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101 Editions
[Carolina de Bartolo]

Founded by Carolina de Bartolo, 101 Editions is the San Anselmo, CA-based publisher of the book Explorations in Typography: Mastering the Art of Fine Typesetting and its iOS companion app. 101 Editions also offers full-service creative direction for a wide range of visual communications. It specializes in contract publishing, typographic consulting and custom typefaces.

Explorations in Typography Mastering the Art of Fine Typesetting is both the title of a 2011 book and the name of a web site by Carolina de Bartolo and Erik Spiekermann. The site is worth a visit, as users can "set" their own text. Their own blurb: [The book] is a vast collection of beautiful typesetting examples. Page after page, a brief article by Erik Spiekermann has been set in hundreds of different ways in hundreds of different typefaces, creating an extended visual taxonomy of typesetting that allows you to learn by looking. With complete type specifications on every page and examples set in hundreds of typefaces (many from the FontFont library), the aggregate effect is an ersatz type catalog as well as an extensive resource of typesetting ideas.

Her typefaces include Txt101 (2014: a fresh typeface for mock text and borders, designed in collaboration with Chiharu Tanaka at Psy/Ops).

Carolina graduated from the School of Design at Carnegie Mellon University. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

45 Symbols

The book 45 Symbols published in Köln in 2014 introduces 45 projects of 45 symbols (so 45 times 45 icons in all) created by students from Parsons The New School For Design (New York), Academy of Media Arts Cologne, Hong Kong Baptist University, Lebanese American University Beirut. Falmouth University UK, and Universidad de los Andes (Bogota) on a variety of themes. [Google] [More]  ⦿

A Primer on Bezier Curves
[Mike "Pomax" Kamermans]

A fantastic on-lie book on Bezier curves, by Mike "Pomax" Kamermans. See also this repository. [Google] [More]  ⦿

A Primer on Bezier Curves
[Pomax]

A Primer on Bezier Curves is an on-line book on Bezier curves by Pomax (Vancouver Island, Canada). [Google] [More]  ⦿

A specimen of cast ornaments by William Caslon, Letter founder to the King, London, printed by C. Whittingham, London, 1795

William Caslon's specimen book published by C. Whittingham, London, in 1795. Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

A specimen of printing types by William Caslon, Letter founder to the King, London,

A specimen book published by C. Whittingham, London, in 1798. By William Caslon (1754-1833). Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

A specimen of printing types by William Caslon, Letter founder to the King, London,

A specimen book published by C. Whittingham, London, in 1796. By William Caslon (1754-1833). Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

A Specimen of the Several Sorts of Printing-types Belonging to the University of Oxford, at the Clarendon Printing-house

A book published by Oxford University Press in 1794. [Google] [More]  ⦿

ABC3D

A 3d type book by Marion Bataille, Roaring Brook Press, 2008. Video. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Abebooks

Excellent source for finding old books on typography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Ada Wardi

Israeli graphic designer who specilaizes in book design and book covers. Art Director at Modan Publishing House, and Senior lecturer at Wizo Academic Institute in Haifa. Speaker at ATypI 2016 in Warsaw on From forgotten boxes to Three Pioneers of Hebrew Typography, Moshe Spitzer, Franciscka Baruch and Henri Friedlander, who trained and worked in Germany during the 20s, and since the late 30s took major part in the developing Hebrew culture in Israel, each seeking in his or her special way a "new Hebrew type".

Ada Wardi edited The Graphic Design of Moshe Spitzer, Franzisca Baruch, and Henri Friedlaender: New Types Three Pioneers of Hebrew Graphic Design (2015, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Ada Yardeny

Ada Yardeny (or Yardeni) received her Ph.D. in ancient Semitic languages, paleography and epigraphy from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She wrote The Book of Hebrew Script: History, Palaeography, Script Styles, Calligraphy and Design, 1997. 364pp. The second printing in 2002 was done by Oak Knoll Press. At Masterfont, she published the Hebrew typefaces Academia MF, Ada MF, Daphna MF, Hagit MF (2020) and Rephael MF. Letter Arts link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Adobe black book

Adobe's Type 1 Font Format book in PDF format. Don't forget to get the Adobe Technical Note #5015, Type 1 Font Format Supplement as well, which discusses multiple master fonts and counter hints. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Adobe Type Catalogs

Contents of the Adobe Font Folio 9 collection of type 1 fonts. Their 145-page PDF catalog, with samples. The Adobe Type Collection OpenType Edition (ca. 2008) is here and here. The Adobe Type Library Reference Book is a printed specimen book, currently in its 3rd edition, and can be obtained from Amazon, Peachpit or Adobe Press, both in paper and PDF format. The cover price of the printed edition is about 45 US dolllars. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Adolf Meier

Hofkonditor (court confectioner) in Detmold, Germany. Author of Schriften-Album fur Konditoren nebst Monogrammen und Tortenschildern (ca. 1910, Heinrich Killinger, Konditoreibucherverlag, Nordhausen). This wonderful book shows many decorative capital alphabets designed mainly for decorating pies, cakes, and pastries. Local PDF file for that book. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Adrian Frutiger

Famous type designer born in 1928 in Unterseen, Switzerland, who died in September 2015. He closely cooperated with Linotype-Hell AG, after having been artistic director at Deberny-Peignot in Paris since 1952. He established his own studio in 1962 with André Gürtler and Bruno Pfaftli. Art director for Editions Hermann, Paris 1957 to 1967. Frutiger lived near Bern, Switzerland, and was very interested in woodcuts. In 2009, Heidrun Osterer and Philipp Stamm coedited Adrian Frutiger Typefaces The Complete Works (Birkhäuser Verlag), a 460-page opus based on conversations with Frutiger himself and on extensive research in France, England, Germany, and Switzerland. Quote: Helvetica is the jeans, and Univers the dinner jacket. Helvetica is here to stay. He designed over 100 fonts. Here is a partial list:

  • Président (Deberny&Peignot, 1954). Digitized by Linotype in 2003.
  • Delta.
  • Phoebus (Deberny&Peignot, 1953).
  • Element-Grotesk.
  • Federduktus.
  • Ondine (Deberny&Peignot, 1953-1954). The Bitstream version of this font is Formal Script 421. Adobe, Linotype and URW++ each have digital versions called Ondine. Bitstream's Calligraphic 421 is slightly different.
  • Méridien (Deberny&Peignot, 1955-1957). Digitized by Adobe/Linotype in 1989.
  • Caractères Lumitype.
  • Univers (Deberny&Peignot, 1957). About the name, Frutiger wrote I liked the name Monde because of the simplicity of the sequence of letters. The name Europe was also discussed; but Charles Peignot had international sales plans for the typeface and had to consider the effect of the name in other languages. Monde was unsuitable for German, in which der Mond means "the moon". I suggested "Universal", whereupon Peignot decided, in all modesty, that "Univers" was the most all-embracing name!. Univers IBM Composer followed. In 2010, Linotype published Univers Next, which includes 59 Linotype Univers weights and 4 monospaced Linotype Univers Typewriter weights, and can be rented for a mere 2675 Euros. In 2018, Linotype added Univers Next Typewriter. In 2020, Linotype's Akira Kobayashi dusted off Univers Next Cyrillic and Univers Next Paneuropean.
  • Egyptienne F (1955, Fonderie Deberny&Peignot; 1960, for the Photon/Lumitype machine).
  • Opéra (1959-1961, Sofratype).
  • Alphabet Orly (1959, Aéroport d'Orly).
  • Apollo (1962-1964, Monotype): the first type designed for the new Monotype photosetting equipment.
  • Alphabet Entreprise Francis Bouygues.
  • Concorde (1959, Sofratype, with André Gürtler).
  • Serifen-Grotesk/Gespannte Grotesk.
  • Alphabet Algol.
  • Astra Frutiger. A typeface variant of Frutiger licensed under Linotype. It is the font used on the highways in Switzerland.
  • Serifa (1967-1968, Bauersche Giesserei). URW++ lists the serif family in its 2008 on-line catalog. Other names include OPTI Silver (Castcraft), Ares Serif 94, and Sierra. Bitstream published the digital typeface Serifa BT. But it is also sold by Adobe, Tilde, Linotype, URW++, Scangraphic, and Elsner & Flake. The slab serif is robust and is based on the letterforms of Univers.
  • OCR-B (1966-1968, European Computer Manufacturers Association).
  • Alphabet EDF-GDF (1959, Électricité de France, Gaz de France).
  • Katalog.
  • Devanagari (1967) and Tamil (1970), both done for Monotype Corporation.
  • Alpha BP (1965, British Petroleum&Co.).
  • Dokumenta (1969, Journal National Zeitung Suisse).
  • Alphabet Facom (1971).
  • Alphabet Roissy (1970, Aéroport de Roissy Charles de Gaulle).
  • Alphabet Brancher (1972, Brancher).
  • Iridium (1972, Stempel). A didone with slight flaring.
  • Alphabet Métro (1973, RATP): for the subway in Paris.
  • Alphabet Centre Georges Pompidou. The CGP typeface (first called Beaubourg) used in the Centre Georges Pompidou from 1976-1994 is by Hans-Jörg Hunziker and Adrian Frutiger, and was developed as part of the visual identity program of Jean Widmer. It is said that André Baldinger digitized it in 1997.
  • Frutiger (1975-1976, Stempel, with Hans-Jörg Hunziker). In 1999, Frutiger Next was published by Linotype. In 2009, that was followed by Neue Frutiger (a cooperation between Frutiger and Linotype's Akira Kobayashi). In fact, Frutiger, the typeface was made for the Charles De Gaulle Airport in 1968 for signage---it was originally called Roissy, and had to be similar to Univers. It was released publically as Frutiger in 1976. The modern Bitstream version is called Humanist 777. Frutiger Next Greek (with Eva Masoura) won an award at TDC 2006. Other digital implementations of Frutiger: M690 (SoftMaker), Quebec Serial (SoftMaker), Frutus (URW), Provencale (Autologic), Frontiere (Compugraphic), Freeborn (Scangraphic), Siegfried (Varityper). In 2018, under the aegis of Akira Kobayashi, the Monotype Design studio published the 150-language superfamily Neue Frutiger World (including coverage for Latin, Greek, Cyrillic, Georgian, Armenian, Hebrew, Arabic, Thai and Vietnamese).
  • Glypha (1979, Stempel). See Gentleman in the Scangraphic collection).
  • Icône (1980-1982, Stempel, Linotype). Digitized by Linotype in 2003.
  • Breughel (1982, Stempel; 1988, Linotype).
  • Dolmen.
  • Tiemann.
  • Versailles (1983, Stempel).
  • Linotype Centennial (1986). Based on Morris Fuller Benton's Clarendon typeface Century, Linotype Centennial was designed for Linotype's 100th birthday.
  • Avenir (1988, Linotype). In 2004, Linotype Avenir Next was published, under the supervision of Akira Kobayashi, and with the help of a few others. In 2021, the Monotype team released Avenir Next Paneuropean (56 styles, by Akira Kobayashi). Avenir Next World, released by Linotype in 2021, is an expansive family of fonts that offers support for more than 150 languages and scripts. The subfamilies include Avenir Next Hebrew, Avenir Next Thai, Avenir Next Cyrillic, Avenir Next Arabic and Avenir Next Georgian. Avenir Next World contains 10 weights, from UltraLight to Heavy.

    Contributors besides Adrian Frutiger and Akira Kobayashi: Anuthin Wongsunkakon (Thai), Yanek Iontef (Hebrew), Akaki Razmadze (Georgian), Nadine Chahine (Arabic), Toshi Omagari (Arabic) and Elena Papassissa (Greek, Armenian). Lovely poster by Ines Vital (2011).

  • Westside.
  • Vectora (1991, Linotype).
  • Linotype Didot (1991). See also Linotype Didot eText Pro (2013), which was optimized by Linotype for use on screens and small devices.
  • Herculanum (1989, Linotype): a stone age font.
  • Shiseido (1992).
  • Frutiger Capitalis (2006, Linotype): a further exploration in the style of Herculanum, Pompeijana and Rusticana. Linotype trademarked that name even though at least five fonts by the name Capitalis already exist.
  • Pompeijana (1993, Linotype).
  • Rusticana (1993, Linotype).
  • Frutiger Stones (1998, Linotype) and Frutiger Symbols.
  • Frutiger Neonscript.
  • Courier New, based on Howard Kettler's Courier, was one of Frutiger's projects he was involved in ca. 2000.
  • AstraFrutiger (2002): a new signage typeface for the Swiss roads. Erich Alb comments: With a Frutiger condensed Type and illuminated signs during night it is mutch better readable.
  • Nami (2008) is a chiseled-stone sans family, made with the help of Linotype's Akira Kobayashi.
  • Neue Frutiger (2009, with Akira Kobayashi) has twice as many weights as the original Frutiger family.
  • In 2019, the Linotype team released variable fonts for Frutiger's main typeface families, Avenir Next Variable, Neue Frutiger Variable, and Univers Next Variable.
Bio by Nicholas Fabian. Erich Alb wrote a book about his work: Adrian Frutiger Formen und Gegenformen/Forms and Counterforms (Cham, 1998). Winner of the Gutenberg Prize in 1986 and the 006 Typography Award from The Society for Typographic Aficionados (SOTA). Famous quote (from a conversation in 1990 between Frutiger and Maxim Zhukov about Hermann Zapf's URW Grotesk): Hermann ist nicht ein Groteskermann. A quote from his keynote speech at ATypI1990: If you remember the shape of your spoon at lunch, it has to be the wrong shape. The spoon and the letter are tools; one to take food from the bowl, the other to take information off the page... When it is a good design, the reader has to feel comfortable because the letter is both banal and beautiful.

Frutiger's books include Type Sign Symbol and Signs and Symbols. Their Design and Meaning (1989, with Andrew Bluhm, published by Studio Editions, London; Amazon link).

Linotype link. FontShop link. Adrian Frutiger, sa carrière française (2008) is Adèle Houssin's graduation thesis at Estienne.

Klingspor link. Wikipedia link. View Adrian Frutiger's typefaces.

View some digital versions of Avenir. Vimeo movie on Frutiger by Christine Kopp and Christoph Frutiger entitled "Der Mann von Schwarz und weiss: Adrian Frutiger". More Vimeo movies. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

A.F. Johnson

Type specialist, and author of numerous books on type. A very nice historical account of the development of type can be found in Type Designs. Their History and Development (1934, Grafton and co., Coptic House, London; the 2nd edition appeared in 1959). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Afrikan Alphabets
[Saki Mafundikwa]

Saki Mafundikwa (Harare, Zimbabwe) is director of the Zimbabwe Institute of Vigital Arts (ZIVA). Author of Afrikan Alphabets, the story of writing in Afrika (Mark Batty Publ., 2003). In this book, he covers all south of the Sahara, and divides things as follows:
A. Liberia and Sierra Leone:
a. The Vai syllabary---212 characters 1883
b. The Mende syllabary---195 characters 1921
c. The Loma syllabary---185 characters 1930
d. The Kpelle syllabary---88 characters 1930
e. The Bassa 'Vah' alphabet---30 characters, 5 diacritics 1920
f. The Gola alphabet---30 characters 1930

B. Guinea, Senegal and Mali,
a. The Mandingo alphabet---25 characters, 8 diacritics 1950
b. Bambara "Ma-sa-ba" script 1930
c. The Wolof alphabet---25 characters, 7 diacritics 1960
d. The Fula (Dita) alphabet---39 characters 1958
e. The Fula (Ba) alphabet
f. The Gerze script

C. Cote d'Ivoire
a. The Bete syllabary---401 characters 1956
b. The Guro script

D. Cameroon and Nigeria
a. The Bamum syllabary---80 characters 1895
b. The Bagam or Eghap syllabary---100 plus characters 1917
c. The Ibibio-Efik alphabet---34 characters 1930
d. The Yoruba holy alphabet
e. Nsibidi
f. A syllabary found among the Djuka of Suriname

[Google] [More]  ⦿

Agata Szydlowska

Agata Szydlowska (b. 1983, Poland) obtained her PhD in Anthropology from the University of Warsaw. She also holds an MA degree in Art History from the same University. She has completed her studies at the Graduate School for Social Research at the Polish Academy of Sciences. Currently she works as a lecturer at the Department of Design History and Theory in the Design Faculty of the Warsaw Academy of Fine Arts. She also lectures at the Polish-Japanese Institute of Information Technology. In 2015, she co-authored a book on the cultural history of Polish type design with Marian Misiak. Speaker at ATypI 2016 in Warsaw. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Agenturtschi
[Ralf Turtschi]

Ralf Turtschi's Swiss site that specializes in type publications. A must-buy book for type classification: Schrift vergleichen, Schrift auswählen, Schrift erkennen, Schrift finden (Verlag Hermann Schmidt, Mainz, 1991): 430 pages! Author of TypoTuning (2006) and of Praktische Typografie (1999, Verlag Niggli AG). In 2004, Anatina Blaser made a handwritten style font called Rooster (after Peter Rooster's handwriting), which can be had for free with any order over 59 dollars. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Agenturtschi Buchtipps

Nice list of German language books on typography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

AIAP

Associazione Italiana Progettazione per la Communicazione Visiva, located in Italy. It has a publishing branch. [Google] [More]  ⦿

A.J. Hewett

Author of Distinctive Lettering and Designs (1919). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Akademie der bildenden Künste Stuttgart

Description of the main type work at the Academy of Graphic Arts in Stuttgart. The big names there were Walter Brudi, J.V. Cissarz, F.H.E. Schneidler and Walter Veit. From 1920 until 1948, F.H.E. Schneidler was head of the graphics division of the Akademie der bildenden Künste Stuttgart.

Some stencil alphabet by them (ca. 1930), and later digitized by "Mindofone" as free art deco stencil typeface Glas Deco (2012). Other examples [taken from the book Handsatzschriften des Instituts für Buchgestaltung an der Staatlichen Akademie der bildenden Künste Stuttgart von Walter Brudi, J.V. Cissarz F.H.E. Schneidler und Walter Veit include Veit Antiqua (Walter Veit), Brudi Mediaeval, Brudi Kursiv and Pan (Walter Brudi), Cissarz-Latein.

The following typefaces are by F.H.E. Schneidler: Amalthea, Bayreuth, Buchdeutsch Zierbuchstaben, Buchdeutsch, Deutsch Roemisch Fett, Deutsch Roemisch Kursiv, Deutsch Roemisch, Die Zierde, Ganz Grobe Gotisch, Graphik, Halbfette Buchdeutsch, Halbfette Deutsch, Halbfette Schneidler Schwabacher, Juniperus Antiqua, Kontrast, Legende, Schmalfetten Gotisch, Schneidler Antiqua, Schneidler Fraktur Zierbuchstaben, Schneidler Mediaeval Halbfett, Schneidler Mediaeval Kursiv, Schneidler Mediaeval, Schneidler Schwabacher Initialen, SSchneidler Untergrund, Schneidler Werk Latein, Schneidler Zierat, Schneidler, Suevia Fraktur Initialen, Zentenar Fraktur Halbfett, Zentenar Fraktur, Zentenar. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Akira Kataoka
[Kataoka Design Works]

[More]  ⦿

Akke Ragnar Kumlien

Swedish painter, poet, scholar, publisher, typographer and type designer (b. Stockholm, 1884, d. Stockholm, 1949) who designed fonts at Klingspor such as Kumlien (1943), Kumlien Bold and Kumlien Antiqua. Tjörbjörn Olsson created interpretations such as KumlienMM (1993) and Kumlien-Initialer (1994). The fist major digital revival and extension came in 2011 at Canada Type, where Patrick Griffin and Kevin King designed the Kumlien Pro family.

Bror Zachrisson penned Akke Kumlien: 1884-1949 in PAGA, volume 1, number 3, pp. 45-56, 1953. Kumlien studied the history of arts and literature at Uppsala University, which later bestowed on him an honorary doctorate. He was also the founder of the Institute for Research of Materials at the Royal Academy of Arts in Stockholm, the head of the Thiel Gallery's well-known art collection, and the main artistic consultant at P. A. Norstedt&Sons, the royal printing house. His Kumlien transitional typeface was the first major Swedish-designed typeface in over a hundred years. Specimen.

Author of Bokstav och ande (The Letter and the Spirit: 1948), and Kunstneren og bokkunsten (Artist and Book Art).

MyFonts link. Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Al Imelli

Author of The Book of Alphabets and Layouts, Designs, Scrolls, Panel Ends, Descriptive Matter: The Art of Metal Etching for Ornamental and Sign Purposes, Written and Illustrated by Al. Imelli (1922, Signs of the Times Publishing Co, Cincinnati, OH) and Imelli's Alphabets and Layouts (1922). Alternate link. Hathi Trust link. For a list of the alphabets in the book, scroll down and check the current page.

Some of Imelli's alpabets inspired others to create digital typefaces. Examples:

[Google] [More]  ⦿

Alan Marshall

Alan Marshall worked at the Musée de l'imprimerie in Lyon, France, from 1995 until his retirement in 2015. He was director of the Museum from 2002 until 2015. A type and book expert, Alan Marshall published Tout le monde connaît Roger Excoffon (2011). Musee de l'imprimerie link. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Alan Peckolick

Connecticut-based graphic expressionist painter and typographer, b. 1940, Bronx, d. 2017, Connecticut. He developed typefaces for brands like New York University and Revlon. After graduating from Pratt in 1964, Peckolick briefly worked in advertising before becoming an assistant to Herb Lubalin, who would become his mentor and lifelong friend. Coauthor with Gertrude Snyder of Herb Lubalin Art Director, Graphic Designer and Typographer (New York, 1985). He began painting professionally in 1998, a few years before he learned he had Parkinson's disease. Huffington Post obituary. New York Times obituary. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Alastair Johnston

Noted type historian in Berkeley, CA. Alastair Johnston is a partner in Poltroon Press, Berkeley. He taught college level courses in typography for over 30 years. He has published scores of books and won the Award of Excellence in the AIGA Just Type Show. His published works include bibliographies and discographies, as well as Alphabets to Order: The Literature of Nineteenth-Century Typefounders' Specimens (New Castle, 2000), Nineteenth-century American designers & engravers of type by William E. Loy (co-editor/designer; Oak Knoll Press, 2009), Hanging Quotes (Cuneiform Press/University of Houston, Texas, 2011), Typographical Tourists: Tales of tramping printers (Poltroon Press, 2012) and Transitional Faces: The Lives and Work of Richard Austin, type-cutter, & Richard Turner Austin, wood-engraver (Poltroon Press, 2013). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Albert Corbeto

Type historian at Reial Academia de Bones Lletres in Barcelona, who has a PhD in art history from Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona (UAB). Born in Barcelona in 1971, Corbeto is responsible for all the publishing activities of the Real Academia de Buenas Letras de Barcelona and the Asociación de Bibliófilos de Barcelona. His field of investigation is the history of printing types and, in particular, the work of Spanish punchcutters throughout the second half of the eighteenth century. At ATypI 2006 in Lisbon, he spoke about the efforts around 1750-1770 to set up the Royal Library type foundry by Juan de Santander and Gerónimo A. Gil. Speaker at ATypI 2009 in Mexico City, where he talked about the punches from the Spanish Royal Printing House. Soon he will publish a specimen and text book on all this.

Interview by Unostiposduros.

His books: Muses de la impremta. La dona i les arts del llibre (segles XVI-XIX) (ed., with M. Garone) (Associació de Bibliòfils de Barcelona, 2009); Especímenes tipográficos españoles. Catalogación y estudio de las muestras de letras impresas hasta el año 1833 (Calambur, Madrid, 2010); Daniel B. Updike, impresor e historiador de la tipografía (Campgrafic, Valencia, 2011); Tipos de imprenta en España (Campgrafic, Valencia, 2011), Las letras de la Ilustración. Edición, imprenta y fundición de tipos en la Real Biblioteca (Catálogo de la exposición en la Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid, 2012) e Història de la tipografia. L'evolució de la lletra des de Gutenberg fins a les foneries digitals (coauthor with M. Garone, Pagès Editors, Lérida, 2012). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Albert Kapr

German type designer, typographer, calligrapher, author and educator, b. Stuttgart (1918), d. 1995. He was art director at the Dresden type foundry VEB Typoart from 1964 until 1977. He founded and led the Institut für Buchgestaltung at the Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst at Leipzig from 1956 until 1978. Obituary by Harald Suess. Page at Klingspor. MyFonts page. Catalog of Albert Kapr's typefaces

He designed these typefaces:

  • Faust-Antiqua (1958-1959), or just Faust. This right-footed serif typeface suffers from the ugly duck syndrom. Nevertheless, it inspired Nick Curtis to design Kaprice NF (2010). In 1993, Steve Jackaman revived it as Faust RR.
  • Leipzig (with Otto Erler in 1963). A font with large x-height.
  • Leipziger-Antiqua (1959). Revived by Tim Ahrens in 2004 as JAF Lapture. It was also digitized--close to the original and under the original name--by Ralph Unger at URW in 2005. And it was shamelessly digitized by Linotype and sold as Hawkhurst without mentioning the Leipziger Antiqua source, in fact claiming that Hawkhurst is an original.
  • Calendon-Antiqua (1965).
  • Prillwitz-Antiqua (1971, Typoart, with Werner Schulze).
  • Magna Kyrillisch (1975).
  • Circa 1975, he created Garamond Cyrillic at Typoart.

A specialist of blackletter, he was passionate about Gotische Bastarda.

Author of these books:

  • Fraktur: Form und Geschichte der gebrochenen Schriften (1993, H. Schmidt, Mainz).
  • F.H.Ernst Schneidler Schriftentwerfer, Lehrer, Kalligraph (SchumacherGebler a.o., München, 2002). Co-authors: Max Caflisch, Albert Kapr, Antonia Weiss and Hans Peter Willberg.
  • The Art of Lettering; The history, anatomy, and aesthetics of the roman letterforms (München, K.G. Saur, 1983, original edition in German by VEB Verlag: Dresden, 1971).
  • Schriftkunst. Geschichte, Anatomie und Schönheit der lateinischenn Buchstaben (Dresden, 1971).
  • Schrift- und Buchkunst (VEB Fachbuchverlag, Leipzig, 1982).
[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Albert-Jan Pool

Dutch writer and designer, b. 1960, Amsterdam, who currently lives in Hamburg. He studied at the Royal Academy of Arts in The Hague. From 1987 until 1991 he was the type director at Scangraphic, and from 1991-1994, he was the type manager at URW in Hamburg, at which time he completed URW Imperial, URW Linear, and URW Mauritius.

In 1994 he started his own studio Dutch Design in Hamburg, and finally he co-founded FarbTon Konzept+Design with Jörn Iken, Birgit Hartmann and Klaus-Peter Staudinger, a professor at the University of Weimar, but Pool, Iken and Hartmann left FarbTon in 2005. Their corporate partners were DTL (Frank Blokland), URW++ (mainly for hinting), and Fontshop International. They also got freelance help from Nicolay Gogol and Gisela Will. Up until today, FarbTon has made about ten corporate types. He has worked at URW++ as a freelancer, contributing text and classification expertise to the book URW++ FontCollection.

He has been teaching typeface design at the Muthesius Kunsthochschule in Kiel between 1995 and 1998 and has taken up that job again in 2005.

Fonts done by Pool include FF DIN (DIN-Mittelschrift is used on German highway signs, 1995; image, another image: for more images, see FF DIN Round at issuu.com), FF DIN Round (2010; +Cyrillic; in use; sample), FF DIN Web (2010), Jet Set Sans (for JET/Conoco gas stations), DTL Hein Gas (for Hamburger Gaswerke GmbH), Regenbogen Bold (for a radical left party in Hamburg, a roughened version of Letter Gothic), and Syndicate Sans (2012, for Syndicate Design). He also made FF OCR-F.

In 2022, FontFont released a major set of updates and extensions of the FF DIN family, all co-designed by Albert-Jan Pool and Antonia Cornelius. These include:

Together with type-consultant Stefan Rugener of AdFinder GmbH and copywriter Ursula Packhauser he wrote and designed a book on the effects of type on brand image entitled Branding with Type (Adobe Press). An expert on DIN typefaces, he spoke about DIN 16 and DIN 1451 at ATypI 2007 in Brighton, and wrote an article entitled FF DIN, the history of a contemporary typeface in the book Made with FontFont. Speaker at ATypI 2013 in Amsterdam: Legibility according to DIN 1450.

