A couple of years before the second World War, Marcel Jacno, the popular French graphic designer who in the 1930s designed iconic posters for Gaumont and Paramount and famously illustrated the Gaulish helmet that first adorned the Gauloises cigarette packs in 1936, was asked by Deberny & Peignot to design a calligraphic typeface for the advertising market. Jacno's Scribe design, billed by D&P as a "virile ad writing" typeface, was released to some great fanfare in 1937, enjoyed some time of French spotlight, and was ready to make waves in the rest of Europe before the war broke out and snuffed its chances at international recognition. However, samples of it can still be found in some specialty post-war publications as an example of a trend that lasted a couple of decades, when Western European type manufacturers commissioned famous visual artists to design typefaces in order to capitalize on the artists' fame - the trend that brought us standards like Futura and the long list of Lucien Bernhard and Imre Reiner faces. This exclusive digital version of Jacno's design expands on the original concept with a large character set that includes plenty of alternates, a couple of different ways for seamless lowercase connections, three sets of figures, and extended Latin language support, adding up to over 540 characters in a one big, contextually-programmed font.

Buttercut was inspired by classic slab serif fonts, such as Roboto Slab and Rockwell. However, Buttercut is way more bouncy and “off grid” - maybe the reason for that is that it was influenced by both grafitti and comics?!

Cherily Blussom was made with an inky pen, and little was done to correct the blurry edges. That's why Cherry Blussom stands out in such an authentic way! Comes with both ligatures and alternates - combine them and spice up your text!

Candycorn Overdose represents how I used to feel on the morning after Halloween, way back when I was young enough to go out begging for candy.

Bremen was designed at Bitstream by Richard Lipton and released in 1992. It is based on German poster art from the period between the World Wars.

A 1918 poster issued during World War I from the YWCA encouraged women to pitch in to the war effort by joining the “United War Work Campaign”. The Art Nouveau hand lettering of that poster was a slight throwback to the “Western” or “Victorian” style of typography because of the characters having split serifs. This is now available as Village Hall JNL, in both regular and oblique versions

Wolfsburg is a classic blackletter stencil typeface. It is reminiscent of the days before computers when the best way to reproduce letters quickly was to stencil them.

During the turbulent era of the 1960s, the youth of America found various ways to protest against "The Establishment". Whether it was campus unrest, protest songs, sit-ins or other methods, the message was the counter-culture movement. Arising from this disenchantment with traditional social standards, a small but effective means of protest arose that made no sound, yet spoke volumes - the pin button. Statements against the war in Vietnam, free love, drug use and other messages popped up on little metal discs pinned to tee shirts, suspenders, head band and hats. Sixties Pin Buttons JNL recreates twenty-six of these messages in both white on black (upper case keys) and black on white (lower case keys). Blank buttons in both white and black are found on the parenthesis keys.

Madison is a classic slab serif stencil typeface. It is reminiscent of the days before computers when the best way to reproduce letters quickly was to stencil them.

This idea of "wrong way weights" was originally called French Clarendon by the Americans, Italienne by the French, and American by the Italians. Sounds like nobody wanted to own up to it. When it was revived by ATF in 1933, it was given the name P. T. Barnum. Many variations have appeared. Dime Museum is an old wood type.

Popsmart means "smart or skilled in a superficial, self-righteous or annoying way" - but when I was young in the 1980ies, it was a positive thing to be popsmart. At least in Denmark! :) Anyway, I find this font to be smart in a positive way: It has a bouncy appearance ( with help from the Contextual Alternates, the font cycles the 6 different versions of each letter!) and a "go-ahead-and-type-anything-and-it-will-end-up-looking-good" kinda vibe.

Findon is a classic sans serif uppercase stencil typeface. It is reminiscent of the days before computers when the best way to reproduce letters quickly was to stencil them.

