Falls, MN, home of the two cartoon stars. The name, Picayune Intelligence, literally means “pretty dumb”, but we don’t think that describes Nick’s competent design at all. It is comforting to know that someone is still watching quality television.

A collaboration based on lettering by Vermont illustrator/artist Mary Trafton and brought to typographic life by Charles Gibbons, the Full Moon Suite is a collection of casual typefaces called after folk names for full moons. A winner of the TDC2 2003 Type Design Competition. Family members include: Falling Leaves, Rustling Branches, Black Cherry, Black Cherry Alternate, Black Cherry Ligatures and Black Cherry Doubles.

Possessing a distinctive Russian appearance, Chervonec Uzkj, or Chervonec Condensed, is a hybrid semi-serif designed by Russian designer Oleg Karpinsky. The typeface family includes three weights with drawn italics.

The standard American sanserif of the first two thirds of the twentieth century, prepared for ATF by Morris Fuller Benton in 1908 under the name News Gothic, with a matching lightface known as Lightline Gothic. Linotype’s Trade Gothic follows News Gothic except for its widely-spaced straight-sided boldface based on ATF Alternate Gothic No.3. Linotype matches News Gothic Bold, a boldface version that originated at Intertype, with Trade Gothic Bold No.2. Ludlow Record Gothic follows News Gothic more loosely. News Gothic BT™ font field guide including best practices, font pairings and alternatives.

A set of capitals popular with American engravers and typefounders through the last third of the nineteenth century, shown under this name by ATF in 1903.

Mr. Gogoll's successful revival of Arno Drescher’s Super Grotesk was awarded the 1999 Kurt Christians Award. The Drescher Grotesk family consists of seven roman weights, including a version designed for use at small point sizes. Drescher Grotesk is a classic German geometric design, complete with the original “angled” brackets.

Artane, Tony Fahy's first typeface for Bitstream Inc., has a specific philosophy at the core of it's creation. He decided he would try to create a Roman sans that would have the elegance of a serifed italic, such as Stempel Garamond, Bembo, or Baskerville.

Gothic capitals of the same form as Copperplate Gothic, lacking only the oversharpened corners.

Lindisfarne Nova is an uncial-like design based on the script found in the Lindisfarne Gospels. Created by Harry Pears and Margaret Layson, it is available in two weights, regular and bold. Lindisfarne Nova is Harry’s first completed font. There are also two companion styles, Lindisfarne Nova Incised and Lindisfarne Runes.

Cruz Cantera is a crisp and stylish yet informal sans serif typeface created by NYC type designer Ray Cruz. It is a slightly condensed design. The vertical strokes have rounded terminals, and there are some characters with serifs. Notable characters include the upper and lowercase E. There are three weights and each works equally well alone, or together for both display and text. Original design by Ramon Cruz completed in 2002.

Wavy Rounded is a stylized sans serif display typeface by Japanese designer Hajime Kawakami. Some of the characters possess quirky features that randomly create fun visual “waves”. There is a handful of alternate characters including an old style figure set. Catch the Wave.

Frank-Rühl (or Ruehl) is the ubiquitous Hebrew text font style. There are many fonts that belong to this style, and all are based on an early 20th-century design by Raphael Frank. Some of the fonts are actually called Frank-Rühl (or Ruehl) and some are not. It was originally designed in a single weight. Bitstream developed Frank Ruehl for the Microsoft Windows operating system. The font is encoded with a Microsoft defined Hebrew character set, Hebrew Code Page 1255. Within the TrueType fonts, the characters are assigned Unicode character IDs. The font includes Hebrew characters, and Latin glyphs from Dutch 801 bold.