Pic.

Interview. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Albrecht Seemann

Author of Handbuch der Schriftarten (Leipzig, 1926), a nearly comprehensive listing of all types at all German type foundries at that time. Just the name index of the types takes 38 pages. Download at Klingspor of the original volume from 1926, and the addenda published in 1927. 1929, 1930, 1933/1935, 1936/1937, und 1938/1939 under the name Nachträge. Emil Wetzig (Leipzig) helped with the production.

Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Aldo Novarese

Italian designer, 1920-1995, who designed most of his typefaces at Nebiolo in Turin. Until 1975, he made about 30 families at Nebiolo, and after 1975, he produced about 70 further families of fonts. With weights included, he created about 300 fonts. Biography by Sergio Polano. He was very influential, and wrote two important books, Alfa Beta: Lo Studio e il Disegno del Carattere, a study on font design and history (1964), and Il Segno Alfabetico (1971). Essay by Sergio Polano on Novarese. The list of fonts done at Nebiolo:

  • Landi Linear (1942). This was revived in digital form in 2011 by Toto as K22 Landi Linear.
  • Etruria (1940-42)
  • Express (1940-43)
  • Normandia (1946-49, with Butti, and 1952)
  • Athenaeum Initials (with A. Butti, 1945-1947)
  • Fluidum (+Bold) (1951, script). Revived by Ralph Unger as Butti (2011).
  • Fontanesi (1951-54, an all caps rococo font). Digital revivals include Fontanesi RMU (2018, Ralph M. Unger) and Fontanesi (2003, a free font by Frogii).
  • Microgramma (1952, with A. Butti; available at URW++). This was done as an alternative to Bank Gothic, and is identical to Eurostile Bold Extended.
  • Nova Augustea (1951, ITC Augustea Open)
  • Egizio (1953-57), a slab serif [see E710 Roman on the SoftMaker MegaFont XXL CD, 2002, or Egizio URW (2009, quite complete family with 5 styles) or Egizio EF (2001), or Thierry Gouttenègre's Aldogizio (2013)]. For a specimen, see here.
  • Cigno (1954). This script typeface was revived an extended as P22 Cigno (2008, Colin Kahn, P22).
  • Swan (1954), aka Cigogna (with A. Butti).
  • Juliet (1954-55). For a superb revival and extension of this copperplate script, see Canada Type's Ambassador Script (2007).
  • Ritmo (1955)
  • Rhythm (1955)
  • Garaldus (1956-ff). A garalde digitally revived in 2012 as Garaldus by Flanker.
  • Slogan (1957). Digital revival by Terry Wudenbachs in 2010 called P22 Slogan.
  • Recta (1958-1961). This is a large sans family. Canada Type published an 18-font revival in 2011, also called Recta.
  • Estro (1961). A western font now found in the Mecanorma collection.
  • Fancy (1961)
  • Exempla (1961). Published by VGC in 1966. Third Prize in the 1966 VGC National Type Face Design Competition.
  • The Eurostile family (1952: caps, with Alessandro Butti; 1962: lower case). This is carried by many foundries such as Adobe, Linotype, and URW++. Eurostile lookalikes include Aldostile (Autologic), ES (Itek), Eurasia (SoftMaker), Eurogothic, Eurostar (MGI Software), Eurostile, Eurostile Next (Akira Kobayashi), Gamma, Jura (Daniel Johnson), Microgramma, MicroSquare (SoftMaker), Microstyle (Compugraphic), NuevoSolStile (Cayo Navarro), SD Eurostile Elite (Justin Rotkowitz), Square 721 (Bitstream), Waltham. Noteworthy is Eurostile Round (2014), a rounded version of Eurostile by URW++.
  • Patrizia
  • Magister (1966)
  • Forma (1966). Alessandro Colizzi explains: From 1965, following a marketing-oriented approach focused on the user, the management set a research group of graphic designers to work on a new typeface design. Headed by Novarese, who provided the basic alphabet, the team included Franco Grignani, Giancarlo Iliprandi, Till Neuburg, Ilio Negri, Pino Tovaglia, Luigi Oriani, and Bruno Munari. The collective design process was based on an analysis of contemporary sanserif typefaces and legibility tests, to develop a more mature, humane interpretation of the Swiss sanserif trend. The process was quite laborious with monthly meetings spanning across over two years. In 1968, Forma was eventually released as lead type. As its name implies, Forma aimed at representing the ideal letterform of its time, equally appealing to designers, printers and the general public. The typeface was favourably received by the design community (it won a special mention at Compasso d'oro in 1970), but although initial sales were encouraging, it could not really compete in a market already saturated by Univers, Helvetica and the like. . A grand revival of Forma, described by Indra Kupferschmdt, was organized by Roger Black for Hong Kong Tatler (as fashion mag). The revival was executed by Font Bureau's David Jonathan Ross in 2013. See David Jonathan Ross's site.
  • Oscar (1966)
  • Lambert (Compacta lookalike)
  • Metropol (1967). This gaspipe typeface was digitized by Patrick Griffin at Canada Type in 2007 as Press Gothic. Originally, it was meant as an alternative to Geoffrey Lee's Impact at Stephenson Blake.
  • Elite (1968, a boring linear script, digitized in 2005 by Canada Type as Fontella)
  • Fenice
  • Stop (1971; available at Mecanorma, Linotype, URW++, Elsner&Flake)
  • Dattilo (1974, an Egyptian face) (1974): his last creature for Nebiolo, a typewriter type. It was considered as a slab serif companion of Forma. This typeface was revived as a variable font in 2020 by David Jonathan Ross.
His post-Nebiolo fonts:
  • Primate (1972), for AG Berthold. For a digital revival of this wedge serif, see Luca Terzo's Noctis (2020).
  • Sintex 1 (VGC, 1973). A revival and expansion of this funky nightclub typeface was done in 2008 by Patrick Griffin at Canada Type as Stretto (2008).
  • Sprint (1974). A script typeface. Digital versons: Sprint (Linotype), Sprint (2019, SoftMaker).
  • Bloc (1974, VGC)
  • Mixage (1977 Haas, a lineal font, now ITC Mixage) 1985?
  • Novarese Book (1978, now ITC Novarese Book)
  • Lapidar (1977)
  • Andromeda (1978, VGC)
  • Global (1978, VGC)
  • Fenice (1977-80; now ITC Fenice)
  • Expert or Expert Haas (1982-1983). At Haas'sche Typefoundry.
  • Floreal Haas (1983). A decorative and slightly wavy serif published by Haas'sche Schriftgiesserei.
  • Colossal (1984); see Colossalis at Berthold, a slab serif sports lettering family)
  • Stadio (1974). A reverse contrast sans that was published only as a rub-on transfer typeface. Revived in 2020 by the Zetafonts team as Stadio Now.
  • Symbol (1982-1984, now ITC Symbol)
  • Arbiter (1989, Berthold)

View Aldo Novarese's typefaces. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Aldo Novarese: Alfa Beta (1964)

Alfa Beta is a text book written by Aldo Novarese in 1964. It is especially useful to learn for the first time about the differences between typefaces and about type classification. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Alejandro Fauré

Chilean illustrator and designer from the art nouveau era, 1865-1912. Check Alejandro Fauré Obre Gráfica (Mariana Muñoz and Fernanda Villalobos, 2009). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Aleksandra Korolkova

Graduate of Moscow University of Printing Arts in 2006 where she studied under Alexander Tarbeev. She teaches type design and typography there. In 2007, her book for Russian students on typography was published (English title: Alive Typography). She received many awards for her work and is a frequent speaker at type design conferences. In particular, she received the prestigious Prix Charles Peignot in 2013. After that she became Type Director at ParaType in Moscow.

Designer of the beautiful Cyrillic serif family Leksa (a winner at Paratype K2009) and the accompanying Leksa Sans family from 2004 until 2007. This was followed by equally gorgeous families such as Fence (2009, an ultra-fat artistic beauty). Skoropix is an experimental pixel typeface done with FontStruct.

She also made Belladonna (2008, a stunning modern typeface for Latin and Cyrillic; a winner at Paratype K2009 and Grand Prize winner at Granshan 2011), Skoropix (with FontStruct), and the experimental typeface Cless (2009). She spoke about Cyrillic at ATypI 2008 in St. Petersburg. She received a TypeArt 05 award for the display family Fourty-nine face. Alternate URL.

At MyFonts, one can buy Gorodets [2009: a Russian decoration typeface based on traditional wood-painting style from the town Gorodets on the Volga river, Russia], Leksa and Leksa Sans], Blonde Fraktur (2010: written with a quill by Alexandra Korolkova and prepared in digital form by Alexandra Pushkova), Airy (2010, a curly script), Airy Pictures (2010, animal and plant dingbats), Bowman (2010: a blackboard children's script), PT Serif (2011, Paratype's superfamily of 38 fonts, co-designed with Vladimir Yefimov and Olga Umpeleva; Open Font Library link), PT Circe (2011, a geometric sans family with a neat Thin weight; Third Prize for Cyrillic text typefaces at Granshan 2011), and Cless (2010: ultra fat and counterless).

Together with Isabella Chaeva, she made PT Mono (2012, Google Web Fonts and Open Font Library).

In 2012, Vasiliy Biryukov and Alexandra Korolkova co-designed the Christmas dingbat font Gingerbread House, together with a plump display face, Gingerbread.

In 2013, Vasily Biryukov and Alexandra Korolkova co-designed the soft roundish sans typeface Kiddy Kitty (link).

In 2014, she cooperated with Maria Selezenava on a revamped Journal Sans typeface at Paratype, called Journal Sans New (Latin and Cyrillic). This geometric sans in the style of Erbar Grotesk and Metro Sans is a major extension of the Journal Sans typeface (1940-1956, SPA, in metal form, and 1990s in digital form). Still in 2014, she co-designed Stem, a geometric large x-height Latin / Cyrillic sans serif with optical sizing, with Isabella Chaeva and Maria Selezeneva at Paratype. This was followed in 2015 by Stem Text.

In 2015, she and Alexander Lubovenko co-designed Circe Rounded, which is an extension of her earlier Circe typeface (2011), both published by Paratype. In 2018, Paratype extended that family with Circe Slab (by Alexandra Korolkova and Olexa Volochay). Still in 2015, Alexandra Korolkova and Alexander Lubovenko published Aphrosine at Paratype, a typeface based on pointed pen script and situated somewhere between handwriting and calligraphy. Many alternatives and smart OpenType features help Aphrosine look like real handwriting.

Codesigner of Kudryashev Display (2015, Isabella Chaeva, Alexandra Korolkova and Olga Umpeleva). Kudryashev Display is a set of light and high-contrast typefaces based on Kudryashev text typeface. In addition to Kudryashev Display and Kudryashev Headline typefaces, the type family includes also two Peignotian sans-serif typefaces of the same weight and contrast, with some alternates. The serif styles were designed by Olga Umpeleva in 2011, the sans styles were created by Isabella Chaeva in 2015 with the participation of Alexandra Korolkova.

In 2016, she designed FF Carina, a delicate and absolutely stunning decorative didone.

In 2018, Alexandra Korolkova and Manvel Shmavonyan designed Fact at Paratype. Fact (2018) is based on Frutiger. The Fact type system contains 48 upright styles with variations in width and weight and eight italics of normal width. At the end of 2018, Alexandra Korolkova, Alexander Lubovenko, and the Paratype team finished Six Hands, which is a collection of six handcrafted typefaces: Black, Brush, Chalk, Marker, Condensed and Rough.

In 2019, Vitaly Kuzmin and Alexandra Korolkova co-designed the free sans serif typeface Golos Text at Paratype. It was originally commissioned by Smena (AIC Group) for state and social service websites.

Typefaces from 2020: Sber (the type system for Russia's Sber Bank; by Korolkova and the Paratype team), Tupo Vyaz (a free modular closed sans serif font with very simple design and some elements from the northern variant of Vyaz slavonic calligraphic hand), Grrr (at Paratype, with Dmiry Goloub; a techno family characterized by an oversized lower case f).

MyFonts interview. Kernest link. Klingspor link.

View Alexandra Korolkova's typefaces. Speaker at ATypI 2019 in Tokyo. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Alessio Leonardi
[BuyMyFonts (or: BMF)]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Alexander Koch

Author of 600 Monogramme Und Zeichen (Darmstadt, 1920). Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Alexander W. White

New York-based designer of the revival fonts Preissig Antikva, Preissig Italika, Menhart Italika and Menhart Manuscript, which won awards at the TDC2 2001 competition (Type Directors Club). He is a professor of graphic design at the Hartford Art School of the University of Hartford, and specializes in publication design. Author of the bestseller How to Spec Type, Type In Use", The Elements of Graphic Design (2002, Allworth Press), and Thinking in Type (2005). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Alfa-Beta
[Davide Tomatis]

Davide Tomatis of Archivio Tipografico in Turin, Italy, is curating the reissue of Alfa-Beta, a book by the Italian type designer Aldo Novarese, originally from 1964 and out of print since a long time. The Alfa Beta team is collaborating with Novarese's family, namely his second daughter Federica, and his granddaughter Francesca Faro (daughter of Gabriella Novarese), to republish it, after having found all the original films. The book will be translated by Alta Price. The first edition of Alfa-Beta (published in 1964 by Progresso Grafico and distributed by G.B. Paravia) reviewed the evolution of writing systems and typography from their advent up to the present day. Kickstarter link (June 2020).

In addition, the project aims to revive Also Novarese's Nova Augustea (1964), which in turn was based on Alessandro Butti's Augustea. That revival will be done by Studio 23.56. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Alfred John Fairbank

English calligrapher, b. 1895, Grimsby, d. 1982, Hove, Sussex. Student at the Central School of Arts and Crafts, disciple (in his own words) of Edward Johnston. In 1921, he co-founded the Society of Scribes and Illuminators, and was honorary secretary from 1931 to 1933.

He wrote several books on handwriting, including A Handwriting Manual (1932), many times reissued, e.g., in 1954 by Faber and faber in London. In 1960, Alfred Fairbank and Berthold Wolpe co-authored Renaissance handwriting: An anthology of italic scripts (Cleveland: World Publishing Co). His last book was A Book of Scripts (1968, London: Pelican Books).

In 1932, Alfred Fairbank proposed Dryad Writing for schools. It is a connected regular and legible style of writing that was influenced by Francisco Lucas (16th century, Spain), and could be called chancery script. After the Second World War he founded the Society for Italic Handwriting.

His only typeface was the first italic for Monotype, Bembo. This was not the italic that was put out for general use, and was eventually released (in 1928) as Bembo Narrow Italic. It is sometimes referred to as Fairbank Italic. The Bembo family is of course due to Stanley Morison at Monotype, after models of Francesco Griffo and Giovanni Tagliente. It has digital reinterpretations such as Bamberg Special (Softmaker) and Bergamo (Softmaker).

It is possible that Fairbank MT (2003, Robin Nicholas) is named after him. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Allan Haley

Allan Haley was the principal of Resolution, a consulting firm with expertise in type; his clients included Apple, Adobe, Linotype, Xerox, IBM, and Agfa Monotype. He was also the Chairman of the Advisory Board of the Goudy International Center at RIT. He was the Typographic Consultant to Compugraphic Corporation. Haley was principal of Resolution, a consulting firm with expertise in fonts, font technology, type and typographic communication. Allan joined ITC in 1981, and became its executive vice president of ITC. He wrote for publications such as U&lc, How, Dynamic Graphics, and Step-by-Step Graphics. He is highly regarded as an educator, and he is a frequently requested speaker. He has written five books on type and graphic communication. Presently, Allan Haley is Director of Words & Letters at Monotype Imaging.

At ATypI in Rome in 2002, he spoke about the development of ITC Bodoni. His books:

  • ABCs of Type : A Guide to Contemporary Typefaces, A Step-by-Step Publishing Book (1990).
  • Alphabet : The History, Evolution,&Design of the Letters We Use Today (1995).
  • Type : Hot Designers Make Cool Fonts (1998).
  • Typographic Milestones (Van Nostrand Reinhold, New York, 1992).
  • Phototypography: A Guide to In-House Typesetting and Design (Charles Scribner's Sons, 1980).
He also writes many essays---one particularly noteworthy is about Bodoni. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Alpha Beta

A 320-page book about the origins of the Latin alphabet, by John Man. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Alphabeta Linguarum Orientalium: typia congregationia de propag. fide

Collection of texts published between 1629 and 1789 in Rome. Digital versions: here, here. Local downloads: Part I, part II. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Alphabets and Others

Walter B. Clement and Ian L. Robertson wrote Alphabets and Others (1988, The Armstrong Press and The Slow Loris Press, Alabama) This 74-page book contains wood type specimens, all clearly identified. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Alphabets de Style

A late 19th century book by an unknown author containing many exquisite ornamental caps alphabets. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Alphabetum
[Juan-José Marcos García]

Juan-José Marcos García (b. Salamanca, Spain, 1963) is a professor of classics at the University of Plasencia in Spain. He has developed one of the most complete Unicode fonts named ALPHABETUM Unicode for linguistics and classical languages (classical&medieval Latin, ancient Greek, Etruscan, Oscan, Umbrian, Faliscan, Messapic, Picene, Iberic, Celtiberic, Gothic, Runic, Modern Greek, Cyrillic, Devanagari-based languages, Old&Middle English, Hebrew, Sanskrit, IPA, Ogham, Ugaritic, Old Persian, Old Church Slavonic, Brahmi, Glagolitic, Ogham, ancient Greek Avestan, Kharoshti, Old Norse, Old Icelandic, Old Danish and Old Nordic in general, Bengali, Hindi, Marathi, Phoenician, Cypriot, Linear B with plans for Glagolitic). This font has over 5000 glyphs, and contains most characters that concern classicists (rare symbols, signs for metrics, epigraphical symbols, "Saxon" typeface for Old English, etcetera). A demo font can be downloaded [see also Lucius Hartmann's place]. His Greek font Grammata (2002) is now called Ellenike.

He also created a package of fonts for Latin paleography (medieval handwriting on parchments): Capitalis Elegans, Capitalis Rustica, Capitalis Monumentalis, Antiqua Cursiva Romana, Nova Cursiva Romana (2014), Uncialis, Semiuncialis, Beneventana Minuscula, Visigothica Minuscula, Luxoviensis Minuscula, Insularis Minuscula, Insularis Majuscula, Carolingia Minuscula, Gothica Textura Quadrata, Gothica Textura Prescissa, Gothica Rotunda, Gothica Bastarda, Gothica Cursiva, Bastarda Anglicana (2014) and Humanistica Antiqua. PDF entitled Fonts For Latin Palaeography (2008-2014), in which Marcos gives an enjoyable historic overview.

Alphabetum is not Marcos's only excursion into type design. In 2011, he created two simulation fonts called Sefarad and Al Andalus which imitate Hebrew and Arabic calligraphy, respectively.

Cyrillic OCS (2012) is a pair of Latin fonts that emulate Old Church Slavonic (old Cyrillic).

In 2013, he created Cuneus, a cuneiform simulation typeface.

Paleographic fonts for Greek (2014) has ten fonts designed by Marcos: Angular Uncial, Biblical Uncial, Coptic Uncial, Papyrus Uncial, Round Uncial, Slavonic Uncial, Sloping Uncial, Minuscule IX, Minuscule XI and Minuscule XV. These fonts are representative of the main styles of Greek handwriting used during the Classical World and Middle Ages on papyrus and parchments. There is also a short manual of Greek Paleography (71 pages) which explains the development of Greek handwriting from the fourth century B.C. to the invention of printing with movable type in the middle of the fifteenth A.D. He wrote a text book entitled History of Greek Typography: From the Invention of Printing to the Digital Age (in Spanish; second edition, 2018). See also here and here. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Alphonso Edwin Tripp

Unconventional artist of the 1930s (b. 1889), who is credited with the art deco typeface Dignity Roman, which was digitized by Nick Curtis in 2002, and called Day Tripper NF, and also in 2000, when it was called Odalisque NF. He also has it as Heavy Tripp.

Author of Modern lettering&design (1929, Chicago: Frederick J. Drake&Co. n.).

The alphabets shown in his 1929 book: Poster Headline, Poster Strong, Roman Heavy Poster, Speedball Classic, Dignity Roman, Classic Roman, Roman Bold, Forty-five Degree. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Alston W. Purvis

Author of various books on design and/or typefaces, including History of Graphic Design (Philip B. Meggs, Alston W. Purvis), Creative Type: A Sourcebook of Classic and Contemporary Letterforms (2005, Thames&Hudson, NY; by Cees De Jong, Alston Purvis and Friedrich Friedl), Type: A Visual History of Typefaces and Graphic Styles, Vol. 1 (2009, Taschen; authors Jan Tholenaar and Alston W. Purvis, edited by Cees De Jong), and Type: A Visual History of Typefaces&Graphic Styles, 1901-1938 (v. 2) (2010, Taschen; edited by Cees De Jong). The latter book features works by type designers including William Caslon, Fritz Helmuth Ehmcke, Peter Behrens, Rudolf Koch, Eric Gill, Jan van Krimpen, Paul Renner, Jan Tschichold, A. M. Cassandre, Aldo Novarese, and Adrian Frutiger. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Amazon.com

Typography books at Amazon. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Ambroise Firmin Didot

Member of the famous French printers family, 1790-1876. Author of Essai sur la Typographie. Paris, typographie de Firmin Didot frère (1851). Bigmore & Wyman mention that This work, an excerpt from the "Encylopédie Moderne," contains the result of the author's lengthened experience, and of his vast theoretical and practical knowledge of the subject. The early history of printing is treated with great clearness and a thorough acquaintance with the best authorities. [Google] [More]  ⦿

American Sign Museum

Founded by Tod Swormstedt, former editor and publisher of Signs of the Times magazine, the American Sign Museum (est. 2005) is based in Cincinnati, OH. Mike Jackson at the American Sign Museum lists the top 25 early sign making books, roughly in order of his personal preference. Many of these contain great alphabets that can provide inspiration. His list with Mike Jackson's comments in italic:

  • Frank Atkinson: Art of Sign Painting (1909, 1915, 1929, 1937, 1983, 1985, 1991). Probably the single most influential sign making book of its time.
  • C.J. Strong: Strong's Book of Designs (1910, 1917, 1982). C.J. Strong was very influential in the sign world following the turn of the century. This book has been reprinted several times, however all the early editions were spattered with wonderful color plates. Strong was also responsible for the Detroit School of Lettering at this time.
  • R. Henderson: Henderson Sign Painter (1906, 1991). Another of the sought after period books; originals are fairly scarce. R. Henderson seemed to be the person responsible for compiling the book of plates by various noteworthy sign designers of the time. The Denver artist, John G. Ohnimus, stands out among the group with striking images, lettering, and layouts.
  • Al. Imelli: Alphabets and Layouts (1922). Loaded with alphabets.
  • Fred Knopf: Coast Manual of Lettering and Designs (1907). Fred Knopf and J. M. Mahaffey compiled a wonderful book of layouts, designs, and alphabets using some of their own material and a who's who list of outstanding sign designers of the period.
  • J.N. Halsted: Modern Ornament & Design (1927, 1985). An original of this little jewel is very hard to find. With no alphabets, J.N. Halsted concentrated on illustrations, ornaments and graphic design.
  • E.C. Matthews: Sign Painting Course (1954, 1958). This book is heavily illustrated with his layouts, letterstyles, and ornaments but the text which covers about half of each page is equally informative.
  • Thaddeus David: David's Practical Letterer (1903). This book was published by Thaddeus Davids Company but was compiled by Sidney Hackes and was illustrated by Arnold Binger. The first half of the book is fairly generic with basic instructions on brush and pen lettering.
  • Charles Wagner: Blueprint Textbook of Sign & Showcard Lettering (1926). Charles Wagner operated the Wagner School of Sign Arts in Boston and this book was used as the textbook.
  • E.L. Koller: Artistic Showcards-How to Design and Make Them (1924). E.L. Koller was the Director of Art Schools for the International Correspondence Schools and it appears it was mostly his artwork used in those textbooks. This book includes layouts, letterstyles, color schemes and ornamentation.
  • H.C. Martin: 1000 Showcard Layouts (1928, 1930, 1984). An amazing book if only from the realization of the effort it took to produce it! H.C. Martin, a frequent contributor to Signs of the Times Magazine, was commissioned to produce a book of 1000 showcard layouts specifically to be used in a book.
  • Samuel Welo: Studio Handbook (1927, 1935). This book features numerous hand-lettered alphabets and several pages of ornaments, dingbats, and panel layouts.
  • W.A. Herberling: Basic Lettering (1922). W.A. Heberling was the Instructor of Sign, Scene, and Pictorial Painting at the Mooseheart Vocational Institute in Mooseheart, IL. This book was also used as a textbook, taking beginners through the basics right up to painted pictorial billboards.
  • Ashmun Kelly: The Expert Sign Painter (1910 (1922)). Ashmun Kelly wrote this book for the technical side of the sign trade audience. He explains some of the most complex elements and techniques of the trade including gilding, mirroring, frosting, and embossing.
  • Raymond J. LeBlanc: Gold Leaf Techniques (1961 (plus numerous reprints)). Raymond J. LeBlanc wrote the quintessential book on working with goldleaf of the time. With a few revisions to allow for updated materials, most of the techniques described in his first book are still being used today.
  • Don Sturdivant: Modern Showcard and Theatrical Lettering (1948). Don Sturdivant produced this book at a time when showcards were still commonplace from department stores to theaters. By that time, showcard writing was a fairly specialized part of the sign industry even though the same theories of layout and design applied across the board.
  • Bill Boley: Basiks of Lettering (1952). Bill Boley's general script look was quickly adopted by many of the handlettering artists of the day. Only six different alphabets are shown.
  • Alf R. Becker: One Hundred Alphabets (1941). Alf Becker produced this book for Signs of the Times Publishing Company and who advertised it in their magazines for quite a few years. There were numerous other titles touting a collection of alphabets, but this one seems to have been the most popular even though finding an original is still tough.
  • Duke Wellington: Theory and Practice of Poster Art (1934, 1986). Duke Wellington worked in some of the finest poster and card shops of the time and many of the projects in the book have a strong movie theme. While there are several color plates, the majority of the book consists of black and white photos of his cards and numerous pages of Deco style images and layouts.
  • J.M. Bergling: Art Alphabets and Lettering (1918). J.M. Bergling produced four books of merit which were considered technical art books. They were produced for architects, craftsmen, engrossers, engravers, lettering specialists and commercial artists and were reprinted numerous times throughout the century. The latest known editions were printed in 1980.
  • George: Speedball Lettering Books (1923-1952). A constant source of inspiration.
  • E.L. Koller: ITC & ICS- Correspondence School Textbooks (1924-1935). During this period, the International Textbook Company and International Correspondence School produced dozens of sign-related books. Actually these were textbooks usually sharing some of the same chapters. E.L. Koller is credited with much of the text and illustrations used in the textbooks and he did produce a similar set of stand alone books with much of the same information.
  • H.C. Martin: Martin's Idea Books 1-4 (1935-1937). This group of four Speedball-sized booklets showcased Martin's later work with even more zest and eye appeal than the original book. #4 was produced in 1937.
  • C.J. Strong: Detroit School of Lettering 1-10 (1905). C.J. Strong owned and operated the Detroit School of Lettering along with a mail order supply department. This group of ten booklets are about the same size as a normal Speedballlettering book, but slightly thinner.
  • D.M. Campana: The Artist and Decorator (1925). An art nouveau text influenced by Alphonse Mucha.
[Google] [More]  ⦿

American Technical Society

The American Technical Society published Cyclopedia of Architecture, Carpentry and Building in 1908 in Chicago. This text contains a chapter dedicated to architectural lettering. [Google] [More]  ⦿

American Type Founders Company: Handy Specimen Book, 1897

A free PDF version of ATF's Handy Specimen Book: Specimens of Type Borders and Ornaments, Brass Rules, Wood Type, etc. (Buffalo, NY, 1897). Alternate download URL. [Google] [More]  ⦿

American Type Founders Company: Specimen Book And Catalogue 1923

The famous ATF catalog from 1923 is available, free to download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

American Type Founders (or: ATF)

In 1892, twenty-three type foundries joined together to compete with the new typesetting machine, the Linotype [and later, the Monotype], to form ATF, which consolidated its type manufacturing facilities in a new plant in Jersey City in 1903. They were the dominant foundry in America until 1933, when ATF went bankrupt. Its collection remains intact at the American Type Founders Company Library&Museum at Columbia University in New York. The Smithsonian possesses most of the original type drawings and many of the matrices, and a number of other institutions and private individuals own matrices. Interestingly, despite the bankruptcy, it continued in operation until 1993, when the Elizabeth, NJ plant was finally liquidated. It was Kingsley's bankruptcy in 1993 that forced the final closure of ATF. In the early part of the 20th century, ATF was the dominant American foundry.