Originally ZionTrain was built as a (probably first in Cyrillic!) navigation typeface for the Kharkiv identity project and Kharkiv subway and airport navigation systems. We wanted comprehensible, distinctive letterforms, that can help everybody on the way from Babylon to Zion. The project was used in Kharkiv promotion at homeland and abroad, but was rejected by the new government. As a corporate typeface it was used for a few cultural projects.

Master of the World was included on the front page of a novel in several parts, The Count of Monte Christo (mid 20th century). Typeface characters show design guidelines of the pre-war era (2nd world war). The idea of development origins from a wish to evolve traditional forms of typefaces which were used in Slovenia.

Gimcrack is "showy but cheap or badly made" - that's what a search on the internet says. Well, that description fits this font quite well - although it was deliberately made that way!

Axteroid was made to look like something that was teleported from a computergame from way-back in the 80s. To make it more 21st century-like, I have spiced the font up with some OpenType alternate letters and ligatures! You will need to use OpenType supporting applications to use the autoligatures.

Browsing online auctions is a wonderful way to pick up ideas for font designs. Take Condensed Stencil JNL for example. This font was modeled from a set of vintage brass interlocking stencils.

The front page headline of the April 6, 1917 edition of the Bemidji Pioneer [from Bemidji, Minnesota] says in extrabold letters: “State of War is Declared”. The subtext underneath reads: “President Signs Resolution 1:13 P.M., Passed by House 3 O’Clock this Morning”. Thus, the United States formally entered into World War I. However… that subtext was set in a sans serif type face which was a perfect addition to the numerous newspaper-inspired type revivals offered by Jeff Levine Fonts. Morning Edition JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Hortensia, designed around 1900 by Emil Gursch for his own Berlin foundry, is a typeface most expressive of the post-Victorian aesthetic that was all the rage in both Europe and America during the second half of the 19th century and up until the Great War. It is a reduced aesthetic of sharp points and natural curves that almost want to apologize for their own elegance, but clearly embody the simple excitement about the blossoming of industry and crafts during the period. This deco script trend would get a re-run for about a decade on either side of the second World War — especially in the entertainment and financial industries — before giving way to art nouveau and big brush faces. Hortensia was Gursch's most popular typeface, used extensively and prominently in many beautiful type catalogs, and a commonly seen design element in Germany for quite a while after its release. This digital version brings plenty of fixes and additions to the original metal Hortensia design, including many alternates sprinkled throughout the character set, and support for a wide range of Latin-based languages (including Central European, Baltic, Turkish and Welsh).

Alphabet Agency proudly presents Bludsport ODS font. The font design captures elements of war and gore with its grungy military stencil style. The font was designed for use in a variety of genres including in the film and television industry (war and horror), gaming industry, outdoors/survivalist industry and combat sport themes. Each font includes uppercase, lowercase, numbers, punctuation and basic Latin characters.

Sometimes you need things organised in a neat way. Organic Tuesday has that, but also a will to break free at the same time. Years ago I was at a restaurant where the menu was handwritten with a clumsy, but characteristic and charming, monospaced font. I must have focused so much on these letters that I can’t recall what I actually ate. But what I do remember is that it was a Tuesday, and the restaurant was organic!

Before ink jet and laser printers; before copy machines, the main way to make multiples of anything not provided by printing press was by a mimeograph machine or spirit duplicator. The mimeograph utilized a porous drum which inked the backside of a waxed stencil sheet. Unlike traditional stencils which have cut out areas that are directly inked or painted, a mimeo stencil has the area to be printed scratched away by removing the wax coating with a stylus. The resulting image allows the ink from the drum to seep through the sheet and transfer to the blank paper. Based on a plastic lettering guide once manufactured by the A.B. Dick Company of Chicago, Mimeograph Template JNL is available in regular and oblique versions. Albert Blake Dick, the company’s founder, coined the term ‘mimeography’. The font’s character shapes follow the routed letters of the template, complete with rounded terminals. An earlier font release [designed with flat terminals and some alternate characters] is available as Interoffice Memo JNL.