Their specimen books are classics:

MyFonts link.

A brief history of ATF by Carol Van Houten. Reference books.

View the digital typefaces that are based (fully, or in part) on ATF's typefaces. See also here, here, and here. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

American Wood Type Manufacturing Company

Wood type company that was located in Manhattan. Their catalogs include Wood Type Printers Equipment and Supplies (1938) and Printers Supplies Wood Type Metal Type (1960s). [Google] [More]  ⦿

An exploration of the Latin Modern fonts
[Will Robertson]

Article in The PracTeX Journal, 2006, no. 1, by Will Robertson, a PhD student in Mechanical/Mechatronic Engineering in the University of Adelaide, South Australia. The Latin Modern family was originally designed by Jackowski and Nowacki to cover as many languages as possible: it has over 69,000 glyphs. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Andrea Brogiotti

Or Andreas Brogiottus. Author of Indice de'caratteri con l'inventori et nomi di essi esistenti nella stampa Vaticana et Camerale (1628, Stampa Vaticana). Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Andrea Brugiotti

Publisher of "Spécimen des caractères de l'imprimerie du Vatican" (Stampa Vaticana e camerale, 1628). Republished as The type specimen of Vatican Press with an introduction and notes by H.D.L. Vervliet at Menho Hertzberger, Amsterdam, in 1967. See also here for this 49-page book. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Andrea Schweiger

Coauthor with André Gürtler of Die Handschrift, Comedia, edition 02-4, 2002. [Google] [More]  ⦿

André Jammes

French type and photography historian, b. 1927, who is the son of Paul Jammes, who founded Librairie Paul Jammes in Paris in 1925. Author of many books. Those relevant to typography include:

  • La naissance d'un caractère: le Grandjean---la réforme de la typographie royale sous Louis XIV, Librairie Paul Jammes (1961) and Promodis (1985).
  • Didotiana, recueil d'articles consacrés à Ambroise-Firmin Didot, in Bulletin du bibliophile, 1990-1993, Paris, 1994.
  • Spécimens de caractères de Firmin et Jules Didot, Paris, Librairie P. Jammes Éditions des Cendres, 2002.
  • (with Isabelle Jammes) Collection de spécimens de caractères: 1517-2004, catalog, Paris, P. Jammes Éditions des Cendres, 2006.
  • Alde, Renouard & Didot: bibliophilie & bibliographie, Paris, Éditions des Cendres, 2008.
[Google] [More]  ⦿

André Vigneau

Author of [Etude publicitaire pour la fonderie] Deberny et Peignot. [Caractères d'imprimerie] (1932, Paris). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Andreas Stötzner
[SIAS (or: Signographical Institute Andreas Stötzner)]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Andreu Balius Planelles

Born in Barcelona in 1962, Andreu Balius studied Sociology in the Universidad Autonoma de Barcelona (1980-1984), and graphic design at IDEP in Barcelona (1985-1989). He holds a PhD in Design from the University of Southampton (UK). He founded Garcia Fonts&Co in Barcelona in 1993 to show his experimental designs. He cofounded Typerware in 1996 with Joancarles P. Casasín. Typerware existed until 2001 and was based in Santa Maria de Martorelles, a village near Barcelona. He cofounded Type Republic (see also here), and ran Andreu Balius (tipo)graphic design. He is presently an associate professor at Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona.

Balius won a Bukvaraz 2001 award for Pradell. Pradell also won an award at the TDC2 Type Directors Club's Type Design Competition 2002. SuperVeloz (codesigned with Alex Trochut) won an award at the TDC2 2005 type competition.

At ATypI 2005 in Helsinki, he spoke on Pradell and Super-Veloz. Speaker at ATypI 2006 in Lisbon. At ATypI 2009 in Mexico City, he spoke about the Imprenta Real. Coorganizer of ATypI 2014 in Barcelona.

Author of Type at work. The use of Type in Editorial Design, published in English by BIS (Amsterdam, 2003).

FontFont link. Linotype link. Behance link.

His production:

  • Garcia/Typerware offers about 50 fonts, including some very artsy typefaces, such as Fabrique (Andreu Balius), Futuda, Garcia Bodoni (Typerware), Alkimia (Estudi Xarop), Ariadna (pixel font, 1988-1989), Garcia Bitmap (1993), Playtext (Andreu Balius, 1995), Matilde Script (Andreu Balius, 1994: an embroidery face), Fabrique (1993, Andreu Balius) and Dinamo (1993, Balius and Casasin at Typerware), Helvetica Fondue (1993-1994), Futuda (1993), Ozo Type (1994), Tiparracus (1994, dingbats), Mi mama Me Soba Script (1994), Parkinson (1994), Garcia Bodoni (1995), Garcia snack's (1993-1995), Juan Castillo Script (1995, irregular handwriting), and Vizente Fuster (1995), all by Andreu Balius and Joancarles Casasin, 1993-1995; Water Knife (Laudelino L.Q., 1995); Alquimia (Estudi Xarop, 1995); Jam Jamie (Malcolm Webb, 1996); Network (Alex Gifreu, 1996); Panxo-Pinxo (David Molins, 1996); Euroface 80 mph (Peter Bilak, 1996); Inmaculatta (Roberto Saenz Maguregui, 1997); Proceso Sans (by Argentinan Pablo Cosgaya, 1996); Afligidos deudos (Adria Gual, 1996); Route 66 (Francesc Vidal, 1997); Popular (Sergi Ibanez, 1997); Visible (handwriting by Fabrice Trovato, 1997); SoundFile (Reto Brunner, 1998); Ninja type (kana-lookalike alphabet by Charly Brown, 1995); Vertigo (Charly Brown, 1996); Loop UltraNormal (Franco and Sven, 1996); Inercia (Inigo Jerez, 1996).
  • Fontshop: FF Fontsoup.
  • ITC: ITC Temble (1996, a great subdued ghoulish face). With Joancarles P. Casasin, he created ITC Belter (1996) and ITC Belter Mega Outline (1996).
  • Typerware: Czeska was developed from Vojtech Preissig's woodtype typefaces. Andreu Balius completed the design and included an italic version and a large variety of ligatures (both for regular and italic).
  • Type Republic: Pradell, Trochut, SuperVeloz, SV Marfil Caps (2004), SV Fauno Caps. Pradell was freely inspired from punches cut by catalan punchcutter Eudald Pradell (1721-1788), and is considered to be Balius' main work. Trochut is based on specimens from the 1940s by Joan Trochut. SuperVeloz is a collection of the type modules designed by Joan Trochut and produced at José Iranzo foundry in the beginning of the 40's, in Barcelona. Digitized and recovered by Andreu Balius and Alex Trochut in 2004. Example of such composition of modules include the great art nouveau typefaces SV Fauno Caps and SV Marfil Caps. In 2007, he added Taüll, a blackletter type. Still in 2007, he did the revival Elizabeth ND, which was based on an old type of Elizabeth Friedlander.
  • In 2008, he created the Vogue mag like family Carmen (Display, Fiesta, Regular), which are rooted in the didone style. Carmen, and its flirtatious companion Carmen Fiesta, were both reviewed by Typographica.
  • Barna (2011) and Barna Stencil (2011).
  • In 2012, Trochut was published as a free font family at Google Web Fonts. It was based on Joan Trochut-Blanchard's Bisonte.
  • Lladro (2012) is a custom sans typeface done for the Lladro company.
  • Rioja (2013) is a grotesque typeface that was custom-designed for Universidad de La Rioja.
[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Andrew Haslam

Phil Baines and Andrew Haslam wrote Type&Typography (2002) [German version: Lust auf Schrift! Basiswissen Typografie, Verlag Hermann Schmidt Mainz], a crash course in typography that is generally well received. Speaker at ATypI 2007 in Brighton and at ATypI 2014 in Barcelona (talk: 6x6: Collaborative Letterpress Dialogues, with Alexander Cooper and Rose Gridneff). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Angus Duggan's home page

Contains a bibliography on type. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Ann Camp

Author of Pen Lettering (1958), an interesting penmanship book. The construction of an alphabet as presented by Ian Taylor on his blog, based on Ann Camp's book, is fascinating. It all starts with a square, and within it, an inscribed circle and an oblong rectangle of area equal to the circle. All letters relate, as Ann Camp shows, to that basic structure. Ann's all caps skeleton alphabet obtained in this manner predates Avant Garde and Herb Lubalin by almost twenty years! [Google] [More]  ⦿

Anne Cuneo

Author of "Le maître de Garamond" (Editions Stock, 2002), a beautiful book on the life and death of Antoine Augereau, who was Claude Garamond's teacher and mentor. Anne Cuneo was born in 1936 in Italy and lives in Zürich. Comment by Guy Schockaert: Le 24 décembre 1534, place Maubert, accusé d'hérésie, Antoine Augereau est pendu, son corps et ses mains brûlées. Homme de lettres, érudit, théologien, Antoine Augereau était un grand imprimeur, éditeur et graveur de caractères typographiques. Il modela ceux dont nous nous servons encore aujourd'hui, et avec Clément Marot, inventa l'usage des accents et de la cédille. La publication du Miroir de l'âme de Marguerite de Navarre lui coûtera la vie. La Sorbonne, gardienne jalouse d'une orthodoxie figée, désapprouve la pensée de la soeur de François Ier, mais ne peut la condamner. Antoine Augereau paiera pour elle. Racontée par le plus célèbre de ses disciples, l'histoire passionnante et émouvante d'un humaniste prêt à mourir pour défendre ses idées. UN livre à lire absolument et à offrir. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Annette Ludwig

Director of the Gutenberg Museum. In 2016, Petra Eisele, Annette Ludwig and Isabel Naegele published Futura: Die Schrift (in German). The English version Futura: The Typeface (Laurence King) followed in 2017. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Annie Thomson

Author of Tipografia En Los 70 (2010: Ediciones Cifuentes, Barcelona). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Anonima Impressori

Graphic design studio in Bologna, Italy, run jointly by Veronica Bassini, Massimo Pastore, Luca lattuga and Roberto Malpensa. Their interest in wood and old lead types in relatively unknown Italian print shops led to a wonderful (wood) type catalog started in 2011, Catalogo Caratteri in Piombo e Legno. That book covers these companies: Tipografia Girasole (Inzago), Tipografia Nazionale (Piacenza), Tipografia Co.Ba (Massa Finalese), Tipografia Artigiana (Vignola), Tipografia Artestampa (Corinaldo), Tipografia Tade (Empoli), Tipografia Riva (Solara di Bomporto Tipografia Sociale (Arezzo), Tipografia Minetti (Rossiglione), Tipografia Aldo Sacco (Vercelli), Tipografia STEM Mucchi (ex Soliani) (Modena Tipografia Nuovagraf (ex Perfecta) (Roma Tipografia Il Dado (ex Pivetti) (Mirandola Tipografia Golinelli (Mirandola), Tipografia Lugli (Rolo), Tipografia Bagnoli (Pieve di Cento), Tipografia La Commerciale (Fidenza), Tipografia Galeati (Imola), Tipografia Perini (Rovigo), Tipografia La Fiorentina (Grosseto), Tipografia Tiferno (Citta di Castello), Tipografia Bottega della Stampa (Sansepolcro Tipografia Montagna (Voghera), Tipografia Artigiani Tipografi (Voghera), Tipografia Emiliana (ex Amici) (Castel San Giovanni Tipografia Valvassori (Vigevano), Tipografia FG (Vicchio), Tipografia Greco Remo (Sorbara), Tipografia Adriatica (Cervia), Tipografia Valpadana (Brescello), Centro Stampa (Poviglio), Tipografia Zanichelli (Sassuolo), Tipografia ArteGrafica 91 (Castellarano), Tipografia Caiti (Reggio Emilia), Tipolitografia Moderna (Reggio Emilia), Grafiche La Comasina (Senna Comasco), Tipografia RD (Medicina), Tipografia Conti (Bologna), Unione Tipografica Operaia (Macerata), Tipografia La Tipografica (Poggibonsi), Tipografia Pesatori (Milano), Tipografia 2000 (Pesaro), Tipografia Antonio La Grotteria (Roma), Tipolito Lugli (Novellara), Tipografia Rossi (San Pietro in Casale), Litotipografia M.P.P. (Modena), Tipografia Lecchese (ex Adda) (Lecco), Tipografia Ghibaudo (Cuneo), Tipografia Botalla (Biella), Tipografia BC (Bologna), Tipografia Olmo (Clusone), Tipografia Fanti (Formigine), Tipolito Ennio Cappetta (Foggia), Tipografia Valgiusti (Bagni di Romagna), Tipografia Guidi (San Piero in Bagno), Tipografia Croppi (Forli), Tipografia Zoli (Forli), Tipografia Pontone (Cassino), Artigrafiche Franco Antoni (Mesagne), Tipolito Valprint (Grezzana), Grafica Sestrere (Sestri Levante), Tipografia Scaletta (Ravenna), Tipografia Uggeri (Cremona), Tipografia Brigati & Molinari (Castel San Giovanni), Tipografia Aldo Sacco (Vercelli), Tipografia Grassigli (San Giovanni in Persiceto), Tipografia Banina (San Colombano al Lambro), Tipografia Reggiana (Reggio Emilia), Tipografia Segreti (Porto San Giorgio), Poligrafico Silva (Parma), Tipografia La Rapida (Mantova), Tipografia E Comelli (Garessio), Tipografia Artegrafica Sociale (Cittadella), Tipografia Boni (Sassuolo), Tipolitografia Savino (Gambolo), Tipografia Bramante (Loreto), Tipografia Martini (Ostiglia), SCIA (Bologna), Grafiche Malvezzi (ex Pennaroli) (Fiorenzuola), Tipografia SMA (Cogoleto), Tipografia Sciocchetti (San Benedetto del Tronto), Tipografia Demetri e Crepaldi (Polesella), Tipografia G. Palermo (Adrano), Tipografia BEMA (Belletti Alberto E C.) (Bellaria), Tipografia SIACA (Cento), Tipografia FD (Bologna), Tipografia F.lli Tine (Floridia), Tipografia Anigoni (Reggio Emilia), Grafiche Vianello (Treviso). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Anthon Beeke

Author of Body Type (1969), reedited in 2011 by Spinhex, Amsterdam, with the help of René Knip. Nijhof and Lee write: Body Type is a re-edition of the legendary naked-women alphabet by Anthon Beeke originally published in 1969. This alphabet, which was published in the famous Kwadraadblad serie by Pieter Brattinga, is a carefully composed representation of the letters of the alphabet using naked women. Beeke made the alphabet as a tongue in cheek response to Wim Crouwel's New Alphabet published in the same serie a year earlier. This new edition which is in colour, is complimented and enlarged with the numbers modelled by naked men all on individual sheets. It also contains a cahier with the history of the alphabet and a block containing the letters which can be used to make a streamer. His alphabet is also referred to as the "Nude Alphabet" in Kwadraat (Steendrukkerij De Jong&Co, Hilversum, The Netherlands, 1970). Using twelve nude women, it is also known as Naked Ladies.

Anthon Beeke died in 2018. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Anthony DiVivo

Anthony hails from Northern New Jersey and studied design at the School of Visual Arts in New York, where he earned an MFA in 2001. He has worked as a designer in New York (where he currently lives), San Francisco and Miami. Author of Devil Type, a headline type specimen book. He designed many custom typefaces, which are showcased at his Behance site. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Antikvariat Morris

Swedish bookstore offering many valuable historical books on typography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Antiquariaat A. Kok&Zn.

Great old type book store in Amsterdam. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Antiquariaat Adr. van den Bemt

Dutch antique book seller specializing in typography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Aon Celtic Art
[Cari Buziak]

Cari Buziak (Calgary, Canada) is the author of Calligraphy Magic---How to Create Lettering, Knotwork, Coloring and More (North Light, 2011).

She also created the beautiful freeware Celtic font family Aon Cari (1998, a modern pseudo-Gaelic uncial).

Dafont link. [Google] [More]  ⦿

A.P. Boyce

Author of The Art of Lettering and Sign Painting Manual (1878). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Archer Zuo
[Zuo Zuotype (or: Zuo Zuo Studio)]

[More]  ⦿

Archive.org: Type and Typefounding

Copyright-free type and typefounding books. Several type specimen books from the University of California Library Collection have been scanned in by Microsoft. Other libraries are participating as well. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Ari Davidow

Hebrew type designer. He now runs a nice Hebrew type blog and news page. This has a great Hebrew Typography Annotated Bibliography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Arktype (was: Atelier René Knip)
[René Knip]

Dutch type designer located in Bloemendaal. Jan Middendorp wrote about him in A.R.K. Ten Years of Type Related Projects 1994-2004 (2004), summarizing Knip's work at Atelier René Knip, mostly experiments in type design. Knip (b. 1963) is a graduate from the St. Joost Academy in Breda, class of 1990. Since 1992, Knip has operated a design studio in Amsterdam, Atelier René Knip.

Recently, Knip and his brother Edgar formed a new company, Gebroeders Knip, which produces furniture and accessories in which letterforms are integral parts of the objects design.

One of his experiments, a unicase typeface with an Arabic feel, was digitized by Nick Curtis as Turban Hey NF (2008).

In October 2012, Knip and another Dutch designer cofounded Arktype, but by 2020, the other Dutch designer left that company.

Typefaces at Knip's site as of 2020:

[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Armin Hofmann

Legendary Swiss type teacher, b. 1920. Hofmann succeeded Emil Ruder as head of the graphic design department at the Schule für Gestaltung Basel (Basel School of Design) and was instrumental in developing the Swiss style of graphic design. His teaching methods were unorthodox and broad-based. He designed, and influenced the design of, books, exhibitions, stage sets, logotypes, symbols, typographical pieces, posters and sign systems. His work is recognized for its reliance on the fundamental elements of graphic form---the point, line, and shape. He retired in 1987. His output includes many fantastic typographic posters. Example.

Author of Graphic Design Manual (1965). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Arne Freytag
[Fontador (was: Arne Freytag)]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Arnold Binger

Author of David's Practical Letterer (1903). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Art Deco Display Alphabets

A book by Dan X. Solo that shows 100 alphabets. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Art of the Printed Book, 1455-1955: Masterpieces of Typography Through Five Centuries

This book is based on the collections of the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, and comes with an essay by Joseph Blumenthal. It was published in 1973 by Pierpont Morgan Library, New York, and David R. Godine, Boston. Second printing, 1974. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Arthur S. Osley

Author of Luminario: an introduction to the Italian writing books of the 16th and 17th centuries (Nieuwkoop, 1972). This book surveys the Italian writing-manuals, 1514-1660. He also wrote Mercator. A Monograph on the Lettering of Maps, etc. in the 16th century Netherlands. With a facsimile and translation of Ghim's Vita Mercatoris (London, 1969). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Arthur Schulze

Author of Moderne Firmen Schilder (1913). [Google] [More]  ⦿

A.S. Barnes

Author of the penmanship book Barnes's National Vertical Penmanship (New York: American Book Co., 1899). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Atelier Perrousseaux

Interesting font links. In French, by Yves Perrousseaux. Jef Tombeur describes this as follows: "The Atelier Perrousseaux is a small publishing house having on its catalogue the founder's books but also books, essays, studies by the late Gérard Blanchard, Adrian Frutiger, Ladislas Mandel, François Richaudeau (a linguist) and, soon, René Ponot." [Google] [More]  ⦿

Atelier Plumereau

Author of Publicité-Vignettes-Lettres-Chiffres-Monogrammes et Rehauts Modernes (1930s). That book shows these art deco alhpabets: La Romane, Les Filets (multilined). [Google] [More]  ⦿

ATF: Online books

The American Type Founders specimen books are virtually all on-line now. Here are the main links:

[Google] [More]  ⦿

Auguste Bernard

Author (1811-1868) of Geoffroy Tory, peintre et graveur, premier imprimeur royal, réformateur de l'orthographe et de la typographie sous François Ier (2e édition, entièrement refondue) (1865, E. Tross, Paris). Local download in PDF [13.8MB].

In 1856, Auguste Bernard published Les Estienne --- Les types grecs de François premier, in which he presents 16th century Greek typefaces known as les grecs du roi. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Auguste Vitu

Author of Petite histoire de la typographie (1886, Librairie Ch. Delagrave, Paris). This delightful book contains great historic accounts from the fifteenth century, including a section in which he "deals with" the myth of Coster. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Austin Norman Palmer
[Portfolio of Ornate Penmanship]

[More]  ⦿

Autograff
[Daniel Berio]

AutoGraff is a research project aimed at computationally modelling the perceptual and dynamic processes involved in the production of graffiti art and calligraphy. The purpose of the study is to develop computer graphics and robotic systems that are capable of generating traces, letters, and patterns that are similar to the ones made by an expert human artist. The project is driven by Daniel Berio and Frederic Fol Leymarie at the University of London.

Daniel Berio is a researcher and artist from Florence, Italy. Since a young age Daniel was actively involved in the international graffiti art scene. In parallel he developed a professional career initially as a graphic designer and later as a graphics programmer in video games, multimedia and audio-visual software. In 2013 he obtained a Masters degree from the Royal Academy of Art in the Hague, where he developed drawing machines and installations materializing graffiti-inspired procedural forms. In 2021, Daniel obtained a PhD at Department of Computing Goldsmiths, University of London under the supervision of Frederic Fol Leymarie. Daniel Berio's PhD thesis is entitled AutoGraff: Towards a computational understanding of graffiti writing and related art forms.

The abstract of this spectacular work that mixes art and mathematical modeling: The aim of this thesis is to develop a system that generates letters and pictures with a style that is immediately recognizable as graffiti art or calligraphy. The proposed system can be used similarly to, and in tight integration with, conventional computer-aided geometric design tools and can be used to generate synthetic graffiti content for urban environments in games and in movies, and to guide robotic or fabrication systems that can materialise the output of the system with physical drawing media. The thesis is divided into two main parts. The first part describes a set of stroke primitives, building blocks that can be combined to generate different designs that resemble graffiti or calligraphy. These primitives mimic the process typically used to design graffiti letters and exploit well known principles of motor control to model the way in which an artist moves when incrementally tracing stylised letterforms. The second part demonstrates how these stroke primitives can be automatically recovered from input geometry defined in vector form, such as the digitised traces of writing made by a user, or the glyph outlines in a font. This procedure converts the input geometry into a seed that can be transformed into a variety of calligraphic and graffiti stylisations, which depend on parametric variations of the strokes.

Co-author of StrokeStyles: Stroke-based Segmentation and Stylization of Fonts (ACM Transactions on Graphics, vol. 41 (3), pp. 1-21, 2022). In this paper by Daniel Berio (Goldsmiths, University of London), Frederic Fol Leymarie (Goldsmiths, University of London), Paul Asente (Adobe Research, San Jose, CA), and Jose Echevarria (Adobe Research, San Jose, CA), the authors develop a method to automatically segment a font’s glyphs into a set of overlapping and intersecting strokes with the aim of generating artistic stylizations. The segmentation method relies on a geometric analysis of the glyph’s outline, its interior, and the surrounding areas. It uses the medial axis, curvilinear shape features that specify convex and concave outline parts, links that connect concavities, and seven junction types. We show that the resulting decomposition in strokes can be used to create variations, stylizations, and animations in different artistic or design-oriented styles while remaining recognizably similar to the input font. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Azerty requiem

Book on typewriter type (edited by Philippe Ernotte&Claude Stassart) with contributions by Fernand Baudin, Hubert Nyssen, Patrick Rogiers, Marcel Moreau, Jean-Pierre Verhegen, Pierre Bergounioux, Nicolas Ancion, Daniel De Bruycker, Veronika Mabardi, François Bon, François Clarinval, and Serge Kribus. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bapurao S. Naik

Author of Typography of Devanagari in three volumes, Bombay, Directorate of Languages (1971). This is a very useful set of books for Indic typeface design. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Barbara Brownie

Author of Type Image (2011). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Barbara Getty and Inga Dubay

Portland, OR-based handwriting consultants and authors of Portland State University's handwriting book Write now: a complete self-teaching program for better handwriting (Portland, OR: Continuing Education Press, Portland State University, 1991). Earlier, they also published Italic letters: calligraphy and handwriting (1984, New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold Co). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Barnhart Bros. Spindler Type Founders: Book of Type Specimens, 1907

Trying to fit this 1000-page book into one web page, with discussion of many types. It's impossible, but I tried it. Download link for Book of type specimens: Comprising a large variety of superior copper-mixed types, rules, borders, galleys, printing presses, electric-welded chases, paper and card cutters, wood goods, book binding machinery etc., together with valuable information to the craft. Specimen book no.9. Another download link. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bauersche Giesserei: Hauptprobe in gedrängter Form der Bauerschen Giesserei

Type specimen book by Bauersche Giesserei published ca. 1915. Open Library link. Archive.org link. Local download. Local download, colored version [27MB].

An earlier and more volumunous book of specimens is Hauptprobe der Bauerschen Giesserei in Frankfurt am main und Barcelona (Frankfurt am Main, 1907). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bauhaus

Local download of some Bauhaus books, as well as some issues of Bauhaus: Zeitschrift für Gestaltung published between 1926 and 1931, which were edited by Walter Gropius, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Ernst Kallai, Ludwig Hilberseimer, Josef Albers, and W. Kandinsky. PDFs via IADDB.org and Monoskop. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bauhaus: Monoskop's page

Monoskop's page on musea, material, documents and references related to Bauhaus. They list these books:

  • Walter Gropius (ed.), Internationale Architektur, Munich: Albert Langen, 1925, 111 pp.
  • Paul Klee, Pädagogisches Skizzenbuch, Munich: Albert Langen, 1925, 50 pp.
  • Sketchbook, intro. & trans. Sibyl Moholy-Nagy, New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1953, 65 pp; 1960. (English)
  • Adolf Meyer (ed.), Ein Versuchshaus des Bauhauses in Weimar, Munich: Albert Langen, 1924, 78 pp.
  • Die Buuml;hne am Bauhaus, Munich: Albert Langen, 1925, 84 pp. The Theater of the Bauhaus, trans. Arthur S. Wensinger, Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press, 1961. (English)
  • Piet Mondrian, Neue Gestaltung, Neoplastizimus, Nieuwe Beelding, Munich: Albert Langen, 1925, 66 pp.
  • Theo van Doesburg, Grundbegriffe der neuen gestaltenden Kunst, Munich: Albert Langen, 1925, 40+[26] pp. (German) Principles of Neo-Plastic Art, intro. Hans M. Wingler, afterw. H.L.C. Jaffé, trans. Janet Seligman, London: Lund Humphries, 1968, x+73 pp; Greenwich, CT: New York Graphic Society, 1968, x+73 pp, PDF. (English)
  • Walter Gropius (ed.), Neue Arbeiten der Bauhauswerkstäffen, Munich: Albert Langen, 1925, 115 pp.
  • L. Moholy-Nagy, Malerei, Fotografie, Film, Munich: Albert Langen, 1925, 115 pp; 2nd ed., 1927, 140 pp. Incl. "Dynamik der Gross-Stadt", pp 116-129.
  • Photography Film, trans. Janet Seligman, London: Lund Humphries, 1969. (English)
  • Kandinsky, Punkt und Linie zu Fläche: Beitrag zur Analyse der malerischen Elemente, Munich: Albert Langen, 1926, 190 pp. Point and Line to Plane: Contribution to the Analysis of the Pictorial Elements, trans. Howard Dearstyne and Hilla Rebay, New York: Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation, 1947, 200 pp. (English)
  • J.J.P. Oud, Holländische Architektur, Munich: Albert Langen, 1929, 107 pp.
  • Kasimir Malewitsch, Die gegenstandslose Welt, Munich: Albert Langen, 1927, 104 pp; new ed., exp., Mainz: Florian Kupferberg, 1980. Russian original written in 1923.
  • Walter Gropius, Bauhausbauten Dessau, Munich: Albert Langen, 1930, 221 pp.
  • Albert Gleizes, Kubismus, Munich: Albert Langen, 1928, 101 pp; repr. in Gleizes, Puissances du cubisme, 1969; repr., Mainz and Berlin: Florian Kupferberg, 1980. Written 1925-28.
  • Epic: From Immobile Form to Mobile Form, trans. Peter Brooke, Association des Amis d'Albert Gleizes, 1995. (English)
  • Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Von Material zur Architektur, Munich: Albert Langen, 1929, 241 pp; facsimile repr., Mainz and Berlin: Florian Kupferberg, 1968, 251 pp.
  • New Vision: From Material to Architecture, trans. Daphne M. Hoffman, New York: Breuer Warren and Putnam, 1930; exp.rev.ed. as The New Vision and Abstract of an Artist, New York: George Wittenborn, 1947, 92 pp. (English)

Local download of some Bauhaus books, as well as some issues of Bauhaus: Zeitschrift für Gestaltung published between 1926 and 1931, which were edited by Walter Gropius, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Ernst Kallai, Ludwig Hilberseimer, Josef Albers, and W. Kandinsky. PDFs via IADDB.org and Monoskop. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bauhaus School
[Walter Gropius]

The Bauhaus school was founded in 1919 by Walter Gropius. It was based in Weimar (1919 to 1925), and then in Dessau (1925 to 1932), and finally in Berlin (1932 to 1933), before it was closed by the Nazi regime. Its directors were Walter Gropius (1919-1928), H. Meyer (1928-1930) and Mies Van der Rohe (1930-1933).

The Bauhaus movement, which cut almost everything to its bare minimum and naked essentials, influenced art, architecture, graphic design, interior design, industrial design, and typography. Its typographical masters included Josef Albers (who made Kombinationsschrift in the 1920s), Herbert Bayer (famous for his Universal), Joost Schmidt and Kurt Schwitters. Bauhaus-style typefaces emerged everywhere---Futura (Paul Renner), Super Grotesk (Arno Drescher), and the types of Moholy-Nagy.

Among the digital representatives, we note ITC Bauhaus (1975, Ed Benguiat and Victor Caruso), BH Geometric 572 (Bitstream), P22 Bayer, R790 (Softmaker), and Dessau (by Gábor Kóthay).

Penela's pages on Bauhaus. Jürgen Siebert on Bauhaus.

Brief bio of Walter Gropius, the founder: Born to a family of architects, he himself studied architecture in Munich from 1903-1904 and in Berlin from 1905-1907, and worked for Peter Behrens until 1910. In 1919, he founded the Bauhaus School. In Programm des Staatlichen Bauhauses Weimar (1919), he describes a utopian craft guild combining architecture, sculpture, and painting into a single creative expression [Gesamtkunstwerk].

Wikipedia page. Bauhaus Museum Dessau. Bauhaus Museum Weimar. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Beat Stamm

Swiss typography expert at Microsoft who wrote Visual TrueType, a truetype font hinting program, and who helped out with Cleartype. He is also the author of The Raster Tragedy (1997, updated in 2011). Beat Stamm has a Ph.D. in Computer Science. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Beatrice L. Warde

Born in New York in 1900, she died in London in 1969. A typographer, writer, and art historian, she worked for the British Monotype Corporation for most of her life, and was famous for her energy, enthusiasm and speeches. Collaborator of Stanley Morison. She created a typeface called Arrighi. She is famous for The Crystal Goblet or Printing Should be Invisible (The Crystal Goblet, Sixteen Essays on Typography, Cleveland, 1956, and Sylvan Press, London, 1955), which is also reproduced here and here. The text was originally printed in London in 1932, under the pseudonym Paul Beaujon. Here are two passages:

  • Imagine that you have before you a flagon of wine. You may choose your own favorite vintage for this imaginary demonstration, so that it be a deep shimmering crimson in colour. You have two goblets before you. One is of solid gold, wrought in the most exquisite patterns. The other is of crystal-clear glass, thin as a bubble, and as transparent. Pour and drink; and according to your choice of goblet, I shall know whether or not you are a connoisseur of wine. For if you have no feelings about wine one way or the other, you will want the sensation of drinking the stuff out of a vessel that may have cost thousands of pounds; but if you are a member of that vanishing tribe, the amateurs of fine vintages, you will choose the crystal, because everything about it is calculated to reveal rather than to hide the beautiful thing which it was meant to contain.
  • Bear with me in this long-winded and fragrant metaphor; for you will find that almost all the virtues of the perfect wine-glass have a parallel in typography. There is the long, thin stem that obviates fingerprints on the bowl. Why? Because no cloud must come between your eyes and the fiery heart of the liquid. Are not the margins on book pages similarly meant to obviate the necessity of fingering the type-page? Again: the glass is colourless or at the most only faintly tinged in the bowl, because the connoisseur judges wine partly by its colour and is impatient of anything that alters it. There are a thousand mannerisms in typography that are as impudent and arbitrary as putting port in tumblers of red or green glass! When a goblet has a base that looks too small for security, it does not matter how cleverly it is weighted; you feel nervous lest it should tip over. There are ways of setting lines of type which may work well enough, and yet keep the reader subconsciously worried by the fear of 'doubling' lines, reading three words as one, and so forth.

Drawing of her by Eric Gill. Life story.

Beatrice Warde was educated at Barnard College, Columbia, where she studied calligraphy and letterforms. From 1921 until 1925, she was the assistant librarian at American Type Founders. In 1925, she married the book and type designer Frederic Warde, who was Director of Printing at the Princeton University Press. Together, they moved to Europe, where Beatrice worked on The Fleuron: A Journal of Typography (Cambridge, England: At the University Press, and New York: Doubleday Doran, 1923-1930), which was at that time edited by Stanley Morison. As explained above, she is best known for an article she published in the 1926 issue of The Fleuron, written under the pseudonym Paul Beaujon, which traced types mistakenly attributed to Garamond back to Jean Jannon. In 1927, she became editor of The Monotype Recorder in London. Rebecca Davidson of the Princeton University Library wrote in 2004: Beatrice Warde was a believer in the power of the printed word to defend freedom, and she designed and printed her famous manifesto, This Is A Printing Office, in 1932, using Eric Gill's Perpetua typeface. She rejected the avant-garde in typography, believing that classical forms provided a "clearly polished window" through which ideas could be communicated. The Crystal Goblet: Sixteen Essays on Typography (1955) is an anthology of her writings. Wood engraved portrait of Warde by Bernard Brussel-Smith (1950). [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Bell & Stephenson

British typefoundry. Specimen books by them include

[Google] [More]  ⦿

Ben Alexander

Author of The Ornamental Penman's Pocket Book of Alphabets (1900). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Ben Shahn

American lettering artist, painter and social realist, b. Kovno, Lithuania, 1898, d. New York City, 1969. He is best known for his works of social realism, his left-wing political views, and his series of lectures published as The Shape of Content. Author of Love and Joy about Letters (1963) and of The Alphabet of Creation: An Ancient Legend From the Zohar (1954, reprinted in 1972, Shocken Books, NY).

In 1995, Maurizio Osti reconstructed and redesigned Ben Shahn's Folk Alphabet, which was originally created as lettering in 1940, with the consent and approval of Bernarda Shahn, Shahn's second wife, and the Estate of Ben Shahn, under license from VAGA (New York). FF Folk (2003, Marizio Osti and Jane Patterson) is the only authorized and officially endorsed digital version of Shahn's well-known protest poster lettering. In the same style, we also have the fonts Bensfolk (2000) and Bensfolk Condensed (2000) by Harold Lohner.

Jean Evans's Hatmaker (1996, Agfa Creative Alliance and later ITC) consists of two all caps typefaces, one of which was inspired by Ben Shahn's hand-constructed alphabet.

Nick Curtis's Outgribe NF (2011) is a rough, raw typeface that is based on the lettering in Ben Shahn's iconic poster protesting the execution of Nicolo Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti in 1927. That same poster also inspired Daniel Pelavin in his Book Country (2010).

Charles Leroux created the Tuscan typeface Rendezvous GRP (2008) based on Ben Shahn's cover of Rendezvous with Destiny.

At Esos tipos de la UTEM, one can download Nahueltoro (2007), an exceptionally beautiful comic book style headline face by Santiago Toro, based on the credits of the movie El Chacal de Nahueltoro by Vicente and Antonio Larrea, and on Ben Shahn's lettering. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Ben Wittner

In 2018, Ben Wittner, Sascha Thoma and Timm Hartmann edited Bi-Scriptual: Typography and Graphic Design with Multiple Script Systems (Niggli). Each chapter covers a different language and is written by a graphic designer who is a native speaker of that language. The languages covered are Arabic by Lara Captan & Kristian Sarkis, Cyrillic by Eugene Yukechev, Devanagari by Vaibhav Singh, Greek by Gerry Leonaidas, Hangul (Korean) by Jeongmin Kwon, Hanzi by Keith Tam, Hebrew by Lirion Levi Turkenich & Adi Stern and Kanji/Hiragana/Katakana (Chinese and Japanese) by Mariko Takagi.

Talib (2004) is a type project of eps51, a Berlin-based graphic design studio founded in 2004 by Sascha Thoma and Ben Wittner. They developed these faux Arabic fonts: Talib Old Style (calligraphic), Talib Kulkufi, and Talib Mohandes.

In 2020, Pascal Zoghbi (29LT) and Ben Wittner released the monospaced Arabic / Latin typefaces 29 LT Baseet Variable and 28 LT Zawi Variable. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Benedikt Gröndal
[Handwriting Models]

[More]  ⦿

Bengt Bengtsson

Swedish art historian whose 1956 PhD dissertation was entitled Svenskt stilgjuteri före âr 1700 (Typefounding in Sweden before 1700). In 1950 he published an 18-page booklet entitled Det äldsta Svenska Stilprovet Tryckt at Skolan for Bokhant verk. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Benjamin Franklin

Benjamin Franklin, Typefounder (1925, Douglas C. McMurtie, New York) describes Benjamin Franklin as typefounder. McGrew writes about Franklin: Prior to 1722 English typefounding was at a low ebb, and most printers in that country used Dutch types. But in that year William Caslon completed the first sizes of his new style, which quickly gained dominance over the Dutch types. This new English style was also extensively exported to other countries, including the American Colonies, where it was popular before the Revolution. In fact, the Declaration of Independence of the new United States was first printed in Caslon's types. Benjamin Franklin met Caslon in London, admired and recommended his types, and used them extensively in his printshop. F. Kerdijk penned the Dutch book Benjamin Franklin. Drukker - Postmeester - Uitvinder en Gezant, 1706-1790 (1956, Drukkerij Trio, 's-Gravenhage), a 16-page booklet that further explains Franklin's multidimensional persona. Further books on Franklin's sideline include Typophiles Chapbook: B. Franklin, 1706-1790. Franklin's interests in typography and as a printer have caused a number of typefaces to be named after him, such as the famous Franklin Gothic, but also Ben Franklin, Ben Franklin Condensed and Ben Franklin Open (metal types at Keystone Type Foundry. 1919), Franklin's Caslon (2006, P22), Poor Richard RR (named after Benjamin Franklin's "Poor Richard Almanack"), Poor Richard (1994, Projective Solutions: a free font), and Benjamin Franklin Antique (free font by Dieter Steffmann). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bernard Stein

In 1998, Frederich Friedl, Nicholas Ott and Bernard Stein wrote the voluminous book, Typography: An Encyclopedic Survey of Type Design and Techniques Through History (Black Dog & Leventhal). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bernd Holthusen

Type director and manager at Scangraphic in the 1980s and 1990s. Author of a number of thick specimaen volumes including Scangraphic Digital Type Collection A-F (1985), Scangraphic Digital Type Collection G-Z (1985), Scangraphic Digital Type Collection Index (1988), Scangraphic Digital Type Collection Supplement 1 (1988), and Scangraphic Digital Type Collection Supplement 2 A-Z Body types (1988). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bert Bos

Bert Bos studied Mathematics in Groningen (1982-1987), and wrote a thesis about Graphic User Interfaces (1987-1993). He worked on an Internet browser and the surrounding infrastructure for the Faculty of Arts in Groningen and is now working for The World Wide Web Consortium on style sheets and math. He lives in Sophia Antipolis near Nice in France.

Author of Cascading Style Sheets---designing for the Web (3rd ed.) (2005, Hakon Wium Lie & Bert Bos).

He also created a free transitional family in metafont and opentype for use with TeX, Gladiator and Gladiator Sans (1991).

Klingspor link. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Berthold Wolpe

German type designer (b. Offenbach, 1905, d. London 1989), who studied under Rudolf Koch from 1924-27 at the Kunstgewerbeschule in Offenbach. With the help of Stanley Morison, he emigrated to England in 1935 because of his Jewish background. Wolpe taught at the Camberwell College of Art (1948-53), at the Royal College of Art in London (1956-75) and at the City&Guilds of London School of Art (from 1975 onwards). From 1941 until 1978, he worked as a book designer for Faber&Faber in London, designing over 1500 book jackets. He published Schriftvorlagen (Kassel 1934), Marken und Schmuckstücke (Frankfurt am Main, 1937), A Book of Fanfare Ornaments (London, 1939), Renaissance Handwriting (with A. Fairbanks, London 1959), and Architectural Alphabet. J. D. Steingruber (London, 1972). Designer of

  • Albertus (Monotype, 1932-1940) is a famous lapidary roman with thickened terminals. The Bitstream version is called Flareserif 821. The Ghostscript/URW free version is called A028 (2000). The Softmaker and Infinitype versions are both called Adelon. The original Monotype version is Albertus MT. The letters are flared and chiseled, and the upper case U looks like a lower case u. The northeast part of the e is too anorexic to make this typeface suitable for most work. Some say that it is great for headlines. It is reminiscent of World War II. See also Albertus Nova (2017) by Toshi Omagari for Monotype.
  • Cyclone (Fanfare Press). A travel poster typeface family.
  • Fanfare. Revived by Toshi Omagari at Monotype in 2017 as Wolpe Fanfare.
  • Hyperion (1931, Bauersche Giesserei). Berry, Johnson and Jaspert write: An angular pen-lettered design, with several unusual letters. The right hand serifs of upper- and lower-case V and W run inwards, the Y descends below the line and has a pronounced serif running to the right. Also done by Berthold in 1952.
  • Pegasus (1938, Monotype). Monotype's digital revival, Wolpe Pegasus, was done in 2017 by Toshi Omagari for Monotype.
  • Tempest (1936). Digital revival in 2017 by Toshi Omagari at Monotype as Wolpe Tempest.
  • The blackletter typeface Sachsenwald-Gotisch (1936-1937, Monotype). In 2017, Monotype published the digital revival Sachsenwald by Toshi Omagari. Sachsenwald was originally called Bismarck Schrift, when it was first designed by Wolpe in the early 1930s.
  • The blackletter typeface Deutschmeister (1934, Wagner&Schmidt, Ludwig Wagner). Revival by Gerhard Helzel in 2009. Warning: The German type community believes that this typeface was not designed by Wolpe, so further research is needed. See also the revival called Deutschmeister by Ralph M. Unger in 20017.
  • Decorata (1950).
  • Johnston's Sans Serif Italic (1973).
  • LTB Italic (1973). Done for the London Transport, and unpublished.

In 2017, Toshi Omagari designed the Wolpe Collection for Monotype, all based on Berthold Wolpe's distinctive typefaces: Wolpe Pegasus, Wolpe Tempest, Wolpe Fanfare, Sachsenwald, Albertus Nova.

Bio at Klingspor. FontShop link. Wiki page. Linotype page.

View Berthold Wolpe's typefaces. Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Bertrand Galimard Flavigny.

Author of La Chronique du bibliophile: La typographie des Didot. [Google] [More]  ⦿

B.G. Teubner

Benedictus Gotthelf Teubner was a publisher in Leipzig, Germany. One of their typographic oeuvres was Schrift- und Polytypen-Proben (1846), a model book aimed at printers that contains some fonts, decorative borders, printer's ornaments, emblems, and clip-art motifs. Additional link with some images. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Biblio@BoyBeaver

List of well-known typographers, with biographies of people such as Nicolas Jenson, Aldus Manutius, William Caslon, John Day, Johann Froben, William Caxton, and Christophe Plantin. Plus a list of typography books. [Google] [More]  ⦿

BibliOdyssey

Great pages with exquisite images taken from old books and manuscripts. On occasion, one finds interesting alphabets and wonderful typographic examples. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bibliograhy on type, fonts and postscript

Rather sloppily compiled by Luc Devroye. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bibliographie typo

List of type books. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bibliographies on typesetting

Computer science bibliographies on the topic of (mathematical and other) typesetting [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bibliographies on typesetting

[More]  ⦿

Bibliography on typographic fonts

Nelson Beebe's computer science bibliography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bibliothèque de l'école Estienne

As part of the Ecole Supérieure Estienne (18, boulevard Auguste-Blanqui, 75013 Paris, Tél : 01 55 43 47 47: subway Place d'Italie), this library has many books on typography. Free, 9-12 and 1-5, Monday to Friday, except Wednesdays and during the school holidays. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bibliothèque virtuelle de livres de typographie
[Jacques André]

Jacques André (IRISA-INRIA, Rennes, France) has compiled a great bibliography of type. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bill Boley

Author of Basiks of Lettering (1952). Mike Jackson writes: Bill Boley's general script look was quickly adopted by many of the handlettering artists of the day. Only six different alphabets are shown. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Binny&Ronaldson
[James Ronaldson]

In 1796, Archibald Binny (ca. 1762-1838) and James Ronaldson (1769-1841 or 1842) (some say 1768-1842) started the first permanent American type foundry in Philadelphia in 1796, called Binny&Ronaldson. James, a business man from Edinburgh was the financial fhalf of the pair. In 1809 and 1812, they published America's first specimen book. The only complete copy of this book is at the Rare Book and Manuscript Library of Columbia University, and is entitled A specimen of metal ornaments cast at the letter foundery of Binny and Ronaldson (20 pages, printed by Fry and Kammerer, Philadelphia, USA, 1809) and Specimen of printing types from the foundry of Binny & Ronaldson (1812, Philadelphia, Fry and Kammerer, printers). Local download of the 1812 book.

James Ronaldson published Specimen of Printing Type, from the Letter Foundry of James Ronaldson, Successor to Binny&Ronaldson; Cedar, Between Ninth and Tenth Streets, Philadelphia (Philadelphia: J. Ronaldson, 1822). Acquired by Johnson&Smith in 1833, it became L. Johnson&Co. in 1843, and finally MacKellar, Smiths&Jordan in 1867. The latter company was the largest typefounder in America when in 1892 it was amalgamated with many others into ATF.

About digital typefaces that are derived: MyFonts sells Isabella, a font by ATF/Kingsley that can be traced back to Binny&Ronaldson. It also offers Really Big Shoe NF (Nick Curtis, 2009), which is based on Ronaldson's Oxford. Dick Pape published the free fonts Binny & Ronaldson English Two Line Orn (2010), Binny & Ronaldson Great Primer Two Pica (2010), and Binny & Ronaldson Primer Two Line Orn (2010). [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

BiViTy: Bibliothèque virtuelle de typographie
[Jacques André]

Jacques André's site that lists all digitally available type specimen books. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bjoern Karnebogen

Author of the (German) thesis Type and Image (2003). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bob Gordon

Author of "Making Digital Type Look Good" (London, 2001), tauted as a comprehensive analysis of the current state of font technology, preceeded by a history of type development and an exploration of the changes that the digital revolution has brought about. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bodoni's books

Adam Koster from Oak Knoll in Delaware describes three of Bodoni's publications:

  • "FREGI E MAJUSCOLE INCISE E FUSE DA GIAMBATTISTA BODONI, DIRETTORE DELLA STAMPOERIA REALE". Parma, Italy: 1771. First edition of Bodoni's first type specimen book. It contains a preface by Bodoni describing the types and ornaments used in the earlier part of his career showing his admiration for the rococo style of Fournier, whom he copied in a flattering manner. "Granted that the most agreeable features of the book are copied, this "specimen" of 1771 is one of the most tasteful and charming volumes of its kind in existence.  Each page is surrounded with borders, of which scarcely one is bad, or scarcely two alilke.  The types are old style, but their delicacy shows current tendencies, being especially true of the italic.  The book is enormously instructive to compare with Bodoni's great, chilly masterpieces, the "Oratio Dominica" and the "Manuale Tipografico" of 1818"  (Updike, Printing Types, Vol. I, p.184). Illustrated with more than 400 type ornaments and several pages of capitals...Majuscole ornate e CARATTERI Moderni.  Giambattista Bodoni (1740-1813) had recently (1768) been appointed director of the Duke of Parma's private press, the Stamperia Reale,  on his way to becoming the most celebrated printer in Europe, and a leader in the development of the modern letter form. " If (Bodoni) was careful in his choice of paper, he relied still more on his type and from 1771 onwards issued a series of typographic manuals, which show the love and labour that he was continuously lavishing on the fashioning and perfecting of this weapon...there is something peculiarly satisfying in the thought of this man through all the vicissitudes of one of the most stormy periods of European history, heedless of changes of regime, cheerfully, unswervingly and successfully pursuing his artistic ideals (Brooks, preface, xi)."  With the Borghese family coat of arms gilt-stamped on front boards. The Borghese family, originally from Siena and later from Rome, produced one pope, Paul V, several cardinals, many prominent citizens, and were noted patrons of the arts and letters.
  • "Epithalamia exoticis linguis reddita. Parmae Ex Regio Typographeo", 1775. With engraved title page vignette, head- and tail-pieces and historiated initals after Ferrari. Considered one of Bodoni's finest type specimen books, it contains the alphabets of twenty-five exotic languages, including Tibetan, Phoenician and Coptic. Has a poem by Conte Della Torre di Rezzonico.
  • "MANUALE TIPOGRAFICO." Two volumes. Parma, Italy: 1818. Bodoni's most substantial and famous type specimen. (Brooks 1216, Updike, Printing Types, II, pp. 169-171). This last specimen to be issued by Bodoni, "with a Discorso by his widow and Prefazione by Bodoni, appeared in 1818, five years after his death. It was completed under the care of his widow and Luigi Orsi, who was for twenty years foreman to Bodoni. Signora Bodoni, writing to M. Durand, of Metz, from Parma (November 14, 1817), says: 'The Manuale Tipografico in two volumes on papier-velin-the only kind of paper used for it-is not yet completed, but it will be, without fail, at the beginning of the coming year. I dare to believe that book-lovers will thank me for having published a volume which is so very important to Typography. The reception which it will have, will make up for the trouble it has cost me (although Bodoni has left the blocks or models for it) and the considerable expense which I shall have had to incur before it is finished. Also, in view of the fact that but 290 copies are struck off, I cannot dispose of them at less than 120 francs, without any reduction. M. Rosaspina has engraved au burin the portrait after one which the celebrated Appiani... painted in oils, which is a striking likeness.'" (Updike II, p.169) The first volume contains a discourse by Vendova Bodoni and a preface by G.B. Bodoni and is followed by the Latin type specimens. Twenty-six separate typefaces are described, each displayed in several different point sizes and most with specimens in Roman and italic. The display of the individual specimens in so many variations is particularly dramatic, the specimens for majuscole alone comprise 108 variations. The second volume displays thirty-four non-Latin type specimens including: Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, Armenian, Cyrillic, Tibetan, and many others. Many of these span multiple pages and present type in varying sizes. The Greek and Russian typefaces are the most comprehensive, with many pages devoted to large and impressive variations. This section is followed by specimens of 1036 decorative borders (Fregi), each designed to work with specific Bodoni typefaces, specimens of ornaments and rules, and specimens symbols for algebra, chemistry, astronomy, and music notation. Several of these are contained on large folding plates.
[Google] [More]  ⦿

BookLook

USA service for searching out-of-print books. This page has a list with books on printing. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Books by Dan X. Solo

Dan Solo's list of books. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Books Jumpstation: Typography

Book list compiled by Fred Showker. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Books on letterforms for sale

Gunnlaugur Briem is selling his own lettering book collection. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Books on Wood Type

Books on Wood Type, as listed by the Design Division of the Department of Art and Art History at The University of Texas at Austin:

  • 1963 / American Wood Type. Design Quarterly, No 56. Minneapolis: Walker Arts Center.
  • 1964 / American Wood Types, 1828-1900, Volume One. Limited edition folio.
  • 1965 / Wood Letters in the 20th Century. Matrix 7. Rochester, NY: Office of Educational Research, Rochester Institute of Technology.
  • 1969 / American Wood Type, 1828-1900: Notes on the Evolution of Decorated and Large Types and Comments on Related Trades of the Period. 1st ed. New York: Van Nostrand.
  • 1977 / American Wood Type, 1828-1900: Notes on the Evolution of Decorated and Large Types and Comments on Related Trades of the Period. 1st Paperback Printing New York: Da Capo Press.
  • 1977 / Wood Type Alphabets: 100 Fonts. New York: Dover Publications. Edited by Rob Roy Kelly.
  • 1990 / Adobe Wood Type, Vol 1. Moutain View, California: Adobe Systems. Introduction by Rob Roy Kelly.
  • 1999 / Specimen Book of Wood Type. Madison: Silver Buckle Press.
A sublist of specimen books held by Columbia University (CU), the Newberry Library in Chicago (NL), the New York Public Library (NYPL) and the Hamilton Wood Type&Printing Museum (HAM) is quite impressive. Here we go:
  • 1828 / CU    Darius Wells: Darius Wells, Letter Cutter.
  • 1838 / CU    George Nesbitt (Edwin Allen): First Premium Wood Types Cut by Machinery.
  • 1838 / NYPL    J.M. Debow (William Leavenworth): Leavenworth's Patent Wood Type.
  • 1840 / CU    Wells&Webb Specimens of Plain and Ornamental Wood Type.
  • 1841 / CU    George Nesbitt (Edwin Allen): Nesbitt's Fourth Specimen of Machinery Cut Wood Type.
  • 1846 / CU    L. Johnson (Wells&Webb): Specimens of Wood-Letter.
  • 1849 / CU    Wells&Webb: Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1853 / CU    Bill, Stark&Co.: Specimens of Machinery Cut Wood Type.
  • 1854 / CU    W.&H. Hagar (Wells&Webb): Specimens of Printing Types.
  • 1854 / CU / NL    Wells&Webb: Specimens of Wood Type. (NL copy is gift from Hamilton Mfg. Co.)
  • 1858 / NL    D. Knox&Co.: Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1859 / CU / NL    William H. Page&Co.: Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1859 / NL    J.G. Cooley&Co.: Specimens of Wood Type. (NL copy also contains parts of two smaller undated specimens: J.G. Cooley&Co. Cooley's Wood Type and Vanderburgh, Wells&Co.)
  • 1860 / NL    William H. Page&Co.: Supplementary Specimens of Wood Type Rules&Borders, Etc..
  • 1865 / CU    William H. Page&Co.: Price List for Wood Type, Borders, Reglet, Etc.. (Affixed to 1859 Page specimen)
  • 1870 / NYPL    William H. Page&Co.: Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1870 / CU    William H. Page&Co.: German Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1872 / CU / NL / NYPL    William H. Page&Co.: Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1872 / NL    Marder, Luce (Page): Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1872 / CU    Dauchy&Co. (Page): Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1873 / CU    William H. Page&Co.: Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1874 / CU / NL    William H. Page&Co. Specimens of Chromatic Wood Type, Borders, Etc.. (CU copy is gift from Rob Roy Kelly)
  • 1876 / CU    William H. Page Wood Type Co.: Specimens of Wood Type. (CU copy is gift from Rob Roy Kelly)
  • 1876 / CU / NL    William H. Page Wood Type Co.: Poster Specimens. (NL copy is gift from Hamilton Mfg. Co.)
  • 1877 / CU    Vanderburgh Wells&Co. Specimens of Wood Type, Borders, Rules, Etc..
  • 1878 / CU / NYPL    William H. Page Wood Type Co.: Specimens of Wood Type. (CU copy is gift from Rob Roy Kelly, NYPL copy contains one additional page showing Aetna Extra Condensed and Egyptian)
  • 1879 / NL    Vanderburgh Wells&Co. Specimens of Wood Type, Borders, Rules, Etc..
  • 1879 / CU    William H. Page Wood Type Co.: Page's Wood Type Album, Vol 1, No 1. (CU copy is gift from Hamilton Mfg. Co.)
  • 1879 / CU    William H. Page Wood Type Co.: Page's Wood Type Album, Vol 1, No 2. (CU copy is gift from Hamilton Mfg. Co.)
  • 1879 / NL    William H. Page Wood Type Co.: Page's Wood Type Album, Vol 1, No 3.
  • 1880 / NYPL    William H. Page Wood Type Co.: Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1881 / CU    Hamilton&Katz: Specimens of Holly Wood Type.
  • 1881 / CU    Morgans&Wilcox Mfg. Co.: Specimens of Wood Type, Printing Materials, Presses, Paper Cutters, Etc..
  • 1882 / CU    William H. Page Wood Type Co.: Specimens of Wood Type&Borders. (CU copy is gift from Hamilton Mfg. Co.)
  • 1883 / NL    American Wood Type Co.: Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1883 / CU    Shniedewend&Lee: Specimens of Page's Wood Type&Borders. (CU copy is gift from Hamilton Mfg. Co.)
  • 1884 / NL [microfilm]    Hamilton&Katz: Specimens of Holly Wood Type.
  • 1884 / CU / NL    Morgans&Wilcox Mfg. Co.: Condensed Specimen Book of Wood Type. (NL copy is gift from Hamilton Mfg. Co.)
  • 1886 / NL [microfilm]    Hamilton&Baker: Specimens of Holly Wood Type .
  • 1887 / NL    National Printers' Materials Co.: Specimens of Enameled Wood Type.
  • 1887 / NL    William H. Page Wood Type Co.: Specimens of Page's Wood Type.
  • 1887 / CU    Hamilton&Baker: Specimens of Holly Wood Type. (CU copy is gift from Rob Roy Kelly)
  • 1888 / CU    William H. Page Wood Type Co.: Specimens of Machine Cut Wood Type. (A facsimile was produced by David W. Peat in 2002)
  • 1888 / CU    Hamilton&Baker: Specimens of Wood Type&Borders. (CU copy is gift from Hamilton Mfg. Co.)
  • 1889 / CU    The Hamilton Manufacturing Co.: Specimens of Wood Type&Borders. (CU copy is gift from Hamilton Mfg. Co.)
  • 1889 / CU    The Hamilton Manufacturing Co.: Specimens of Wood Type&Borders. (CU copy is gift from Hamilton Mfg. Co.)
  • 1889 / CU    The Hamilton Manufacturing Co.: Calendar Sets.
  • 1889 / NL    Vanderburgh Wells&Co.: Specimens of Wood Type, Borders, Rules, Etc..
  • 1890 / CU    Morgans&Wilcox Mfg. Co.: Condensed Specimen Book of Wood Type.
  • 1890 / CU / NL    William H. Page Wood Type Co.: Page's New Process Wood Type. (Reprinted by American Life Foundation in 1983)
  • 1890 / CU    Vanderburgh Wells&Co.: New Styles Wood Letter. (3-color Broadside)
  • 1890 / CU    Heber Wells: Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1891 / NL    Heber Wells: Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1892 / CU    Heber Wells: Specimen Book of Wood Letter.
  • 1892 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: New Process Wood Type Manufactured by Page.
  • 1892 / CU / NYPL    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Wood Type&Borders (Oversized). (Front matter indicates that there was an 1891 catalog)
  • 1893 / NL    Nelson&Chessman&Co. (Hamilton): New Process Wood Type. (NL copy is gift from Hamilton Mfg. Co.)
  • 1893 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Specimens of Wood Pointers (Broadside).
  • 1894 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Perpetual Calendar Sets (Broadside).
  • 1895 / CU    Heber Wells Specimens of Wood Type. (Front matter indicates there was an 1893 catalog)
  • 1895 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: DeVinne Series Specimens.
  • 1899 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Specimens of Wood Type (No 14).
  • 1900 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co. Specimens of Wood Type (No 15).
  • 1904 / NL    Tubbs&Co.: Tubbs Wood Type.
  • 1906 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Specimens of Wood Type, With Ornaments, Fewer Issues, Dashes, Silhouettes, Catchwords, Corners, Fractions, Calendars&Borders (No 16).
  • 1908 / CU / NL    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Specimens of Wood Type (No 17).
  • 1918 / CU / NL    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Wood Type&Borders. (Hamilton re-used existing Tubbs Mfg. Co. specimen book)
  • 1927 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Unit Gothic&Hamilton's Series of Roman Borders (2 Broadsides).
  • 1927 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Cheltenham Faces.
  • 1927 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Specimens of Wood Type.
  • 1928 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: New Gothic Faces&Wood Type.
  • 1929 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Poster Cheltenham.
  • 1930 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Large Wood Type.
  • 1932 / CU    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Display Gothics.
  • 1938 / CU / NL    The Hamilton Mfg. Co.: Wood Type Catalog No 38.
  • 1957 / NL    American Wood Type Mfg. Co.: Interim Catalog 1957.
  • 1958 / NL    American Wood Type Mfg. Co.: Catalog 1958-1959.
  • 1961 / NL    American Wood Type Mfg. Co.: Catalog 1961-1962.
[Google] [More]  ⦿

Bowfin Printworks
[Mike Yanega]

Links to commercial foundries. Site done by Michael Yanega, who now lives in Washington State. Has an interesting script font identification guide. It also has a bibliography on type. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bram de Does

Bram de Does was a type designer born in Amsterdam in 1934. He died on December 28, 2015. At Enschedé in Haarlem, which he joined in 1958, and for which he worked most of his life, he designed Trinité (1978-1981) and Lexicon (1990-1991). Enschedé write-up. Author of Kaba Ornament Deel I - Vorm (De Spectatorpers, 2002), De Kaba Ornament in Vignettes Borders and Patterns (2006, De Buitenkant) and Kaba Structuren (De Buitenkant), which present the Kaba ornaments that de Does designed at enschedé in 1987 just before its closure in 1990.

Trinité won him the prestigious H.N. Werkman Prize in 1991. Mathieu Lommen and John A. Lane published Bram de Does Boektypograaf & Letterontwerper Book Typographer & Type Designer (Amsterdam, 2003). Mathieu Lommen published Bram de Does: letterontwerper & typograaf / typographer & type designer in 2003 at De Buitenkant.

In 2003, a 53 minute Dutch documentary was made: Systematisch Slordig: Bram de Does - Letterontwerper&Typograaf (Coraline Korevaar/Otto de Fijter, Woudrichem). That video is also at Vimeo and here. A collection of many of his drawings is at the University of Amsterdam. Part of this collection (e.g., the development of Lexicon) has been scanned in and placed on the web. Details on his fonts:

  • Lexicon is discussed in the book by Bram de Does and Mathieu Lommen, Letterproef Lexicon. The Enschedé Font Foundry (1997, Amsterdam). Lexicon was produced by Peter Matthias Noordzij. It was first used for the new edition of the Groot Woordenboek der Nederlandse Taal (the Standard Dutch Dictionary, or the Dikke Van Dale as we say in Belgium). For a digital descendant of Lexicon, see Lucas Sharp and Connor Davenport's Eros (2017).
  • Trinité according to Wikipedia: Trinité was originally designed for phototypesetting machines. In 1978, the printing office Joh. Enschedé replaced their phototypesetting machines (with Autologic machines), for which they wanted to adapt Jan van Krimpen's typeface Romanée. The company consulted with De Does, who was against it. He feared that Romanée would lose its character in the translation from metal movable type to phototype, specifically because Romanée was not a single font but several versions for each pointsize, which would not be possible to preserve in phototype. He considered commissioning a new typeface, specifically designed for the new technology, a much better idea. Although it was not his intention, Enschedé invited him to design this new typeface. [...] Trinité was originally published as an Autologic typeface in 1982. However, at the end of that decade, when De Does had already left the firm, Enschedé once again switched typesetting machines (this time the digital Linotronic system) and only kept the old one because of Trinité. Being an important business asset for the firm, they commissioned De Does and Peter Matthias Noordzij (the designer of PMN Caecilia) to produce digital PostScript fonts of Trinité, using Ikarus M. To distribute the typeface, Noordzij proposed starting a small-scale digital type foundry, The Enschedé Font Foundry (TEFF), on which they released Trinité in 1992.
[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Bram Stein

Copenhagen, Denmark-based author of Webfont Handbook. He tweets on web typography and front-end development. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bret Victor

Author of a book on data visualization, Magic Ink Information Software and the Graphical Interface (2006). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Brigitte Schuster

Brigitte Schuster is a graphic designer, calligrapher and lettering artist who graduated in 2008 from Concordia University in Montreal (only one block away from Luc's house...). She wrote about herself: I am an independent Art Director (Graphic Design), Print Artist and Photographer practicing in Montreal, Canada. I am currently teaching typography and photography courses in the Graphic Design department of a college in Montreal. After attending a three-year graphic design program in Munich, Germany, I spent a few years working there both as an employee for print and web agencies, and as a freelancer. In 2005, I completed a Bachelor in Fine Arts, with a specialization in painting from the Italian Academy of Fine Arts of Carrara, Italy. [...] I moved to Canada in 2005 where I continued working in and for the graphic design industry. In 2008 I completed the Graduate Certificate in Digital Technologies in Design Art Practice at Montreal's Concordia University. In my graphic design practice I ideally work in editorial design, also corporate branding, with a focus on typography. Over the last year or two, I developed a great interest in type, which I express in my calligraphy and lettering work and type design research. Graduate of the Masters program in type design at KABK, 2010. Author of Brush calligraphy with a tree branch (2009) and Book Designers from the Netherlands (2014). In 2013, she founded the imprint Brigitte Schuster Editeur. Presently, she lives and works in Bern, Switzerland.

Her typefaces:

  • Canella (2010): a book ad magazine family with the angular necessities required for small print. Part of her Masters project at KABK.
  • Life Sans (2008).
  • A revival of Monotype Plantin (2010).
  • Cardamon (2015 Linotype). Cardamon is an old style serif design with large x-height and a sturdy look. Its proportions are inspired by 16th century punch-cutters Hendrik van den Keere and Robert Granjon.
[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Bruce Kennett

Bruce Kennett is a designer of books and exhibits, photographer, writer, and teacher. He studied calligraphy and book design with Austrian artist Friedrich Neugebauer, and later translated Neugebauer's book The Mystic Art of Written Forms. Kennett also served as manager and book designer at Maine's Anthoensen Press. His client list ranges from the Folger Shakespeare Library and the Grolier Club to L.L.Bean and the Mount Washington Observatory.

Author of W. A. Dwiggins: A Life in Design (2017, Letterform Archive, San Francisco). Bruce Kennett discovered the work of W. A. Dwiggins in 1972 and has drawn inspiration from it ever since, writing articles, essays, and lecturing widely about the man and his many talents. Bruce has been working steadily on this book since 2003. The publisher's blurb: W. A. Dwiggins: A Life in Design offers an engaging and inspiring overview of the designer's wide-ranging creative output and lasting impact on the graphic arts. Bruce Kennett's careful research, warm prose, and inclusion of numerous personal accounts from Dwiggins's friends and contemporaries portray not only a brilliant designer, but a truly likable character. The texts---five essays and two works of fiction, plus a title page and colophon---are set on the Linotype in Dwiggins's Caledonia, Electra, Eldorado, Metro, and the very rare Falcon, accompanied by an assortment of Caravan ornaments. Twenty-two illustrations, hand-lettered titles, and decorated initials (all made from original Dwiggins pen-and-ink artwork in the files of Boston Public Library) accompany the text, reproduced via high-quality copper photoengravings.

His other books include a foreword in Dorothy Abbe's William Addison Dwiggins: Stencilled Ornament and Illustration (2015). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Bruce Willen

2002 graduate from the Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore. Rumored to be working on a typeface called Composite. Author of Lettering&Type: Creating Letters and Designing Typefaces (2009, with Nolen Strals). See also here. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Brush Lettering

Brush Lettering is a tutorial book written by Eliza Holliday and Marilyn Reaves. [Google] [More]  ⦿

BuyMyFonts (or: BMF)
[Alessio Leonardi]

Alessio Leonardi (b. Florence, 1965) is an Italian designer and type designer who lives in Berlin since 1990. He worked in Berlin at MetaDesign of Erik Spiekermann and in Frankfurt at xplicit. In 1997, with Priska Wollein, he opened the office Leonardi Wollein Visuelle Konzepte in Berlin. His humor shows through his letters and his many dingbats.

In 2002 he founded Buy My Fonts that produces typefaces for corporate applications and also for standard use.

Speaker at ATypI in Rome in 2002. In 2004 he published his book From the Cow to the Typewriter: the (true) History of Writing. The Alberobanana project tries to suggest an alphabet that could have been. In 2007, he started the pixel font project BMF Elettriche. Available from MyFonts, it includes 648 styles. Speaker at ATypI 2007 in Brighton.

Linotype link. Typefaces.de site.

His fonts include

  • F2F Ale Ornaments (1994, +Rotato, +Spirato), Ale Signs, Ale Transport: all done at Linotype.
  • F2F Allineato (1995): grunge, part of the Face2Face project.
  • Alternativo Franklin Gothic
  • Aposto
  • F2F Al Retto (1995): grunge, part of the Face2Face project.
  • BMF Ale Pi Fonts
  • BMF Atypico (1994): organic.
  • FF Baukasten (1995): grungy pixel face.
  • BMF Bolbody, or Bolbodico.
  • Bodetica
  • BMF Brohan Black (2000)
  • BMF Bread Type.
  • BMF Brera.
  • FF Cavolfiore
  • FF Coltello (+Figure)
  • BMF Cratilo Poster (1996, +Signs): angular face.
  • Cool Wool
  • Cotton Club
  • Debaq Face
  • BMF Elleonora Dun Tondo, BMF Elleonora Dun Cane (1994): script typefaces.
  • Etica Temporale
  • Font Card (2000)
  • FF Forchetta (+figure)
  • BMF Fontcard (2000): Monospaced, modular.
  • FF Graffio (+Visivo) (1995): scratchy graffiti face.
  • Graffiti One, Two, Three and Four (1993): at AA International.
  • Ha Manga Irregular (+Pictures)
  • FF Handwriter (+Symbols)
  • Happy Days
  • BMF However
  • Kaos
  • BMF Imme Gothic (2001): made for the official communication of the wedding of Imme and Alessio.
  • BMF Just Do It Again (1999).
  • FF Letterine (+Archetipetti, +Esagerate, +Teatro): kid font family.
  • BMF Love and Hate Pie (2010)
  • F2F Madame Butterfly (1995)
  • FF Matto, FF Matto Porco, FF Matto Sans, matto Sans Porco: blotchy.
  • Metadoni
  • F2F Metamorfosi (1995): experimental, part of the Face2Face project.
  • FF Mulinex
  • BMF Mekanikamente
  • F2F Mekkaso Tomanik
  • BMF Objects Pi (2010)
  • Omegalo
  • BMF Planets Pi (2010)
  • F2F Poison Flowers (1994).
  • FF Priska Serif (+Little Creatures)
  • F2F Prototipa Multipla
  • F2F Provinciali
  • BMF Quaderno
  • Samuele
  • Schering type family (2000): done for a pharmaceutical company headquartered in Berlin. Includes Sans, Serif, Letter.
  • BMF Serbatoio (1991): Pixel face, originally called This Is Not (My Beautiful Wife). Includes Pieno, Vuoto, Prospettico.
  • F2F Simbolico
  • BMF Sicily (1991): grungy ransom note face.
  • Stone Washed
  • F2F Tagliatelle Sugo
  • Tagliatelle Poster, Tagliatelle Grazie, Tagliatelle Tagliate
  • Tempore
  • BMF Testuale, BMF Testuale Sans, BMF Testuale Cornici (1994): angular family.
  • BMF Zazi.
  • BMF Zodiac Pi (2010)

FontShop link. Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

C. van der Post Jr

Book shop owner in Utrecht, The Netherlands, in the 19th century. In 1855, he published the popular lettering model book Alphabeths voor steenhouwers, schoonschrijvers, schilders, graveurs, lithegraphen. In his book Nederlandse Belettering, Mathieu Lommen deduces that the alphabets in this book were developed in the atelier of lithographer P.W. van de Weijer in Utrecht in cooperation with van der Post.

Reference: Nederlandse belettering negentiende-eeuwse modelboeken (2015, Mathieu Lommen, de Buitenkant, Amsterdam). [Google] [More]  ⦿

C. Webb

Author of Guerrilla Typography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Cade Type Foundry
[Philip Cade]

Cade Type Foundry is the private foundry of Philip Cade. He cut his first (metal) typeface in 1972. The foundry is an outgrowth of the Juniper Press. Cade published a Specimen book Type Borders Ornaments and Bras Rule in 1976 (Juniper Press, 24 GinnRoad, Winchester, MA). Local download.

Typefaces include Jenson Old Style No. 58, Goudy Lanston No. 279, and Caslon Old Style Italic 3371. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Calligraphy and Penmanship in History 42 Books

Alternate URL. Alternate URL. These files have 42 e-books on penmanship, for a total of 300MB. The list:

  • 1.Ames, Daniel T., 1884, Ames' Guide to Self-Instruction in Practical and Artistic Penmanship
  • 2.Ames, Daniel T., The Daniel T. Ames Notebook, A wonderful collection of penmanship from the early 1860s from one of America's preeminent penmen and teachers
  • 3.Behrensmeyer, H.P, Lessons in Practical Penmanship
  • 4.Barnett, C.A., J.T. Henderson and J.N. Yocom, 1901, Oberlin Business College - Compendium of Penmanship.
  • 5.Bloser, P.Z. (Copies by E.A. Lupfer), 1948, Lessons in Ornamental Penmanship.
  • 6.Canan/Zanerian College, 1921, C.C. Canan Collection of Penmanship - The Canan Book, Copyright by Zaner-Bloser, Inc. Used with permission. All rights reserved.
  • 7.Champion, Mary L., Champion Method of Practical Business Writing
  • 8.Charles, A.A.S., 1983, Steel Pen Trade 1930-1980 Used with permission. All rights reserved.
  • 9.Clark, Clinton H., The Clinton Clark Scrapbook Part One, Part Two, Part Three.
  • 10.Comer, George and Oliver Linton, 1864, Penmanship Made Easy
  • 11.Courtney, F.B., The Francis B. Courtney Scrapbook, courtesy of Bob Hurford
  • 12.D'Avignon, L'ecriture Americaine, "Writing American" by D'Avignon, circa 1840
  • 13.Dennis, W.E., 1914, Studies in Pen Art
  • 14.Gaskell, G.A., 1883, Gaskell's Compendium of Forms (the section on writing)
  • 15.Huntington, Eleazer, 1821, Art of Penmanship
  • 16.IAMPETH Scrapbooks - A remarkable collection of Golden Age penmanship, PDF Number 1, PDF Number 2.
  • 17.Jenkins, John, 1813, The Art of Writing
  • 18.Jones, C.W., editor, 1914, Lessons in Engraver's Script
  • 19.Jones, C.W., editor, 1914, Ninety-five Lessons in Ornamental Penmanship
  • 20.Kelchner, Lloyd M., 1901, Complete Compendium of Plain Practical Penmanship
  • 21.Knowles and Maxim, publisher, 1881, Real Pen Work - Self Instructor in Penmanship
  • 22.Madarasz, Louis, Lessons in Advanced Engraver's Script, published by C.W. Jones
  • 23.Madarasz/Zanerian College, 1911, The Madarasz Book - The Secret of the Skill of Madarasz, Copyright by Zaner-Bloser, Inc. Used with permission.All rights reserved.
  • 24.McDonald Business Academy, 1894, Penman's Leisure Hour
  • 25.Meyrat, P., circa 1920's, Recueil Methodique de Principes d' Ecriture ("A Methodical Collection of Principles of Writing"
  • 26.Mills, Edward C., 1903, Modern Business Penmanship
  • 27.Noyes, Enoch, 1839, Noyes's Penmanship
  • 28.Palmer, A.N., 1935, The Palmer Method of Business Writing
  • 29.Palmer, A.N., 1919, Palmer's Penmanship Budget
  • 30.Palmer Company, The A.N., Portfolio of Ornate Penmanship
  • 31.Real Pen-Work Publishing, 1867, Bible Pearls of Promise
  • 32.Spencer Authors, 1874, Theory of Spencerian Penmanship
  • 33.Spencer Brothers, 1881, New Standard Practical Penmanship
  • 34.Spencer, Platt Rogers, Sr., 1866, Compendium of Spencerian or Semi-Angular Penmanship
  • 35.Spencerian Authors, 1879, New Spencerian Compendium
  • 36.Stacy, L.E., 1907 (compiled by), The Blue Book
  • 37.Sull, Michael R., 1989, Spencerian Script and Ornamental Penmanship, Volume I, Chapters 1,2 and 8.
  • 38.Sykes, circa 1885, Sykes's Manual of Penmanship
  • 39.Williams, J.D. and S.S. Packard, 1867, Gems of Penmanship
  • 40.Zaner, C.P., 1888, Gems of Flourishing
  • 41.Zaner, C.P., 1920, Lessons in Ornamental Penmanship
  • 42.Zaner, C.P., 1900, The New Zanerian Alphabets
[Google] [More]  ⦿

Campgràfic

Spanish publisher carrying Spanish translations of many popular typography books. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Caratteri Nebiolo

John Berry discusses this wonderful Nebiolo specimen book from the 1950s. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Cari Buziak
[Aon Celtic Art]

[More]  ⦿

Carl Dair

Renowned Canadian type and graphic designer (b. Welland, Ontario, 1912, d. 1967 from a heart attack on a flight between New York and Toronto). He ran the Eveleigh-Dair Studio from 1947-1951 in Montreal with partner Henry Eveleigh. He worked mainly as a freelance designer, was department store art director and even typographic director for the National Film Board of Canada (1945). Dair lectured on typography at the Ontario College of Art between 1959 and 1962, and taught for a couple of years at the Jamaica School of Arts and Crafts. In 1956 and 1957 he received an RSC fellowship to study type design and manufacture in the Netherlands. During this period he had the opportunity to study metal type and hand-punching at Enschedé Foundry in Haarlem, where he created a silent film called Gravers and Files documenting one of the last great punchcutters, P. H. Rädisch. There is a beautiful modern version of the movie with voiceover by Matthew Carter.

He created Canada's first roman typeface, Cartier (1967, MonoLino Typesetting Company Limited) for Canada's centennial. Cartier was unfinished when he died. Rod McDonald finished it, to become a working and much larger typeface family called Cartier Book in 2000. Cartier has a sequel: Raleigh (Ingrama, 1977), co-designed by Robert Norton, David Anderson and Adrian Williams is sold by Bitstream, Adobe, Linotype, Paratype, and URW++. It is characterized by a bloated belly N. Raleigh was produced in 1977 by Robert Norton, and was based on Carl Dair's Cartier typeface. It was renamed Raleigh after Dair's death. Adrian Williams added three weights for a display series, and Robert Norton designed the text version. Several typefaces were influenced by Cartier. These include Ludwig Ubele's award-winning FF Tundra (2011). For a full revival, including both a facsimile and an interpretation, see Nick Shinn's Dair (2017).

Author of Design with Type (1952, revised and expanded in 1967 and republished by the University of Toronto Press (First Edition) in 2000). He also wrote several wonderful short treatises on various topics in type design. John Berry discusses Dair's seven different kinds of contrast, size, weight, form, structure, texture, color and direction.

FontShop link. Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Carl Faulmann

Johann Christoph Carl Faulmann or Karl Faulmann, b. Halle an der Saale, Germany, 1835, d. Vienna, Austria, 1894. In his Geschichte der Schrift: Von den Hieroglyphen bis heute (2002), Harald Haarmann describes Faulmann as a pioneer in the study of writing in the 19th century. He writes that when Carl Faulmann published his Illustrierte Geschichte der Schrift in 1880, his work was the first universal history on the subject and stood alone on the academic landscape of the day.

Carl Faulmann initially trained to be a typesetter. His travels led him to Munich, where in 1854 he saw shorthand types from the Royal Court and State Printers in Vienna. Faulmann was inspired by the experience to develop similar versions for Franz Xaver Gabelsberger's stenography system which was popular in the southern part of Germany. In 1855 he became typesetter for foreign languages at the court in Vienna. After four years he resigned from state service and worked as a stenography teacher and typesetter. On the side he continued to augment his language skills auto-didactically, learning Hebrew, Persian and Sanskrit, among others. He wrote various works on linguistic fundamentals that were re-issued for decades. In 1884, Carl Faulmann was named professor of stenography at the University of Vienna. A complete compendium of his work can be found in this German wikipedia page. His books include

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Carl G. Liungman

Swedish author (b. Stockholm, 1938) in 1974 of a book about Western ideograms. Its title was the Swedish equivalent of "Symbols - Western ideograms". This book is an encyclopedia and has for each new edition been revised and substantially enlarged. Its first English language edition was published in 1991 in the US under the title Dictionary of Symbols (ABC-CLIO, 1991, 596 pages). The latest published revised and much enlarged English language edition appeared in 1995 under the new title Thought Signs The semiotics of symbols - Western non-pictorial ideograms. Review. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Carl Gustav Naumann

C.G. Naumann is Carl Gustav Naumann, who ran a family printing business in Leipzig. In 1901, he published Schriftproben der Firma C.G. Naumann. Sample pages of that book are shown in the link. Poster by Naumann. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Carl Hermann Albert Anklam

German type designer, b. 1842, Berlin, d. 1931, Berlin. In 1870, he started working at Genzsch and Heyse in Hamburg as punchcutter and engraver. His Neue Schwabacher of 1876 became a very popular typeface.

Anklam created Mönchs-Gotisch (or: Mediaeval-Gotisch) in 1877 (Schnelle says 1881) at Genzsch & Heyse. In 1876, he made Neue Schwabacher (normal and halbfett) at Genzsch & Heyse (and Klinkhardt). That same type can also be found at many other typefoundries, including J. John&Söhne, Shelter&Giesecke, Ludwig & Mayer, Gebr. Klingspor, AG Schriftguss, Barnhart Brothers Spindler, H. Berthold AG, etcetera.

Author/editor of Kunstwerke der Schrift Bund für deutsche Sprache und Schrift (Großenkneten 1994).

Digital revivals include Schwabacher Mager Gross and Möncgs-Gotisch, both by Gerhard Helzel, and Neue Schwabacher (2021) by Ralph Unger. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Carl Hrachowina

In the late 19th century, Dr. Carl Hrachowina (1845-1896) taught at the Arts and Crafts School in Vienna. Among his students were Franz von Matsch and Gustav Klimt. He selected and published a series of study aids. Author of Initialen, Alphabete und Randleisten verschiedener Kunstepochen (1897, Carl Graeser, Vienna), and of Vorlagen für das Kunstgewerbe 1. Band. Künstliches Alphabet von J. Th. de Bry (1886, Carl Graeser, Vienna). Downloads of his 1897 books: Archive.org, local. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Carl Volmer Nordlunde
[Nordlundes Bogtrykkeri]

[More]  ⦿

Carol Belanger Grafton

In 1981, Carol Belanger Grafton published Bizarre & Ornamental Alphabets (Dover).

Dick Pape digitized these ornamental caps typefaces, naming them by page number: BizarreAlphabets-Page108, BizarreAlphabets-Page112, BizarreAlphabets-Page114, BizarreAlphabets-Page116a, BizarreAlphabets-Page116b, BizarreAlphabets-Page117a, BizarreAlphabets-Page117b, BizarreAlphabets-Page121, BizarreAlphabets-Page14, BizarreAlphabets-Page22, BizarreAlphabets-Page24, BizarreAlphabets-Page62, BizarreAlphabets-Page66, BizarreAlphabets-Page74, BizarreAlphabets-Page76, BizarreAlphabets-Page78, BizarreAlphabets-Page92, BizarreAlphabets-Page93Bold, BizarreAlphabets-Page94, BizarreAlphabets-Page95, BizarreAlphabets-Page96-Dusty, BizarreAlphabets-Page98, BizarreAlphabets-Page99.