Moore 003 was inspired by Henryk Tomaszewski's poster lettering for the Moore Exibition (Warsaw, Poland 1959). The headline "Moore" is composed of paper collage. The lettering, in Tomaszewski's vision, contrasts in ways that recall the contrast of Moore's sculptures. It was my intention to continue this research using lettering in the form of a typeface.

This was put together by Dan X. Solo to provide a quick way to set headings for a circus brochure. The name was given in recognition of the Baraboo Circus Museum. The end pieces are in pairs on the uppercase keys A-B, C-D, etc. The alphabet itself is in the lowercase position.

Franklin Gothic Hand Demi Shadow is another one in my series of hand-drawn fonts from way back in time – before computers changed the way we worked in advertising. This one was especially used for what we called "pork-belly-ads": ads for food-stores! I think it is very useful for all kinds of advertising that demands a lot of bang! Your powerful typedesigner Gert Wiescher

Perhaps the greatest tragedy in all English history began in 1642 when, for five years, families and friends were divided by violent struggle. Respect for the monarchy was as great then as it is today; but it was squandered by Charles I and Civil War ensued. Out of Cromwell's eventual victory came a period of absolute rule just as arbitrary. In communicating the affairs of Court, Mercurius Aulicus can claim to be England's first regular newspaper, printed at Oxford and reprinted in London almost throughout the entire war. This typeface family echoes the calligraphic scripts of newspaper cartoons of the time.

Designed over three years after the second World War, and published in 1949 by the Nebiolo foundry, Normandia was Alessandro Butti’s take on the fat face. As it usually was with Butti’s designs, this face effectively injected a catchy yet expertly calculated calligraphic spin into its source of inspiration — which was the essentially geometric/deco, thicker model of Bodoni’s very popular aesthetic. The metal Normandia saw some widespread use for a handful of years after its publication, not least because of the multitude of sizes in which it was available. It stepped out of the limelight by the mid-1950s, due to a combination of the popularity of cold type and Nebiolo’s refusal to retool its faces for new technologies. It was copied by a few small film typesetting outfits on both sides of the Atlantic, but never really found its way back to the mainstream. By the time computer type became the norm, Normandia was pretty much relegated to a type historian’s collection of anecdotes. This digital update of the classic series revives and refines the three original metal designs (Tonda/Regular, Corsiva/Italic, and Contornata/Outline) and expands the character set to more than 600 glyphs per font, including small caps, six types of figures, fractions and nut fractions, a full set of f-ligatures, some stylistic alternates, and other fine typography niceties.

The Art Nouveau hand lettered title on the sheet music for the 1909 composition "If the Wind Had Only Blown the Other Way" was the basis for Courtship JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Zapped is a grungy font with a sort of extruded look. I was working on a poster for the punk band MAXILLA (they are hot check'm out). It looks like it came out of a war zone. Abuse it!

Yalla PRO was inspired during a trip Mateusz Machalski took to Cairo (Egypt). The vast array of strong Arabic headline type, geometric forms working in interesting ways and contrasting with smooth, calligraphic details fed the design. Due to the same proportions and heights, Yalla works great together with Afronaut. Yalla was extended in 2024 by Mateusz Machalski & Małgorzata Bartosik with new weights.