Download here. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Carolina de Bartolo
[101 Editions]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Carolyn Porter

Carolyn Porter is a St. Paul, Minnesota-based graphic designer, type designer, and author.

At P22, Carolyn Porter published P22 Marcel Script in 2014. This stylish fountain pen script comes with a story: The font Marcel is named in honor of Marcel Heuzé, a Frenchman who was conscripted into labor during World War II. During the months Marcel was in Germany, he wrote letters to his beloved wife and daughters back home in rural France. Marcel's letters contain rare first-person testimony of day-to-day survival within a labor camp, along with the most beautiful expressions of love imaginable. The letters---stained and scarred with censor marks---were the original source documents used by designer Carolyn Porter to create a script font that retains the expressive character of Marcel Heuzé's original handwriting. The letters were found in an antique shop in Stillwater, Minnesota, and the 1300-glyph font was developed from 2011 until 2014. It comes with a set of filets and calligraphic ornaments, P22 Marcel Ornaments, and a set of capitals, P22 Marcel Caps. Marcel Script won an award at TDC 2014. Speaker at ATypI 2017 Montreal. The story of Marcel Heuzé is captured in her award-winning book Marcel's Letters: A Font and the Search for One Man's fate. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Caslon & Catherwood

British type foundry active in the 19th century. Caslon and Catherwood published a now famous Italian in 1821.

They also had a collection of fat faces that were popular in the first three decades of the 19th century.

Books by the foundry include Specimen of Printing Types (T. Bensley, printer, 1815). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Catherine Dixon

Catherine Dixon is a freelance designer, writer, and Senior Lecturer in Typography at Central Saint Martins College of Art&Design, London. She completed her PhD, A description framework for typeforms: an applied study at Central Saint Martins in 2001. She has worked together with Phil Baines on book designs for Phaidon Press; Laurence King; and for the award-winning Penguin Books Great Ideas series. She is a frequent contributor to Eye. Other writing includes a web site and the book Signs: lettering in the environment (Laurence King 2003). Speaker at ATypI 2006 in Lisbon on the topic of Nicolete Gray's Lisbon (with Phil Baines). At ATypI 2009 in Mexico City, she spoke on Lambe-lambe letters: Grafica Fidalga, São Paulo a project she undertook with Henrique Nardi (Tipocracia). Speaker at ATypI 2010 in Dublin, where she dealt with a lettering project for the Pozza Palace in Dubrovnik, and took people on a lettering walk of Dublin. Speaker at ATypI 2013 in Amsterdam. Keynote speaker at ATypI 2015 in Sao Paulo. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Céline Hurka

Céline Hurka (b. 1995) grew up in Karlsruhe, Germany, and moved to the Netherlands to study graphic design at the Royal Academy of Art (KABK) in The Hague. Besides her studies she works on freelance projects in the cultural field, where she combines an interest in editorial design with emphasis on type design and photography. She is based in 's Gravenhage.

Graduate of the TypeMedia program at the Royal Academy of Art (KABK) in Den Haag, The Netherlands, class of 2020. During her studies at the KABK in Den Haag, Céline Hurka designed the poster sans typeface Alfarn (2018) as part of the Adobe Originals collection. This typeface is based on poster lettering in 1923 by Bauhaus student Alfred Arndt (1898-1976). Her KABK graduation typeface was the intestinal / stone age / graffiti family Version.

In 2019, Nora Bekes and Celine Hurka published Reviving Type. The book as described by them: One study tells the story of the Renaissance letters of Garamont and Granjon. The other is about the Baroque types of Nicholas Kis. Reviving Type guides the reader from finding original sources in archives, through historical investigation and the design process, to a finished typeface. The first, theoretically grounded part of the book provides insight into historical changes in type design through visual examples of printed matter. The second part offers a thorough explanation of the production process of the revival typefaces. Here, two different approaches are placed side by side, creating a dialogue about different working methods in type design. Technical details, design decisions, and difficulties arising during the design process are thoroughly discussed. Rich imagery of original archival material and technical illustrations visually buttress the texts. Taken as a whole, the publication becomes a cookbook for anyone wanting to dive into revival type design.

Speaker at ATypI 2019 in Tokyo. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Cecil A. Wade

British lettering (b. 1896) artist who wrote Manual of Lettering (1952, Blandford Press, London) and Modern Lettering from A to Z (1932), a book which shows many alphabets. We also find a 1934 edition: Ed. Pitman Isaac & Sons LTD - London. Example. There are several art deco alphabets. Another example (scanned by Sam Judge). His books provided inspiration for several digital typefaces:

  • Nick Curtis: Slapdash Deco NF (2005, based on a showcard alphabet presented by Cecil Wade in his Manual of Lettering), Block Party NF (2008).
  • Jim Parkinson: Wigwag (2003, a display family inspired by Ross George as well as the work of Samuel Welo and Cecil Wade).
  • Richard Dawson: Letraset Comedy (with Dave Farey).
[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Cees W. De Jong

Editor of the two-volume book A Visual History of Typefaces and Graphic Styles 1901-1939, and A Visual History of Typefaces and Graphic Styles 1628-1900. Both volumes were published by Taschen. Cees is located in Hilversum, The Netherlands. [Google] [More]  ⦿

C.G. Wrentmore

Instructor in descriptive geometry and drawing at the University of Michigan. Author of Plain Alphabets for Office and Schools (1898, George Wahr Publ., Ann Arbor, MI). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Charles Ayers Faust

Author of Faust's 75 Alphabets (1920). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Charles Enschedé

Dutch author (1855-1919) who wrote the following books or book chapters:

  • Die Hochdeutschen Schriften aus dem 15ten bis zum 19ten Jahrhundert der Schriftgiesserei und Druckerei (1919, Enschedé en Zonen, Haarlem), a publication which has four articles:
    • Gustav Mori: Christian Egenolff, der erste ständige Buchdrucker in Frankfurt a/M
    • Christian Münden: Von den ersten Franckfurter Bruchdruckern
    • Gustav Mori: Geschichte und Entwicklung des Schriftgiesserei-Gewerbes in Frankfurt a/M
    • Charles Enschedé: Die Druckerei der Elsevier und ihre Bezichung zu der Lutherschen Schriftgiesserei
    This book is mainly about the development and history of blackletter types. Open Library link.
  • Fonderies de caractères et leur matériel dans les Pays-Bas du XVe au XIXe siècle (1908: Haarlem, De erven F. Bohn).
  • Technisch onderzoek naar de uitvinding van de boekdrukkunst, door Mr. Ch. Enschedé (1901).
[Google] [More]  ⦿

Charles Hasler

British author of A Show of Hands (Typographica, 1953, pp. 4-11). The journal Typographica was edited by Herbert Spencer and published sporadically between 1949 and 1967. This article has many images of printer's fists and pointing hands.

Plinc Hasler Circus (2011, House Industries) is a digitizztion of a photo era font, Circus, done by Hasler for Photo-Lettering, Inc. in the 1950s. This circus font was digitized by Erik van Blokland in 2011 at House Industries, with a helping hand from Ken Barber.

Other typefaces designed by him at Photo Lettering include Regency Inline (caps only), French Antique Inline and Pearl Shaded (decorative caps). [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Charles J. Strong

Charles J. Strong (b. 1866, Hunstville, IL) was very influential in the sign and lettering world following the turn of the century. His text Strong's Book of Design (1910, 1917, 1982) has been reprinted several times. The early editions had wonderful color plates. Strong founded the Detroit School of Lettering along with a mail order supply department. He also wrote Strong's Art of Show Card Writing (1919) and Detroit School of Lettering 1-10 (1905). The latter text consists of ten thin booklets. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Charles L. Adams

Author of Lettering Plates (1902). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Charles L.H. Wagner

Charles L.H. Wagner was the founder and director of the Wagner School of Sign and Commercial Art, Boston, Massachusetts. Formerly instructor in Show Card Writing at Northeastern University and Young Men's Catholic Association, Boston, and University Extension, Department of Education, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and Principal, Wagner-Sprague Correspondence School. Wagner wrote six volumes of poetry and was a frequent contributor to technical magazines and metropolitan newspapers. He was a landscape and oil portrait artist as well. In 1926 he published Blue Print Text Book of Sign and Show Card Lettering (at Fellowcrafters Inc, Boston, MA). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Charles Mazé

Charles Mazé is a graduate of the Type and Media program at KABK, 2009. There, he designed a didone typeface (Bat Font) that has more warmth than classical didones in the hope of making scientific texts set in modern typefaces less boring. He did this by fattening up the italics. After graduation he moved to Brussels but now he is back in Paris.

In 2009, he started a revival of Mercator, a sanserif typeface by Dick Dooijes and G. W. Ovink designed in 1959 at the Amsterdam Type Foundry.

He set up Cataloged in Brussels with Coline Sunier. In 2012, Stéphanie Vilayphiou, Alexandre Leray, Coline Sunier and Charles Mazé co-designed the readable typeface Dauphine Regular, which can be downloaded from Github and Open Font Library. See it in action on the web site of ESAD (Ecole Supérieure d'Art et de Design). Dauphine is a sans-serif font inspired by lettering in late 19th and early 20th century maps. Github link for Dauphine.

He works with Coline Sunier since 2009. They were fellows at the French Academy in Rome's Villa Medici in 2014 and 2015, and are now graphic designers in residency at Contemporary Art Center CAC Brétigny. Charles is part of the teaching staff of Atelier National de Recherche Typographique (ANRT) in Nancy, France.

At Abyme, he published two typefaces:

  • Mercure (2010-2021). He writes in 2021: Mercure, designed by Charles Mazé, is the result of an inquiry into Latin epigraphy and the typographic forms associated with that discipline. Epigraphy is the study of écritures exposées (exposed writings), typically ancient or classical inscriptions engraved in stone or metal. The developments in mid-nineteenth century Latin epigraphy required new methods to transcribe classical inscriptions into print, which in turn required and inspired new typefaces. The Caractères Augustaux of 1846, produced by the printer Louis Perrin and the punchcutter Francisque Rey in Lyon, was the first typeface specifically designed for the transcription of the Roman capitalis monumentalis, used for the first time in 1854 in Alphonse de Boissieu's Inscriptions antiques de Lyon. It was soon followed by the Latins épigraphiques of the Imprimerie Nationale (Paris, 1854) and Ferdinand Theinhardt's Monumental (Berlin, 1863). At the same time, in reaction against the use of the prevalent Didot style, some French printers and publishers turned their attention to other typographic sources. While they found suitable models for the lowercase in typefaces produced during the French and Dutch Renaissance, the regain of interest for Roman inscriptions would provide a template for the uppercase. Around 1858, Théophile Beaudoire, sous-directeur of the Fonderie Générale in Paris, published his Elzévir (after the Dutch Renaissance printers Elsevier), one of the first typefaces to define this pattern. Mercure, which is based in part on Beaudoire's Elzevir, also goes back to the epigraphic origins of Perrin's Augustaux. Its Regular and Italic styles are completed by an additional fixed-width style, Transcript, a set of signs and symbols for the transcriptions of Latin inscriptions into print with fragmented, false, broken or missing letters. Mercure Transcript is included with any license of Mercure Regular or Italic. A study of the first three typefaces for Latin epigraphy in France and Germany, written by Charles, will soon be published in the Abyme Revue.
  • Berthe (2011-2018). Berthe is designed after another typeface called Série no. 16, whose first cuts were produced at the end of the nineteenth century by the Parisian type foundry Deberny & Peignot. It was engraved by Constant and Auguste Aubert under the direction of Charles Tuleu, the adoptive son of Alexandre Deberny whose mother, Laure de Berny, had bought from her lover Honoré de Balzac the printing house he didn't manage to transform in a profitable company. Série no. 16 quickly became a popular choice among printers and found its way into many editions of classic and popular texts. Review by Hrant Papazian, who wrote that it presents a congenial evolution of the theatrical Didone style of type. Lower contrast, fluid structures, humane proportions. It is like a Didot or Bodoni taking leave of the catwalk and relaxing among friends.. Author of the related article Abîmées (2021).
[Google] [More]  ⦿

Charles Nix: Books on typography

Type Directors Club President in 2009, Charles Nix, has compiled a long list of books on typography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Charles Paxton Zaner

Famous American teacher of penmanship, b. 1864. Author of Lessons in Ornamental Penmanship (1920), Gems of Flourishing (1888), and The New Zanerian Alphabets (1900, Zaner & Bloser, Columbus, OH). This site describes his story: In 1888, Charles Paxton Zaner founded the Zanerian, College of Penmanship, in Columbus, Ohio. The schools curriculum included courses that prepared students for careers as penmen who, at that time, wrote by hand most of the documents used by business and industry. The school also trained students to become teachers of penmanship, illustrators, engravers, and engrossersspecialists in the kind of ornamental writing used for diplomas and certificates. In 1891, Zaner sold a share of the Zanerian to Elmer Ward Bloser, whom he met in 1883 while the two men were students at Michaels Pen Art Hall. Bloser, who had been working as an instructor at the Spencerian Business College in Cleveland, was a superb penman, and he had accumulated the capital necessary to sustain the college in its early days (when its three instructors had only three pupils). By 1895, the Zanerian College of Penmanship had become the Zaner-Bloser Company, an institution that offered courses in penmanship, published professional materials about handwriting and illustration, and sold handwriting supplies. In 1904, Zaner-Bloser published The Zaner Method of Arm Movement, a landmark text that taught the simplified style of writing learned by students at the Zanerian to children in elementary schools all over the United States. This book also applied the findings of psychologists who had discovered that young children completed manual tasks more easily if allowed to use the large arm movements that were natural to them at their early stage of motor skills development.

In 2006, Paul Hunt designed a set of connected calligraphic scripts, called P22 Zaner.

Link to some of his books. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Charles Pearce

Calligrapher and painter, b. 1943, Birmingham, UK. He made several calligraphic fonts: Cantabria (first developed at Camberwell School of Art and loosely based on the work of poet and artist, David Jones), Daniel, Fiorentina, Helena, Penkridge, Ullswater (brush script), Umbria (classic calligraphy). Corporate/custom typefaces: RKO Century Warner, Guinness (Cranks Health Foods font redesign). Author of these books:

  • Calligraphy, The Art Of Fine Writing (1975). Published by Cumberland Graphics division of British Pens as part of the Penstyle Calligraphy Set.
  • Lettering, The Art Of Calligraphy (1978). Published by Platignum as part of their Lettering Set.
  • Italic Writing (1979). Published by Platignum as part of their Italic Handwriting Set.
  • A Young Person's Guide to Calligraphy (1980). Published by Pentalic as part of A Young Person's Calligraphy Starter Set.
  • A Little Manual of Calligraphy (1981). Published by Wm. Collins (worldwide) and Taplinger (USA).
  • A Calligraphy Manual for the Beginner (1981). Published by Pentalic as part of the Pentalic Introductory Calligraphy Course.
  • The Calligraphy Sampler (1985). Published by Wm. Collins.
  • The Anatomy of Letters (1987). Published by Taplinger.
[Google] [More]  ⦿

Charles Percival Bluemlein

Charles Percival (or just Percy) Bluemlein (b. 1891) served in the 346th Infantry in World War I. In 1920, he married Mildred Vanderbilt and settled in Brooklyn, NY. He died in 1944 and is buried in the Long Island National Cemetery in Farmingdale, NY. Famous for his scripts and penmanship, his best known book is Script and Manuscript Lettering (1947, Higgins Ink Co, Brooklyn). Earlier editions are from 1943 and 1944 and have Bertram Cholet and Dorothy Sara (1943 edition only) as co-authors.

Modern revivals of his scripts include

  • KolinskySable SG (Jim Spiece, 2004), based on a 1944 brush design called Mr. Ronald G. Sheppards.
  • Bender Script (2008) by Alison Argento. She writes: Would you hire one of the top hand lettering artists that worked for companies like Max Factor for your designs? Of course you would! Chas Bluemlien passed away many years back, and you couldn't have afforded his services anyway, but his lettering prowess which graced many advertisements, primarily cosmetic ads, has been pulled together from numerous samples to make this font.
  • Alejandro Paul's Bluemlein Scripts (2004-2005, Umbrella and Veer) are based on Bluemlein's alphabets from the book cited above: Miss Le Gatees, Mr Rafkin, Mr Keningbeck, Mr Lackboughs, Lady Dawn, Mrs Von Eckley, Mr Sheppards, Mr Dafoe, Mr Canfields, Mr Stalwart, Mr Sandsfort, Mr Leopolde (and later, Mr. Leopolde Pro), Mr DeHaviland, Mr Blaketon, Miss Stanfort, Miss Packgope, Miss Fajardose, Mrs Saint-Delafield, Mrs Blackfort, Mr Sopkin, Mr Sheffield, Miss Lankfort, Herr Von Muellerhoff, Dr Sugiyama, Dr Carbfred. In 2011, that series was made available at Google Web Fonts. Al;ejandro writes: From the early 1930s through World War II, there were about 200 professional hand letterers working in New York City alone. This occupation saw its demise with the advent of photo lettering, and after digital typography, became virtually extinct.
  • Soft Horizon's Lainie Day (1993) is an earlier free font in the style of Paul's Lady Dawn and Mr Lackboughs.
  • In 2012, Intellecta Design got into the act and promised to digitize the entire series under the name Bluelmin instead of Bluemlein. They created Bluelmin Kisaburo, Bluelmin Ralph (2012), Bluelmin Ronald (2012), Bluelmin Sandsfort (2012) and Bluelmin Benedict (2012).

Credits: Several of the images below, as well as some biographical information, are courtesy of Charles's grandson, David Musgrave. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Charles Rollinson

Author of Alphabets and Other Materials Useful to Letters (1912, publ. D. Van Nostrand Co, New York). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Charlotte Rivers

Author of Type Specific: Designing Custom Fonts for Function and Identity (2005, RotoVision). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Chas W. Reinhardt

Author of Lettering for Draftsmen, Engineers & Students (1917). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Christer Hellmark

Swedish author (b. 1946) of Typografisk håndbok (1998, Ordfront & Ytterlids; see also Ordfront/Ordfront Galago, Sweden, 2004), and of Bokstaven, ordet, texten, andra utgåvan, första tryckningen (Ordfront förlag, 1998). Old URL. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Christian Axel-Nilsson

Author of Type Studies The Norstedt Collection of Matrices in the Type foundry of the Royal Printing Office (Norstedt Tryckeri, Stockholm, 1983), in which we find reproductions of all metal typefaces in the collection of the Norstedt foundry. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Christian Laucou-Soulignac

Or just Christian Laucou, b. 1951, ex-graduate of and professor at Ecole Estienne in Paris. Typographer who worked with lead. He started Les Editions du Fourneau, later renamed Fornax. In 2000, he founded l'Ouvroir de typographie potentielle.

Designer of Zarbres (2004), a typeface used in the book Nouvelles des arbres, by Gérard Bialestowski. This is a private face, as he explained to Jef Tombeur: Quelques mots sur le Zarbres. Je ne trouvais pas ce qui me plaisait ni en plomb, ni en fonte informatique. Alors je l'ai créé, mais avec un cahier des charges bien précis. Il devait s'approcher du résultat qu'on obtient en gravant dans du bois ou du lino pour s'harmoniser avec les illustrations. Pour cela, il devait être gras, d'un dessin un peu maladroit (taillé à la serpe), quelques lettres hors norme (avec une e bdc à la barre trop oblique, la u bdc un peu onciale, etc.), comme dessiné par un amateur qui ne connaît pas la typo et qui cherche à imiter, à obtenir une hauteur d' assez importante pour réaliser, sans interlignage, des compositions d'un gris très foncé. J'ai fait ainsi un romain, un italique et les deux polices expertes correspondantes (petites capitales et ligatures). Pour l'instant le Zarbres est reste une police exclusive qui ne sort pas de mon ordinateur.

Author of Histoire de l'écriture typographique: Le XIXe siècle français (2013, with Jacques André). From the blurb: Pour montrer toute la richesse de cette période, les auteurs ont choisi d'en raconter les aventures successives: les Anglais avec l'invention des caractères gras, des égyptiennes et des sans-sérifs; la fonderie Gill?é qui devient celle de Balzac puis de De Berny et qui rejoindra, à l'aube du XXe siècle, celle des Peignot; la saga des Didot, de la rigueur de Firmin à l'extravagance de Jules; l'Imprimerie royale, puis impériale ou nationale, ses caractères orientaux et ceux de labeur, qui perdureront tant qu'il y aura du plomb; Louis Perrin, qui réinvente les elzévirs; les grandes fonderies françaises, qui rivalisent d'invention et de copies, et, enfin, les évolutions techniques de tout le siècle. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Christian Paput

From MyFonts: Punchcutter for the Imprimerie Nationale, Paris, where he works with Nelly Gable. Author of La Lettre - La Gravure du Poinçon typographique / The Punchcutting (Wissous, 1998). He works at the Cabinet des poinçons. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Christine Hartmann

Author (b. 1938) of Kalligraphie. Die Kunst des schönen Schreibens (1986-1989, with Christian Scheffler). In that book, she drew several alphabets, including an Antiqua Versalien, a Fraktur, a Humanistische Kursiv, a Schwabacher, and a Schwung Kursiv. She studied with Karlgeorg Hoefer at the Offenbacher Kunsthochschule. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Christine Thompson

Coauthor with Steven Heller in 2000 of "Letterforms: Bawdy, Bad and Beautiful: The Evolution of Hand-Drawn, Humorous, Vernacular, and Experimental Type", Watson-Guptill, New York. Christine Thompson, designer at the New York Times on the Web since the site's inception in 1995, has won multiple awards for her work in interactive media. She lives in New York. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Christoph Schwedhelm

Author of Rekonstruiert (2013, Dortmund, Germany), which served as a Diploma Arbeit at the Fachhochschule Dortmund. This book has contributions by Friedrich Forssmann, Albert Rahmer and Bernhard Schnelle. It describes the process of reconstruction of some blackletter fonts, and discussions blackletter typography in general. The four revived blackletter typefaces showcased in the book are

[Google] [More]  ⦿

Christopher Burke
[Hibernia Type]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Christopher Dean

Graduate of the Master of Design program (MDes) at NSCAD University, 2010, in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where he was born and still lives. Typographer and enthusiastic supporter of open source projects. He says: I conduct experimental research designed to support or refute typographic conventions in accordance with objective measures of human performance and empirical data. Useful subpage on type literature. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Chromatic type

Fancy metal or wood type from the second half of the 19th century. According to Ringwalt in his American Encyclopedia of Printing and Bookbinding (1871): type made of metal or wood for color printing and so arranged that there are duplicate or triplicate copies of each letter, which, after being printed, respectively, in different colors, on a given space, blend together in a harmonious whole. Chromatic types were shown regularly in foundry type specimen books of the 1840s and 1850s.

Rob Roy Kelly describes the early history: Chromatic types were first produced as wood type by Edwin Allen, and shown by George Nesbitt in his 1841 Fourth Specimen of Machinery Cut Wood Type. Both William H. Page in 1859, and J.G. Cooley in c.1859, showed several pages of Chromatic type in each of their wood type specimen books. Page showed these types in most of his specimen books in the 1870s. The high point of Chromatic wood type production came in 1874 when the William H. Page Wood Type Co. issued their 100-page Specimens of Chromatic Type & Borders. Though Hamilton, Morgans & Wilcox, and Heber Wells all showed samples of Chromatic types through the rest of the century, none of these ever reached the level of intricate precision attained in Page's 1874 masterpiece.

Free copy of William H. Page's Specimen of Chromatic Wood Type Borders Etc (1874). Local download of this PDF file. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Círculo de Tipógrafos

A select dynamic group of type design specialists in Mexico, est. 2007. Their goals are to educate, research and publish. For example, in 2009, they published Jan van Krimpen Modernidad y Tradición, with text provided by Jan Middendorp. Their grandest project to date is the research on book cover designer Boudewijn Ietswaart, which led them to develop the Balduino type family, which was unveiled at ATypI 2009 in Mexico City. The group consists of Rebeca Durán, Raul García Plancarte, Cristóbal Henestrosa, Noemí Hernández, Feike de Jong, David Kimura, Alejandro Lo Celso, Isaías Loaiza, Nadia Méndez, David Ortíz, Mauricio Rivera, and Óscar Yáñez. Logo. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Cláudio Rocha

Cofounder of Now Type, Cláudio Rocha is an Italian Brazilian illustrator and designer (b. 1957) who was first based in sao Paulo, then in Treviso, Italy, and currently in The Netherlands. Now Type is jointly run with his son Lucas Franco (b. 2001). He edited Tupigrafia, a magazine dedicated to typography and calligraphy in Brazil. Partner of Oficina Tipografica Sao Paulo. His typefaces include:

  • ITC Gema (1998: a felt tip pen font) and ITC Underscript (1997, a grungy fat script).
  • Cashew (2000-2020). Cashew is a rounded squarish sans serif font, originally created as a logotype for Tupigrafia magazine (2000). In its 2020 iteration, done together with Lucas Franco, it is a variable font with one axis, from Regular to Extended.
  • Tenia.
  • Viela Regular (Claudio Rocha & Lucas Franco, 2008-2019). A great thick-and-thin typeface.
  • Unidin (sans display face).
  • Rock Regular (slab face). Rock Titling (1998-2019).
  • Old Future (a brush version of Futura).
  • Chacal Pixel.
  • Persplextiva (2001-2002, a bouncy hand-drawn 3d face done in the lettering style of Brazilian cartoonist Millor Fernandes).
  • Liquid Stencil (1998-2000). A brush stencil.
  • Feijoada Light.
  • Akrylicz Grotesk (2002, brush/paint face).
  • Sampa (1999-2019). An informal brush script.
  • Genova (2008-2020). A reinterpretation of Paganini typeface, lauched by Nebiolo type foundry in 1928 for hand composition and developed by Alessandro Butti under the supervision of Raffaello Bertieri.
  • Stampface (2006-2018, by Claudio Rocha and Lucas Franco). Based on a Headline Gothic metal type sample found in a reference book, which was designed by Morris Fuller Benton in 1936 for American Type Founders.
  • Pieces Stencil (2016). Think piano key or Futura Stencil.
  • Antonio Maria (2017): Antonio Maria, a font by Claudio Rocha and Lucas Franco, takes its shapes from the lettering found in the cover of Afixação Proibida (Display Prohibited), a book by the Portuguese poet Antonio Maria de Lisboa (1928-1953). In fact, Antonio Maria was the leader-writer of Afixação Proibida, a collective manifesto from 1949, that initiated the surrealist movement in Portugal. It is an inverted-contrast typeface with 150 ligatures and a large character set.
  • Rudolf Antiqua and Rudolf Initials (2018). A faithful revival of Rudolf Koch's Koch Antiqua (1922). Followed by Rudolf Text (2017-2020, Lucas Franco and Claudio Rocha).
  • Mefistofele. A revival in 2018 by Claudio Rocha and Lucas Franco of the modular stencil typeface Mefistofele (1930, Reggiani foundry).
  • Rudolf Titling (Lucas Franco and Claudio Rocha), a typeface that won an award at Tipos Latinos 2018.
  • Agora Titling Extra Light (2018).
  • Pieces Stencil (2016-2019). Pieces is a piano key typeface built on a modular system with emphasis on diagonal endings.
  • Moreira Serif (2019). A slab serif version of Morris Fuller Benton's art deco typeface Broadway (1927). In the 1930s, the Portuguese graphic artist Antonio Moreira Junior added serifs to Broadway's letterforms and marketed it under a new name. Moreira Serif revives that typeface.
  • Scarpa Titling (2019, Claudio Rocha and Lucas Franco). An all caps typeface based on a nameplate found on the front door of a shoemaker in Treviso, Northern Italy.
  • Anton (2020, by Claudio Rocha and Lucas Franco). An art deco typeface modeled after a Dutch deco type seen on the Anton Antonius Kurvers's cover of Wendingen in 1927.
  • Esperanca Sans (2019). A Peignotian sans by Claudio Rocha & Lucas Franco.
  • Jaguaribe (2020). In Unicase and Serif versions, by Claudio Rocha. A squarish sans and serif pair based on the of letterforms drawn by Brazilian artist Gil Duarte.
  • Spinface (2020). An experimental turned letter font by Claudio Rocha and Lucas Franco.
  • Werner (2020-2021). A revival of A.D. Werner's famous deco inline typeface Dubbeldik (1972).
  • Densa (2020). Emulating 19th century wood types. Densa typeface was based on the Fantastic Voyage movie title in the 1966 poster
  • Tegel (2020-2021). Tegel is a layer font that emulates the ceramic tile letters found on a school façade in Delft.
  • Etna Futurist (2020, Claudio Rocha & Lucas Franco). Digital interpretation of Etna, a wood type produced by the Italian type foundry Xilografia Meneghello & Belluzzo, in the 1920s.
  • Cassiano (2020). A super-fat octagonal typeface based on letters found on a book cover by the Brazilian artist Belmonte (1896-1947).
  • Fortunato (2020). A digital interpretation of the lettering work done by the Italian Futurist genius Fortunato Depero (1892-1960) for advertising and editorial design. A pure Italian art deco typeface. The lowercases were developed from scratch.
  • Jurriaan (2021). A square block typeface.
  • Hendrik (2021, by Claudio Rocha & Lucas Franco). A revival of Simplex (Sjoerd Hendrik de Roos, 1937).
  • Martin (Swing, Straight) (2020). A beatnik typeface based on the letters found in the jazz record albuns designed by David Stone Martin (1913-1992).
  • Tesoura (2020). A paper-cut typeface.

He published the books "Projet Tipográfico" (Ed. Rosari), "Trajan e Franklin Gothic" (Ed. Rosari), and "Tipografia Comparada" (Ed. Rosari). Claudio now lives in Treviso, Italy, from where he launched the type magazine Tipoitalia in 2009.

FontShop link. Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Clarence Pearson Hornung
[Dick Pape]

Prolific author, b. 1899. His books include the typographically magnificent Handbook of Early Advertising Art, Mainly from American Sources (Dover, 2 volumes). The typeface Lexington is attributed to him, as Mac McGrew writes: Lexington is a font of shaded and decorated letters and figures, drawn for ATF by Wadsworth A. Parker in 1926, from a design by Clarence P. Hornung. It is an ornamental form of roman letter, with curly serifs, and tendrils at the ends of light strokes. It was recast in 1954, and copied in one size by Los Angeles Type.

The book Early Advertising Alphabets, Initials and Typographic Ornaments (1956), edited by Clarence P. Hornung, led Dick Pape to creates these digital fonts in 2008: AltDeutsch, Amorette1889, ArabesqueDesign, BreiteEgyptienne (2008), BreiteverzierteClarendon, ChiswickPressGothicInitials, EarlyScrollAlphabet, EarlySignboards, EnglandInitials1880, ErhardDatdolt, FlorentineInitials, FlorentineInitialsReverse (2008), GothicChancery1880s, GothicClosedLetter (2009-2010, Lombardic), Hollandisch-Gothic (2010), JudendstilAlphabet (2009), LilyoftheValley, Papillon 1760 [First shown in Paris in 1760, and reprinted by Clarence P Hornung in Dover Pictorial Archive Series: Early Advertising Alphabets, Initials and Typographic Ornaments (1956, Dover Publications). Hornung's images inspired Pape's typeface], Phantasie (2009-2010), Romaine Midolline (2010), RomanPrintShaded (2010, ornamental roman caps), RusticAlphabet, SilhouetteInitials1880, TheTerrorsofNightLife, VerzierteAltGothic, VerzierteGothic, VictoriaGingerbread1890 (2007).

Klingspor link.

Download here. More direct link to Pape's digitizations. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Claude Lamesle

Parisian printer, whose 1742 book Épreuves générales des caractères qui se trouvent chez Lamesle is at the Rochester Institute of Technology. A facsimile was published by A.F. Johnston in 1965 at Menno Hertzberger&Co, Holland: The Type specimens of Claude Lamesle, a facsimile of the 1st edition printed at Paris in 1742. Free Google Books download.

Among many other types, Lamesle's 1742 text book shows a Civilité. Revivals:

[Google] [More]  ⦿

Claude Médiavilla

French type designer (b. 1948) who was born in the South of France. He studied typography, calligraphy and painting at the School of Fine Arts in Toulouse. He received the Prix Charles Peignot in 1982. In 1992, the President of France invited him to design the inscriptions for the royal tombs in the Basilique Saint Denis in Paris. He published Calligraphie (Imprimerie Nationale, 1993). Author of Calligraphy (Wommelgem, Belgium, 1996) and Histoire de la calligraphie française (Albin Michel, 2006; examples here). In 2009, with the help of Atelier des Signes, he created a typeface for the signage at Chateau de Fontainebleau. Additional URL. In 2010, Mediavilla cofounded Media type Foundry with Sonia Da Rocha and Joel Vilas Boas in Paris.

His typefaces:

  • Galba: an elegant roman titling face, done at Mecanorma in 1987.
  • Media Script (Mecanorma, 1985).
  • Mediavilla (CCT, 1976).
  • Mediavilla Script (Graphitel, 1986).
  • Palazzo (Mecanorma, 1984).
  • Tory (1991).

Examples of calligraphic alphabets drawn by him and shown in his Histoire de la calligraphie française (2006): Bastarda, Cancellaresca, Carolingian, Cursive gothic 1410, Luxeuil, Roman Capitals, Roman cursive 1st century, Roman cursive 4th century, Rustica 1st century, Textura 14th century, Textura 15th century, , Tourneure 15th century, Uncial 4th century.

Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Claudia Walde

Author of Street Fonts: Graffiti Alphabet From Around The World (Thomas & Hudson). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Clemens De Wolf

Coauthor with John Lane in 1993 of "Proef van Letteren, welke gegooten worden in de Nieuwe Haerlemsche Lettergietery van J.Enschedé 1768". An Enschedé specimen book with a companion volume with notes by John Lane. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Colgate Collection

The Colgate Collection at McGill University is Canada's finest type book and specimen collection. It probably rivals any collection in North America as well. The link leads you to just the first half of the type specimen collection (Text format for most of that list). Part of the collection on typography. Part of the collection on typefounding and type-cutting. I know that there are fine books at Harvard and other Ivy League libraries, but none (!!!) allows the use of scanners or digital cameras in the rare books divisions. Duplication is possible at a cost well above the purchase price of the (rare) book if you need a reasonable number of copies. But McGill is open for business. Free, democratic, accessible to "the people", even the poor, the way it should be. Cameras and scanners are allowed. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Colin Banks

Born in Ruislip, Middlesex, in 1932, Colin Banks has been involved in graphic design, corporate identity and typography since 1958 through the London-based partnership Banks&Miles (1958-1998), with John Miles.

Author of London's handwriting (London Transport Museum, 1994) about the development of Edward Johnston's Underground Railway Block-Letter. CV. He died in March 2002 in Blackheath. Obituary by James Alexander.

Banks&Miles had offices in London, Amsterdam, Hamburg and Bruxelles. Their clients included the British Council (it is unclear if he helped design British Council Sans at Agfa Monotype in 2002: a major controversy erupted in the UK when it was learned that the British Council had paid 50k pounds for British Council Sans), English National Opera, the European Parliament Election campaigns, producing corporate identities for the Post Office, Royal Mail, British Telecom, the Institute of Mechanical Engineers, Fondation Roi Baudouin, City and Guilds, Commission for Racial Equality, United Nations University, and major publications etc for UNHCR Geneva. He was consultant to London Transport for over thirty years, then Mott Macdonald engineers and Oxford University Press.

The Royal Mail font is called Post Office Double Line, and was designed by Colin Banks in the 1970s.

The British Council Sans family (2002, Agfa Monotype) is now available for free download here. Included is support for Arabic (Boutros British Council Arabic), Khazak, Greek, Cyrillic, and Azerbaijani.

Other typefaces with Colin Banks's name on it include New Johnston (1979, after Edward Johnston's typeface for the London subway) and the sharp-serifed Gill Facia (1996, Monotype: based on letters drawn by Eric Gill in 1903-1907 for use by the stationers, W. H. Smith) [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Colin Clair

Author of Christopher Plantin (1960, Cassell and Co, London). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Conrad William Schmidt

Author of An Album of Monograms, Crests & Scrolls (1895). Conrad William Schmidt was a manufacturer of coach and railway varnishes and colours located on Carpenters Road in Stratford, London. He writes F.A. Glaeser in brackets, so perhaps one of the two names is an alias or nom de plume. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Convention typographique

Jef Tombeur's site on orthotypography (in French). One can buy at this site the comprehensive book by Jean Meron entitled Orthotypographie : recherches bibliographiques (2002), which has a preface by Fernand Baudin. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Cornelis Dirckszoon Boissens

Dutch letterer and calligrapher, 1568-1634 (or 1635). He published the calligraphic masterpiece Gramato graphices in Amsterdam in 1605. This book has several blackletter and chancery alphabets proposed by Boissens. Teaser web site by yours truly. [Google] [More]  ⦿

CRA list of books

List of books compiled by Jay Vegso at the Computing Research Association regarding the advantages and disadvantages of copyright. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Cristóbal Henestrosa
[Estudio CH]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

CSA Creative Studio
[Curtis Canham]

Curtis Canham (CSA Creative Studio, est. 2010, upstate New York) designed the vector-format typeface Chloe in 2015. In 2015, he started work on the book A-Holes: A Type Book. Home page. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Curtis Canham
[CSA Creative Studio]

[More]  ⦿

Curwen Press

The Curwen Press founded in 1863 by the Reverend John Curwen concentrated on printing music for the tonic sol-fa method, but when his grandson Harold (d. 1955) joined in 1908, he broadened their output to include limited edition books of high quality. It published a nice specimen book A Specimen Book of Types & Ornaments in Use at the Curwen Press, Plaistow, London (1928) and A Working Handbook of Types in Use at the Curwen Press (1931). The latter book shows an original art deco era ssan, Curwen Sanserif (+Titling). In the 1980s, it went under. Typefaces related to Curwen Press:

  • Colin Kahn designed P22 Curwen in 2005 and says: P22 Curwen Poster is a digitized version of a rare wood type used by the Curwen Press in England in the early 20th Century for poster work. P22 Curwen Maxima is a new hyper-stylized re-interpretation of Curwen Poster.
  • Ari Rafaeli designed the delicate caps typeface Curwen Initials based on drawing by Jan van Krimpen in 1925 for the Curwen Press.
  • Curwen Sans (2018, Keith Bates). A monoline sans based on an in-house sans of Curwen Press.
[Google] [More]  ⦿

C.W. Jones

Jones lived in Brockton, MA. Author of Alphabets for Practical and Ornamental Engrossing (1914), Lessons in Engraver's Script (1914), American Method of Business Writing, and Ninety-five Lessons in Ornamental Penmanship (1914). The second book contains one full formal calligraphic alphabet by Jones himself. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Cyrus Highsmith
[Occupant Fonts]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

D. Bolle

Dutch printer located in Rotterdam, who published the lettering model book Calligrafische voorbeelden ten dienste van schlders, steenhouwers, lithographen, bouwkundigen enz in 32 genres (1888).

Reference: Nederlandse belettering negentiende-eeuwse modelboeken (2015, Mathieu Lommen, de Buitenkant, Amsterdam). [Google] [More]  ⦿

D. Duvillé

D. Duvillé was a professor at Ecolesdes arts de Paris. Author of Art du tracé rationnel de la lettre (1934, Société Française d'Éditions Littéraires et Techniques, Paris). The text shows how to trace letters in different styles.

There are some digital typefaces that are based on Duvillé's alphabets:

[Google] [More]  ⦿

Dagmar Welle

Graduate of the University of Leipzig. Author of Deutsche Schriftgiessereien und die künstlerichen Schriften zwischen 1900 und 1930 (1997, S. Roderer Verlag, Regensburg). Graduate from the University of Leipzig. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Dan Cederholm
[SimpleBits (or: Icon Shoppe)]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Dan X. Solo
[Dan X. Solo: Art Deco Display Alphabets]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Dan X. Solo
[Dan X. Solo: His books]

[More]  ⦿

Dan X. Solo
[Solotype]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Dan X. Solo: Art Deco Display Alphabets
[Dan X. Solo]

Dan Solo wrote Art Deco Display Alphabets (1982, Dover Pictorial Archives). The images of the book were scanned in by Google. View them here [large web page warning]. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Dan X. Solo: His books
[Dan X. Solo]

Dan Solo's books contain a series called "Ready-to-use...". These are not included in the chronological list given here.

[Google] [More]  ⦿

Daniel Berio
[Autograff]

[More]  ⦿

Daniel Berkeley Updike

Born in Providence, 1860, he died in Boston in 1941. Typographer, printer, historian and author, best known for his classic book Printing Types: their History, Forms and Use" (1922, Harvard University Press; second edition at Harvard University Press in 1951) which is based on a lecture series he gave at Harvard University from 1910 to 1916. The second edition is from 1937.

In 1893 (some say 1894), he founded the Merrymount Press in Providence, Rhode Island. He designed the Montallegro typeface. In 1896, Daniel Berkeley Updike and Bertram G. Goodhue co-designed a bold text typeface.

Britannica entry. Abebooks link.

Volume 1 and Volume 2 of his book have been scanned in. Patent office link. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Daniel Mellis

Daniel Mellis (Chicago) printed a small book in 2010 based on 19th century ornamented metal typefaces from the collection at Wells College. These include Tinted, Tasso, Banquet, Antique Extra Condensed, Aquatint, Dandy, Modoc, Columbus, Art Gothic, Rubens, Yukon Pointed, Tuscan Stellar, Halftone, Obelisk, Alpine, Gothic Shade, Ruskin, Condensed Roman, Ray Shade, Tuscan Floral, Souvenir and Aurora Uncial (Victor Hammer, ATF---never produced, but rediscovered by Theo Rehak). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Daniel Sauthoff

Author with Gilmar Wendt and Hans Peter Willberg of Schriften erkennen: eine Typologie der Satzschriften für Studenten, Grafiker, Setzer, Kunsterzieher und alle PC-User (1997, Verlag Hermann Schmidt, Mainz). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Daniel T. Ames

American penman. Author of Compendium of Practical and Ornamental Penmanship (New York, ca. 1883) and Ames' Guide to Self-Instruction in Practical and Artistic Penmanship (1884). The latter book contains some explicit alphabets: Roman, Italic Roman, Gothic, German text, Old English, Church Text, Medieval, Egyptian, German Round Hand, Marking and Rustic (elaborate caps). One of the initial caps in that text led Robert Fauver to create the free font Dirty Ames (2006).

In 1890, Ames wrote Ames' Book of Flourishes.

Handdrawn portrait of Ames found in "Real Pen Work" (1881, Knowles and Maxim). [Google] [More]  ⦿

David Bergsland
[Hackberry Font Foundry (Was: NuevoDeco Typography, or: Bergsland Design)]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

David Carson

David Carson (b. 1955, Corpus Christi, TX) graduated from San Diego State University. Arguably one of the world's most famous graphic designers, he created a few fonts and is credited with launching the typographic grunge style in the 1990s. When people talk of "David Carson" fonts, they usually mean fonts he used in publications he helped realize, like Ray Gun and Eye magazines, and the End of Print book. A number of these fonts that have appeared in Ray Gun (for which he worked from 1992 until 1995) while Carson was art director are available for sale from Garage Fonts. A font designed by Carson (emulating hand/finger gestures) is included in one of Neville's FUSE series. At FUSE 7, he published Fingers. In 1995, Carson left Ray Gun to found his own studio, David Carson Design, in New York City. In 2000, Carson closed his New York City studio and followed his children to Charleston, South Carolina, where their mother had relocated them. Since then he has lived in San Diego, Seattle, Zurich, and Tortola. Currently he lives and works in NYC.

Joe Clark ends an interview like this: I sent David Carson a copy of my published story via poste escargot, only to have it returned unopened with a handwritten note declaring: "Joe-- I'm not interested in your type of 'journalism.'" The design prima donna's antics are increasingly irrelevant now that he has been dismissed from Ray Gun (ding-dong!) and is now a meta-personality famous for being famous, rather like Zsa Zsa Gabor on The Hollywood Squares. No quantity of hagiographic Apple and other advertisements, David, can substitute for a genuine career. And your new magazine Speak comes dangerously close to monomania. Letting you lay it out and edit it and write it is the Peter principle brought to life. Though you're not interested in my type of "journalism," more and more readers are losing interest in yours.

First, a font list of fonts attributed to David Carson (but read on about that after the list): Australis, BigEd, BigLazyBoy, ChicaShica, ChickenPlain, Coniption, Contrary, Copper, Cystfun, Darwin, Dead, Evangelic, FragileReg, Freeway, Fux, Gangly, Gunnnn, Hawkwindps, Heroin, JapanNetta, Johndvl, Manifesto, Macanuda Pro, Magical, Mexican, Newcent, Note, O, OCROver, One, Ooombabold, PhaseGothic, Pizzaface, Public, PublicEnemy, Serifedsans, Seven, Shurpa, SignSystem, Spicadog, Temblorosa, Thaitrade, Times, Timstypo, Wingnut, Wrongfont, Yoyoyo, Zwigaforma.

This text was found on the web, by an anonymous poster: By Carson's own admission, he has designed "only a few typefaces." In fact, only one face from his own digital foundry (he is the founder of Garage Fonts) is credited to him---and even then it is in conjunction with Betsy Kopshina (Chicken Scratch). He has however, modified some existing faces from various designers for his own design work. Yet the majority of what you see labled Carson is "in the manner of," as he is generally recognized as the father of deconstructive (grunge) type and style, having lead the design of RayGun magazine and most notably being the author of "The End of Print." His style is literally taught at many design schools such as American Applied Arts, CalArts, and Cranbrook; where he is often a featured speaker. A substantial amount of work from schools such as these are incorrectly credited to Carson, when they're actually student assignments following his style. Still another portion are thought to be rejected submissions to Garage Fonts. And yet others are just misfilings (where no one took the time to get info). I have identified the source of many of the [fonts] credited to Carson. They are as follows:

    Addmorph - should be - Cranbrook (student: Schorn)
  • Big Eds Used Type - should be - American Applied Arts (student: Edwin Utermohlen at CalArts)
  • Boutime - should be - CalArts (student: Smith)
  • Canadian Photographer - should be - Font Police/RSF (Rodney Sheldon Fehsenfeld) - note: this is a pre-Garage version
  • Caustic Biomorph - should be - Fuse by FontShop (Barry Deck)
  • Coppertop - should be - CalArts (student: unkn)
  • EveFace - should be - CalArts (student: unkn)
  • Freeway - should be - American Applied Arts (student: unkn)
  • Ghettout - should be - Font Police/RSF (Rodney Sheldon Fehsenfeld)
  • One Ioda - should be - Laport, Sue (probably a student at one of the schools)
  • Sacred Cow - should be - Cranbrook (student: D. Shields)
  • Spiker - should be - CalArts (student: unkn)
  • STA Portable - should be - American Applied Arts (student: Christa Skinner)
  • Swimblur - should be - Tozzi, Craig (probably a student at one of the schools)

Author of the successful text The End of Print: The Graphic Design of David Carson (Chronicle, 1995).

Wikipedia link. Interview with Joe Clark (Toronto). Very readable bio. %d Apr 19 2000 [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

David Consuegra

Author of American Type Design&Designers (Allworth Communications, Inc., 2004). Google has a free preview of the entire book. [Google] [More]  ⦿

David Covington

Author of Legibility: Techniques of Investigation (1998) and Type on the Screen. [Google] [More]  ⦿

David Earls

Author of "Designing Typefaces" (2002), a book that profiles some current typographers (Jonathan Hoefler, Jonathan Barnbrook, Akira Kobayashi, Zuzana Licko, Jean-François Porchez, Rian Hughes, Carlos Segura, Erik Spiekermann, Jeremy Tankard, Matthew Carter, Erik van Blokland), and has a 12-page type tutorial and a glossary. [Google] [More]  ⦿

David Harris

British lettering artist based in Exeter who specializes in the medieval versal cadel (or cadeau) letter. He created these typefaces:

  • Alexei Copperplate (1982, Letraset). A copperplate calligraphic script.
  • Chromium One (1983, Letraset, and later ITC). A decorative neon-light all caps typeface.
  • Becka Script (1985, ITC).
  • Julia Script (1983, psychedelic).

Author of The Art of Calligraphy (Dorling Kindersley), Calligraphy: Inspiration, Innovation, Communication (Anaya), and The Calligrapher's Bible (A&C Black).

FontShop link. Klingspor link. Linotype link. Behance link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

David Kindersley

English stonecutter (b. Codicote, 1915; d. Cambridge, 1995). An ex-apprentice of Eric Gill, he set up his own shop in Cambridge in 1939. His carved plaques and inscriptions in stone and slate can be seen on many churches and public buildings in the United Kingdom. He and his third wife Lida Lopes Cardozo, also a stonecutter, designed the main gates of the British Library.

In 1952 Kindersley submitted MoT Serif to the British Ministry of Transport, which required new lettering to use on United Kingdom road signs. The Road Research Laboratory found Kindersley's design more legible than Transport, a design by Jock Kinneir and Margaret Calvert, but nevertheless chose Transport. Many of the street signs in England, especially in Cambridge use Kindersley's fonts.

The book typeface Octavian was designed by Will Carter and David Kindersley for the Monotype Corporation in 1961. He also created Itek Bookface.

Kindersley was known for his letterspacing system. Author of Optical Letter Spacing for New Printing Systems (Wynkyn de Worde Society/Lund Humphries Publishers Ltd, 1976) and Computer-Aided Letter Design (with Neil E. Wiseman).

The Cardozo Kindersley workshop, which Kindersley founded and was later continued by Cardozo, publishes a number of typefaces based on Kindersley's work. They include Kindersley Street (2005, aka Kindersley Grand Arcade) which is based on Kindersley Mot Serif (1952). It was designed for the Grand Arcade, Cambridge.

London street signs that were designed by David Kindersley served as the basis of a complete lapidary typeface by Boris Kochan and Robert Strauch of Lazydogs Type Foundry, called Streets of London (2013).

Image: Stone cut alphabet from 1979 displayed in the University of Amsterdam' Special collections.

Linotype link. FontShop link. MyFonts link. Wikipedia. Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

David Lance Goines

San Francisco-based poster artist and writer, b. 1945, d. 2023. Author of A Constructed Roman Alphabet, a Geometric Analysis of the Greek and Roman Capitals and of the Arabic Numerals (David R. Godine, Boston, 1982). Each character of his roman alphabet is described using compass and ruler in the style of the romain du roi. Wonderful! He also wrote An Introduction to the Elements of Calligraphy (3rd ed. 1968; reprint, Berkeley, California: Saint Heironymous Press, 1975).

In 2017, he designed an art nouveau poster based on a 1921 poster by Jugendstil artist Leopold Forstner. Wikipedia page. [Google] [More]  ⦿

David Pankow

Editor of American Proprietary Typefaces (New York: American Printing History Association, 1998). This book has contributions by the following people:

  • Susan Otis Thompson: American Arts & Crafts Typefaces
  • Martin Hutner: Type of the Merrymount Press
  • Herbert Johnson: Montaigne and Centaur Types of Bruce Rogers
  • Cathleen Baker: Typefaces of Dard Hunter, Senior & Junior
  • Mark Argetsinger: Frederic Warde, Stanley Morison, and the Arrighi Type
  • Jerry Kelly: Joseph Blumenthal's Spiral/Emerson Type
  • Dwight Anger: Frederic Goudy's Kaatskill Type
  • W. Gay Reading: Victor Hammer's Uncial Types
  • John Kristensen: The Experimental Types of W.A. Dwiggins
  • Paul Hayden Duensing: Contemporary Private Types.
[Google] [More]  ⦿

David Rault

French graphic designer, journalist and photographer. In 2004, he started work in Istanbul for a branding company. Director of the collection Atelier Perrousseaux, and frequent speaker at design and type meetings.

Author of

Creator of a nice poster for a Turkish debate held in November 2011 on the theme of freedom of expression, entitled Ghetto. [Google] [More]  ⦿

David Ryan

Author of Letter Perfect The Art of Modernist Typography 1896-1953 (San Francisco, 2001). [Google] [More]  ⦿

David S. Rose

New York-born founder of the wireless publishing company AirMedia, who designed a character in the September 11 charity font done for FontAid II.

CV at MyFonts. Author of An Annotated Bibliography of Typography, Letterpress Printing & Other Arts of the Book (2003, Five Roses Press, New York), of Overviews of Printing Types, and of Introduction to Letterpress Printing. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Davide Tomatis
[Alfa-Beta]

[More]  ⦿

D'Avignon

Author of the penmanship and calligraphic script manual L'Écriture Américaine, published in Paris in the nineteenth century. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Davis Printing Company

Located in Toronto, this outfit published Alphabetical index to type faces, ca. 1935. [Google] [More]  ⦿

De Amsterdamse Krulletter
[Ramiro Espinoza]

In English, Amsterdam's curly letter. While doing a revival / interpretation of this style in his Krul typeface (2012), Ramiro Espinoza tells the story of this style, so I will reproduce excerpts:

Krul is a typographic interpretation of the lettering style created by Dutch letter painter Jan Willem Joseph Visser at the end of the 1940s, which decorated the traditional brown bars of Amsterdam. In the beginning, these letters were strongly associated with the pubs connected to the Amstel brewery, given that Visser was the company's official painter. As the years passed, the style became increasingly popular, and various business owners in Amsterdam and other Dutch and Belgian cities also commissioned its use. In the 1970s and 1980s, Leo Beukeboom, another talented letter painter, continued and expanded this lettering tradition while employed under the Heineken brand. Much of his work can still be found in the Jordaan and De Pijp neighborhoods in Amsterdam.

The Amsterdamse Krulletter, or Amsterdam's curly letter, is strongly inspired by the calligraphic works of the 17th century Dutch writing masters, of which Jan van den Velde was a central figure. However, distinct characteristics of this style, for example, its unusual and beautiful "g" originate from a model that was published by Johannes Heuvelman in 1659, which J. W. J. Visser referenced.

Typographic circles have somehow overlooked the Amsterdamse Krulletter and its heritage. The Dutch calligraphic hands preceded and influenced the formal English penmanship which has inspired numerous typefaces in the Copperplate style. In contrast, the models from van den Velde, Heuvelman, and Jean de la Chambre, among others, are a missing chapter in Dutch typographic history, and had never been turned into typefaces until now.

He continues about his own typeface Krul: Conscious of the cultural and identity issues that arise in reviving a unique style, and concerned about the speed with which the lettering style was disappearing, Ramiro Espinoza focused the project of designing Krul on digitally recreating the calligraphic complexity of these beautiful letters. Created through several years of research, Krul is not a direct digitization of the Amsterdamse Krulletter, but instead, an interpretation that incorporates numerous alternative characters absent in the original model, and improves upon details where necessary, resulting in an optimal performance on the printed page. The typeface is presented in Open Type format, with an abundance of intricate ligatures, fleurons, and swashes, which permit the creation of numerous calligraphic effects. The very high contrast and rhythm of the strokes in this typeface make it especially suited for media applications conveying a sense of elegance and sophistication. Designers of feminine magazines, advertisements, and corporate identities within the fragrance and fashion industries will find in this typeface to be an extremely useful and appropriate resource. The great Amsterdamse Krulletter is finally back, and we are proud to make it available to you. Krul can be purchased at ReType.