FranklinGothicHandLight is part of a series of hand-drawn fonts from way back in time – before computers changed the way we worked. When I was in advertising – before computers – a very time consuming part of my daily work was sketching headlines. I used to be able to sketch headlines in Franklin Gothic, Times, Futura, Helvetica and several scripts. We had a kind of huge inverted camera – which we called Lucy. We projected the alphabet onto a sheet of transparent paper, outlined the letters with a fineliner and then filled them in. It was very tedious work, but the resulting headline had its own charm and we had a permanent race going on who was best and fastest. I won most of the time! They used to call me the fastest "Magic Marker" this side of the Atlantic. Great days, just like today! Your sentimental type designer from the past Gert Wiescher

FranklinGothicHandDemi is part of a series of hand-drawn fonts from way back in time – before computers changed the way we worked. When I was in advertising – before computers – a very time consuming part of my daily work was sketching headlines. I used to be able to sketch headlines in Franklin Gothic, Times, Futura, Helvetica and several scripts. We had a kind of huge inverted camera – which we called Lucy. We projected the alphabet onto a sheet of transparent paper, outlined the letters with a fineliner and then filled them in. It was very tedious work, but the resulting headline had its own charm and we had a permanent race going on who was best and fastest. I won most of the time! They used to call me the fastest "Magic Marker" this side of the Atlantic. Great days, just like today! Your sentimental type designer from the past Gert Wiescher

There are a lot of things to say about fashion. I never really cared about what people meant was fashion, at any time of my life...well, not counting my teenage years!!! I was a teenager in the 1980ies and I was really into what was hot or not...but when I look at photos of myself from that time, I always wonder what kind of fashion trends I was following! :) Brutal Fashion is really not brutal in any way, but more attractive, nice, charming, handsome, delicate and graceful - with a stunning amount of handmade roughness!

Martin Wilke’s underrated yet influential deco classic from 1932 has both feet firmly planted in the high traditions of Western European calligraphy while carefully and subtly introducing some traits from the sweeping geometric/minimalist vision of the time. In a way, it was one of the representatives of the European anti-type typefaces of that era, when print media was searching for the elusive aesthetic balance between humanism and geometry. This typeface enjoyed some popularity in Germany for a few years, and went on to influence further type designs in Holland and Italy. After the second World War, the black hole that swallowed a big chunk of Europe’s print culture, new influences and technologies overtook the scene, and selective historical emphasis ensued, highlighting some of the era’s designs and overlooking others. Further selective picking in the digital era all but buried Wilke’s body of work - unfairly so, because he was just as important in German type history as Bernhard, Post, Schneidler, Tiemann and Trump. The original metal Wilke Kursiv came in one weight. This digital version goes a long way in expanding on that original offering. Now Wilke’s masterpiece comes in three weights, and with a full Pro treatment including swash caps, small capitals, five types of figures, automatic fractions, and plenty of other OpenType niceties. Each of the Wilke Kursiv Pro fonts comes with over 700 characters, and contains support for most Latin-based languages. Also available are three non-Pro fonts in each weight.

The other day, I ate an orange - and I absolutely love oranges! This one was perfect - juicy, sweet and crispy in a very delicate way. This font is also juicy, sweet and crispy and on top of that, organic and handmade!

Tenison is a semi-formal script which echoes the way the designer was taught to write in school. It is not overly decorative and it is highly legible. All lowercase characters link with each other, just as we were taught.

SK Bade is a demi serif and condensed font. It was designed by Salih Kızılkaya in 2020. This is a completely decorative font, but legibility is at the forefront. In this way, it can be used easily in long texts.

This font was inspired by the swirling steam drawn on a chalkboard at a coffee shop. Not actually a script font though it has a similar feel. This font dances and twirls the way a wisp of smoke or steam would.

I was in a bit of a gloomy mood just before I created this font. I had no inspiration whatsoever (which always affects me in a bad way). I was trying to create a font using broken satay skewers, as using those gives the letters a unique look. I broke about 25 skewers and they all broke ‘the wrong way’. Yes, it’s pathetic, I know, but that’s how it is. I decided to go to the gym and do a little workout, hoping my dark mood would pass. When I came back, I broke one more skewer and lo and behold, it broke exactly the right way! I made this font in one go, using that fantastic skewer and lots of Chinese ink. Darkness Rising comes with all the diacritics you’ll need, plus double letter ligatures and some cool underlined alternates.