At ATypI 2013 in Amsterdam, Ramiro explained his work on the Krulletter. Still in 2013, Rob Becker and Ramiro Espinoza coauthored Amsterdamse Krulletter. In 2015, they published The Curly Letter of Amsterdam (Uitgeverij Lecturis, Eindhoven and Amsterdam). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Dean Norman

He is about to publish a book on the letterers at Hallmark. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Deborah Littlejohn

Editor of "Metro Letters," (2003, a 144-page book, University of Minnesota Design Institute), which shows work by Peter Bilak (Peter Bilak, graphic design&typography/Typotheque), Erik van Blokland and Just van Rossum (LettError), Gilles Gavillet and David Rust (Optimo), Sybille Hagmann (Kontour), Conor Mangat (Inflection), and Eric Olson (Process Type Foundry), done in a design competition for the twin cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul, Minnesota, as part of the Twin Cities Design Celebration 2003. The LettError contribution is a type family called Twin. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Delve Fonts (was: Delve Media Arts)
[Delve Withrington]

Delve Withrington (Alameda, CA; b. 1970, Asheville, NC) studied at Savannah College of Art and Design, designed signage, print projects and web pages in addition to designing custom typefaces, worked for Fontshop, and in 2004, joined the type team at Agfa Monotype, which morphed into Monotype Imaging, Redwood City, CA. From Asheville, NC, he moved around and ended up in San Francisco. In 1996, he founded Delve Fonts in Berkeley, CA (in fact, Delve Media Arts, and later renamed Delve Fonts). He has collected a virtually complete list of books on typography. Author index. MyFonts link. Designer of these typefaces:

  • Beleren (2015). A custom typeface for the trading card game Magic: The Gathering (Hasbro).
  • Blasphemy Initials: a free (and also commercial...) spooky font.
  • Blot Test (1999): a dingbat font inspired by the work of noted German psychologist Hermann Rorschach [1885-1922].
  • Cody (1999): an informal comic book face.
  • Continuo (1996): an all caps bilined outline face.
  • Cortina (2011). A futuristic family by Joachim Müller-Lancé.
  • Delve Hand (1996-2003).
  • Eucalyptus Regular.
  • Eulipia (1997-2003): organic.
  • Helfa (2011). Delve writes: Readability is baked in with a generous x-height, fine proportions that have a medium height to width ratio, and reasonable contrast in stroke weight variation.
  • Filmotype Washington (for Font Diner). Designer unidentified.
  • Muskeg. A combination of German expressionism and brush styles.
  • Oktal Mono (2012, a rounded octagonal modular typeface by Joachim Müller-Lancé and Erik Adigard of MAD studio in Sausalito).
  • Peso (1999): an octagonal family inspired by a parking sign discovered in Guanajuato, Mexico.
  • Quara (2009): a techno sans.
  • Smith & Nephew (2003) and Smith & Nephew Cyrillic (2015), rounded sans typefaces in the style of VAG Rounded.
  • Tilden Sans (2004-2009): low contrast, large x-height.
  • Tome Sans (2020). A 10-weight sans superfamily, with a variable font option.
  • Uppercut Angle (2011). A signage typeface by Joachim Müller-Lancé. It was originally developed for the Krav Maga training center of San Francisco.
  • Ysobel (2009; winner of an award at TDC2 2010). Delve co-designed the newspaper type family Ysobel (Monotype) with type designers Robin Nicholas, head of type design at Monotype, and Alice Savoie (Frenchtype, Monotype). The sales pitch: According to Nicholas, the idea for the Ysobel typefaces started when he was asked to create a custom, updated version of the classic Century Schoolbook typeface, which was designed to be an extremely readable typeface - one that made its appearance in school textbooks beginning in the early 1900s. See also Ysobel eText Pro (2013).
His Art work often involves type. Bitstream's Type Odyssey 2 (2002) has Continuo, Blot Test, Peso, Peso Negative. In 2009, Steven Skaggs designed Rieven Uncial and Rieven Italic at Delve Fonts. Pic.

Adobe link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Delve Withrington
[Delve Fonts (was: Delve Media Arts)]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Denis Diderot et Jean le Rond d'Alembert

Authors in 1751 of Encyclopédie, ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers (1751-1772), a wonderful 17-volume encyclopedia (in French), in which one can find lots of historical tidbits about early typography in France. The book is entirely on the web. Cover page. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Derek Yaniger
[Mister Retro]

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Dermot McGuinne

Researcher at the National Print Museum in Dublin, and one of the world's top experts on Irish type design. Author of Irish Type Design: a history of printing types in the Irish character (Blackrock: Irish Academic Press, 1992). He obtained a doctorate from Trinity College Dublin for work completed on the subject of the Irish Character in Print. He was Art Director of the University of Iowa Press for a number of years before returning to Ireland. He was a lecturer in design at the Dublin Institute of Technology, where he held the position of Head of the Departments of Visual Communication and Fine Art. At ATypI in 2003, he spoke about Irish type design: the Canadian connection. Speaker at ATypI 2010 in Dublin. Speaker at ATypI 2011 in Reykjavik. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Design with FontForge

Design with FontForge (2012-2017) is a great introduction to type design. Free download at Github. People or organizations that have contributed include Nathan Willis, Vernon Adams, Eben Sorkin, Jason Pagura, Ben Martin, Matthew Skala, Martin B. Brilliant, and Google, Inc. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Designing with Type
[James Craig]

Craig was the Design Director for Watson-Guptill Publications and is a member of the New York Art Directors Club, Association Typographique Internationale (ATypI), Type Directors Club (TDC), Typophiles, and a past member of the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA). He teaches typography and design at The Cooper Union and lectures widely. Designing with Type is a growing resource for typography students and educators maintained by James Craig, author of Designing with Type: A Basic Course in Typography (1999, Watson Guptill). That book was updated to Designing with Type, 5th Edition: The Essential Guide to Typography (2006, by James Craig and Irene Korol Scala, published by Watson Guptill). Links to commercial foundries. Also check the student design subpage. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Design:Technology:Society

The UIUC School of Art's annotated graphic design bibliography. Dead link. [Google] [More]  ⦿

designwithfontforge.com

Book about how to design new typefaces with FontForge. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Detroit Type Foundry

Extinct type foundry, which published a Specimen Book in 1951. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Devanagari Linotype

Devanagari Linotype (1933, Mergenthaler Linotype Company, Brooklyn, NY) explains keyboard operations for composing Sanskrit, Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati and other Indic scripts on the Devanagari Linotype machine. The PDF of this book was posted by John Hudson in 2013. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Dick and Fitzgerald

Publisher of Dick's Alphabets (1900). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Dick Dooijes

Dutch typeface designer, b. Amsterdam, 1909, d. Baarn, 1998. Trained and worked at the Lettergieterij in Amsterdam under S.H. de Roos, starting in 1926. He worked with de Roos on the design of the typefaces Nobel and Egmont. Dooijes studied at the Amsterdam College of Arts and Crafts and at the Academy of Art. In 1940, Dooijes succeeded de Roos as artistic director of Lettergieterij Amsterdam. He was director of the Gerrit Rietveld Acedemie from 1968 until 1975. Author of Mijn leven met letters, and Wegbereiders van de moderne boektypografie in Nederland (Amsterdam, De Buitenkant, 1988). His typefaces:

  • The art deco triplet, Bristol, Carlton (1929, an engraved version) and Savoy (1936, a deluxe version). These beauties were published by Plantin. Images: 1932 1932. A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M. In 2010, Nick Curtis turned the three typefaces into digital fonts: Dooijes Deco NF, Dooijes Deco Engraved NF, Dooijes Deco Deluxe NF. Curtis muses that Dooijes made these fonts as a reaction to the huge success of Broadway (Morris Fuller Benton) in the United States a few years earlier.
  • Rondo (with Stephan Schlesinger, 1948). Well, "with" Schlesinger is a bit of an overstatement. Hans van Maanen made a digital face, Minuet (2007, Canada Type), that revives Rondo. He writes: Minuet, an informal script with crossover deco elements giving it an unmistakable 1940s flavor, is a revival and expansion of the Rondo family, the last typeface drawn by Stefan Schlesinger before his death. This family was initially supposed to be a typeface based on the strong, flowing script Schlesinger liked to use in the ads he designed, particularly the ones he did for Van Houten's cocoa products. But for technical reasons the Lettergieterij Amsterdam mandated the typeface to be made from unattached letters, rather than the original connected script. Schlesinger and Dooijes finished the lowercase and the first drawings of the uppercase just before Schlesinger was sent to a prison camp in 1942. Dooijes completed the design on his own, and drew the bold according to Schlesigner's instructions. The typeface family was finished in February of 1944, and Schlesinger was killed in October of that same year. Though he did see and approve the final proofs, he never actually saw his letters in use. It took almost four more years for the Lettergieterij Amsterdam to produce the fonts. The typeface was officially announced in November of 1948, and immediately became a bestseller. By 1966, according to a memo from the foundry, the typeface had become almost too popular. This digital version of Schlesigner's and Dooijes's work greatly expands on the metal fonts.
  • Mercator (1958): a sans family at Lettergieterij Amsterdam. It was considered at the time as a Dutch version of Helvetica, and referred to as the Dutch Helvetica. See here. Laurenz Brunner did an interpretation of Mercator for the wayfinding at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie. Ken Meier's interpretation is Mercator Vet (2006). Daniella Spinat's is Mercator Roman (2007). Charles Mazé's is just Mercator (2009). Atlas Grotesk (2012, by Kai Bernau, Susan Carvalho and Christian Schwartz, Commercial Type) is a revival of Mercator, which Henk Gianotten chacterizes as being too American, influenced by the American gothics. In 2018, Philip Cronerud released his digitization and expansion, Dooijes Sans at Truly Type. In 2015, Bauke van der Laan and Theo van Beurden set out to make another revival of Mercator in their Mercator project [it will possibly be published by Monotype].
  • Contura (1965-1966): an outline font in garalde style.
  • Flambard (1954, Lettergieterij). A bold version of Adolf Overbeek's Studio from 1946. The 1963 Tetterode specimen book points to Overbeek as Flambard's designer, and mentions in addition the date 1953. Flambard is called Studio Bold. Canada Type's revival in 2008 by Hans van Maanen is Adams. Mecanorma also has a version. Finally, there is a pirated version from 1998, called Studio Bold. See also OPTI Bold (by Castcraft).
  • Lectura (1962-1966, Lettergieterij; 1969, Intertype; acquired by Stephenson Blake): Lectura is a very legible garalde family, ideal for books. It was Dooijes's final typeface. Digitized by DTP Types Limited as Leiden DT (1992).
[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Dick Pape
[Clarence Pearson Hornung]

[More]  ⦿

Didot

Bios of the main members of the Didot family: François Didot (1689-1757), François-Ambroise Didot (1730-1804), his son, Pierre-François Didot (1731-1795), the second son, Pierre Didot (1761-1853), the oldest son of François-Ambroise, and Firmin Didot (1764-1836), the second oldest son of François-Ambroise. Belgians may be interested in Pierre, who used the fonts of his brother Firmin and had them improved by Vibert. Pierre Didot published Specimen des caractères and Specimen des nouveaux caractères in 1819. His son Jules (1794-1871), who succeeded him in 1822 in the Didot foundry, moves the foundry to Brussels in 1830 and sells it to the Belgian government to start its "imprimerie nationale". Jules returns to Paris, sets up a new printing shop, loses his mind in 1838, and sells all his material. The Didot family: extracted from the forthcoming "Bibliography of printing" (Bigmore, E. C. (Edward Clements), 1838?-1899; Wyman, C. W. H. (Charles William Henry), 1832-1909; book published by Wyman&Sons in 1878). Scan of the original Didot typeface. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Die Hochdeutschen Schriften aus dem 15ten bis zum 19ten Jahrhundert der Schriftgiesserei und Druckerei

Book in German published by Enschedé en Zonen in Haarlem in 1919. Now available on the web, it deals with blackletter type. Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Digital Scriptorium

Housed at Columbia University, The Digital Scriptorium is a growing image database of medieval and renaissance manuscripts that unites scattered resources from many institutions into an international tool for teaching and scholarly research. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Digital Type Design Guide
[Sean Cavanaugh]

Book by Sean Cavanaugh and accompanying 220 font CD with most well-known families (TTF and T1). [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Digital Typography (Don Knuth)

Don Knuth's 700-page book (1999) on typography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

DigitalThread Fonthaus

Font links and discussions. Book discussions. [Google] [More]  ⦿

DIN specifications

DIN is a set of typeface norms set by the Deutsches Institut für Normung (The German Institute for Industrial Standards). In 1919, Germany had its first (Grotesk) typeface for technical drawings that followed strict norms, the DIN 16. This was followed in 1927 by DIN 1451. The latter set of raster-based specifications was developed under the guidance of Siemens engineer Ludwig Goller in 1926-1927. The DIN 1451 would be further developed and broadened over the years, leading to DIN Engschrift and DIN Mittelschrift (1931). Various modifications led to DIN 1451 (1936), DIN 17 (1938) and the "new" DIN 16 (1934). The DIN was heavily used in Germany from 1936 until the 1980s in stencils, sold by companies such as Faber-Castell, Rotring, Staedtler, and Standardgraph. Articles on DIN:

Poster by Federico Arguissein (2013). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Dino dos Santos
[dstype]

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Display Material Company

Company located in New York City, and St. Paul, MN, which sold stencils as standard equipment with the Style A-029 Stencillor. In 1930, they published the lettering book Display material catalogue.

In 2013, Jeff Levine designed the typeface Floorwalker JNL, which is based on stencils made in 1926 by Display Material Company. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Ditta Nebiolo&Comp.

This company published an unbelievable 900-page catalog in 1920 entitled "Campionario Caratteri e Fregi Tipografici". Gerald Lange on Typo-L wrote this: "Makes you weep. The decorative devices and ornamental initials are unbelievable, many of which I have never seen anywhere before. Almost 900 pages worth of salivating." [Google] [More]  ⦿

D.J.R. Bruckner

Author of Frederic Goudy (Masters of American Design) (1990, Harry N. Abrams Publishers, New York). Synopsis copied from an anonymous source: First edition. A great new biography of this famous type designer. Well illustrated, including many examples of his designs and a complete showing of all types he designed. Goudy (1865-1947) was an American innovator in typeface design and manufacture, creator of more than 100 faces, many still popular today. In this first major critical study--the second volume in a projected biographical series on major figures of 20th-century American design---New York Times Book Review editor Bruckner presents a lively and informative survey of Goudy's varied careers as author, type designer, and businessman (founder of the Village Press, an influential private printing press). The author analyzes in detail many of Goudy's typefaces and airs conflicting opinions regarding his contributions as a designer. Numerous, well-chosen illustrations attest to Goudy's design skills. Recommended for large graphic design collections. [Google] [More]  ⦿

D.M. Campana

Author of many art books, based in Chicago, IL, where he ran D.M. Campana Art Co. His books include Book of Monograms and Fancy Letters (1900) and The Artist and Decorator (1924, 1925). The latter is an art nouveau text influenced by Alphonse Mucha. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Dmitriy Horoshkin's Library

Dmitriy Horoshkin's library of Rusian books on type and typography include these downloadable texts:

  • Album of written and printed fonts, M.A. Netyksa, 1906
  • Font album of Zemsky typography, Simferopol, 1904-1910
  • Bibliography of Russian typographic fonts, V.Ya. Adaryukov, 1924
  • Bibliography of Russian typographic fonts, V.Ya. Adaryukov, 1924 (electronic book) Rab-book
  • The Art of the Book, A.A. Sidorov, 1922
  • The history of Russian ornament. Museum of the Stroganov School, 1868
  • Font file according to GOST-1947, VNITO Polygraphy and Publishing.
  • Book Proof, N.N. Filippov, 1929
  • Book font, M.V. Bolshakov, 1964
  • Brief information on printing business, P. Kolomnin, 1899
  • Typeface, T.I. Kutsyn, 1950
  • New Russian font V.Mashin, 1906
  • Model fonts of the Military Printing House, 1821
  • Samples of the writings of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, 1862
  • Samples of Slavic-Russian printing from 1491, 1891
  • Samples of the foundry of I. Shcherbakov in St. Petersburg, 1881
  • Samples of text machine fonts of the linotype, Leningrad, 1938
  • Samples of artistic fonts and frames, A.A. Kotlyarov, 1929
  • Piusa Bauer in Warsaw, 1888
  • Font samples (Printing and Bookbinding) Yu.A. Mansfeld, 1904
  • Font samples of the 4th printing house named after E. Sokolova, 1956
  • Font samples, General Staff of the Red Army, 1937
  • Font Samples, Graphic Workshops at Academic Publishing House, 1923
  • Samples of fonts and frames for drawings and plans, A.D. Demkin, 1924
  • Types of fonts and decorations of the printing house of I. Wilborg, B.G.
  • Samples of IAN fonts - "Our Father" and other texts in 325 languages and dialects, 1870
  • Font samples of the St. Petersburg Synodal Printing House, 1902
  • Types of typographic lithography fonts of the Siberian T-v Printing, bg
  • Samples of fonts of A.Transhel's printing house, 1876
  • Samples of fonts of the printing house of the Astrakhan provincial government, 1886
  • Samples of fonts of the printing house of the Moscow Union of Mozhaisk PEC, 1926
  • Samples of fonts of the Printing house of the Central Union, bg
  • Book Design - A Guide to the Preparation of a Manuscript for Printing, L.I. Hessen, 1935
  • Design of the Soviet book, G.G. Guillo, D.V. Konstantinov, 1939
  • Printing ornament B.1, Glagol, 1991
  • Printing ornament B.2, Verb, 1991
  • Font construction, Ya.G. Chernikhov N.A. Sobolev, 2005
  • Guide to the study of ribbon (Rondo) font, A.I. Pechinsky, 1917
  • Russian typographic font. Issues of history and application practice, A.G. Shitsgal, 1974
  • Tutorial of calligraphy and cursive writing, S. Volchenka, 1902
  • Collection of old Russian and Slavic letters, K.D. Dalmatov, 1895
  • Slovolitni O. I. Leman in St. Petersburg and Moscow, Font Catalog, 1915 (?) G. Moscow.
  • Slovolitnya O.O. Gerbek. Fonts and ornaments, 19 ?? g.
  • Collection of fonts. Compiled and published by Mikhail Maimistov, 1912
  • Modern Font, W. Toots, 1966
  • Art fonts, A.M. Jerusalem, 1930
  • Font, B.V. Voronetsky E.D. Kuznetsov, 1967
  • Font in visual agitation, S. I. Smirnov, Third Edition, 1990
  • Fonts and Alphabets, O.V. Snarsky, 1979
  • Fonts for inscriptions on drawings, M.D. Mikeladze, 1961
  • Fonts for projects, plans and maps, A.S. Shuleykin, 1987
  • Fonts and their construction, D.A. Pisarevsky, 1927
  • Fonts and type works, V.V. Grachev, B.G.
  • Typographic fonts, ONSH, ed. A.N. Strelkova, 1974
  • Fonts Development and use, G.M.Baryshnikov, 1997
  • Fonts The educational-methodical manual for cadets of LVTKU, N.A. Shashurin, 1981
  • Aesthetics of the art of font, A. Kapr, 1979

Local download (with Horoshkin's permission). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Dolphus Mieg (or Dollfus Mieg)

The Dollfus Mieg Company was founded in 1800 by Daniel Dollfus (1769-1818) and Anne-Marie Mieg (1770-1852). In the 1890s and again in 1901 it published Monograms and Alphabets for Combination, a book with alphabets and monograms for cross-stitching. This book served as example for several digital fonts. Paulo W (Intellecta Design) made Dolphus Mieg Monograms (2011) and Dolphus Mieg Alphabet (2011). There is also the interesting Victorian outline family MFC Sappho Monogram (2010) by Brian J. Bonislawsky. MFC Baelon Monogram (2013, Brian J. Bonislawsky and Jim Lyles) is an 800-character monster font with outlined spurred letters from Dollfus Mieg's book. MFC also published MFC Capulet Monogram (2014), MFC Imperator Monogram (2016), MFC Laroux Initials (2016), MFC Diresworth Monogram (2016), MFC Endeavor Monogram (2018), MFC Keating Monogram (2017) and MFC Elmstead Monogram (2018), which are all based on Dolfus's work. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Don Hosek's Essential Books on Type

[More]  ⦿

Donald E. Knuth

Professor of computer science at Stanford University, who by himself changed the world of mathematical and scientific typesetting when he developed TeX in the 1980s. That system needed fonts, so he developed a program called Metafont that permits a simple software description of a glyph. And with Metafont, and the help of Hermann Zapf, he created the Computer Modern type family. This is a tour de force, because each letter in the 72 original fonts has only one descriptive program that contains several parameters. Different parameter settings yield the typefaces, from italic to roman and bold, from 5pt to 10pt and 17pt optical settings, and from sans to serif and typewriter. Since a few years ago, he is Professor Emeritus of The Art of Computer Programming at Stanford University.

In 1983, Hermann Zapf and Donald Knuth headed a project to develop a font set called Euler. One implementation of that is AMS Euler Text.

Author in 1998 of Digital Typography (CSLI Publications). His METAFONT Book is free.

In 2013, he received the Peter Karow Award in typography. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Donny Truong
[Vietnamese Typography]

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Doug Clouse

Author of Mackellar, Smiths&Jordan: Typographic Tastemakers of the Late Nineteenth Century (Oak Knoll Press, New Castle, DE, 2008). Description by Oak Knoll Press: This is the first full-length study of the leading American type foundry of the nineteenth century. It is an interesting history of the foundry from both a business and a design point of view. The emphasis is on the design of the hundreds of typefaces that were produced by the foundry, from its inception in the 1860s until its merger with most other American foundries at the end of the century. The author describes (with many detailed photographic illustrations) how changing business conditions and technical improvements in typefounding interacted with changes in public taste to modify, over the decades, the appearance of the typefaces that Americans found in their publications. While this is a study of only one of many American foundries, in many ways MacKellar, Smiths&Jordan can stand as an exemplar of all the rest. It was the descendant of the first successful American type foundry, Binny and Ronaldson, started in Philadelphia in 1796. Extensive business records of the firm exist, as do scores of type specimen books and promotional publications of the foundry. All of these have been used extensively by the author. The scores of typefaces illustrated and described are considered as the ever-changing output of a corporation, with lesser emphasis on the individual creators of each typeface. At the turn of the twentieth century, taste turned away from the florid, ornamented style of the earlier decades. Mr. Clouse has shown in this well-written study that the earlier styles were very successful in their own time and should be judged on that basis. A completely illustrated appendix showing MS&J's patented typefaces is extremely helpful. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Douglas C. McMurtrie
[McMurtrie: A Memorandum on Early Printing on the Island of Malta]

[More]  ⦿

Douglas C. McMurtrie
[McMurtrie: The Didot Family of Typefounders]

[More]  ⦿

Douglas Crawford McMurtrie

Author (1888-1944) of over 400 books on printing and typography. His life story is told by Scott Bruntjen and Melissa L. Young in Douglas C. McMurtrie, bibliographer and historian of printing (Metuchen, N.J. : Scarecrow Press, 1979). A partial list of his books, limited to the history of typography:

His typefaces include McMurtrie Title, Ultra-Modern&Italic (1928, an art deco typeface published at Ludlow), and Vanity Fair Capitals. Jim Spiece's UltraModernClassicSG is based on Ultra-Modern. And so is Steve Jackaman's Ultra Modern RR (Red Rooster).

FontShop link. Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Douglas Thomas

Douglas Thomas is a graphic designer, writer, and historian. He holds an MA in history from the University of Chicago and an MFA in graphic design from the Maryland Institute College of Art, where he also taught. He currently teaches at Brigham Young University. Author of Never Use Futura (2017). The blurb: It's everywhere, including the moon (on the commemorative plaque left by Apollo 11 astronauts), Nike sneakers, the artworks of Barbara Kruger, Ed Ruscha, and Jenny Holzer, 2001: A Space Odyssey credits, Domino's Pizza boxes, Absolut Vodka bottles, and Red Bull cans. Futura and its typographic offspring have been the face of presidential campaigns from Richard Nixon to Hillary Clinton. Indeed, Futura is one of the most used fonts in the world today---the typeface of modern design---more so even than Helvetica. This fascinating book explores the cultural history and uses of a face that's so common you might not notice, until you start looking, and then you can't escape it. Douglas Thomas traces Futura from its Bauhaus-inspired origin in Paul Renner's 1924 design, to its current role as the go-to choice for corporate work, logos, motion pictures, and advertisements. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Dover Pictorial archive series

An inexpensive collection of books by Dover Press with mostly copyright-free drawings, bookplates, ornaments and illustrations. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Doyald Young
[Doyald Young: Logotypes and Letterforms]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Doyald Young: Logotypes and Letterforms
[Doyald Young]

Graphic designer, typographer, type designer, author, teacher and lecturer, born in 1926 in Holliday, TX. He died on February 28, 2011 due to complications following a heart operation. He attended Los Angeles City College, Los Angeles Trade Technical Jr. College, and Art Center College of Design where he has taught for 27 years and holds the honorary title Inaugural Master of the School. Doyald drew characters, often of a calligraphic or handlettered nature. He was deeply influenced by his mentor, Hermann Zapf.

Steve Heller writes: When digital programs like Fontographer made it easy for anyone with a computer to create typefaces, many of them purposefully inelegant, he advocated a high level of craftsmanship that he believed had been lost. In so doing, Mr. Young challenged a new generation to reject so-called grunge design in favor of precision. When the American Institute of Graphic Arts awarded Young its 2009 Medal for Lifetime Achievement, Marian Bantjes wrote Taste. Practicality. Formality. Understated prestige. The combination of those qualities forms as perfect a descriptor of Young's work as any you are likely to find, both in the process and the result. Although he is widely known for his elegant curves and scripts, he has never been a showy designer---there is not a trace of ego in his work. The range of letterforms able to flow at any time from his hand is great, and there is no way to particularly define Young's mark unless you have seen the hand-drawn comp. That is where his work is unmistakable: perfect letterforms drawn in pencil at a surprisingly small size without so much as a mark of hesitation or awkwardness. The style varies but the fluidity and perfection do not.

Links and media: Scott Erickson's movie on Doyald Young. FontShop link. Klingspor link. Short obituary and video. Longer video about his life. Steven Heller's obituary in the New York Times. Obituary by Marian Bantjes for AIGA.

He was adored and respected for his craft and gentleness. Portrait. Another portrait (credit: Louise Sandhaus). Author of several influential texts:

His typefaces include the extra bold condensed sports scripts fonts Home Run Sanscript (1999) and Home Run Script (1999, a connected bold retro signage script), Young Gallant (2010, a formal calligraphic script based on the alphabets his teacher, Leach, trained him on), ITC Eclat (1985, 1992, fat script face, which was used for titles by Comedy Central and the Queen Latifah movie Beauty Shop), Young Finesse (2003, an Optima-inspired thin headline typeface used in his book, Fonts&Logos), Young Finesse Italic (2006), Guts (1976, VGC), and Young Baroque (1984, 1992, Letraset; calligraphic Spencerian copperplate script; this is copied by Castcraft as OPTI Yen Script). [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Dr. Maurits Sabbe

Curator of the Plantin-Moretus Museum in the early part of the 20th century, and author of Antwerpsche Druckerye (Brussel, N. V. Standaard-Boekhandel, and Amsterdam, P. N. Van Kampen en Zoon, and Antwerpen, J. E. Buschmann, s. a.), a 153-page book on foundries and printers in Antwerp. Coauthor with Marius Audin of Die Civilité-Schriften des Robert Granjon in Lyon und die flämischen Drucker des 16 / Jahrhunderts (Wien, Bibliotheca Typographica, Herbert Reichner, 1929). That last book is a German version of Les caractères de civilité de Robert Granjon et les imprimeurs flamands (1921). Some of the findings in that beautiful book are reported here. [Google] [More]  ⦿

DRAIM
[Victor Miard]

Author of La Lettre dans le Décor et la Publicié Modernes (1930s). That book shows some unnamed art deco alphabets. [Google] [More]  ⦿

dstype
[Dino dos Santos]

Established in 1994, dstype used to offer free fonts but has gone commercial now. It is run by Dino dos Santos (b. 1971, Oporto) from Oporto, Portugal. He graduated in Graphic Design at ESAD, Matosinhos. He received a Masters degree in Multimedia Arts at FBAUP, Porto. MyFonts place. In 2006 he won the Creative Review Type Design Competition in the Revival/Extension Family. At ATypI 2006 in Lisbon, he spoke about Portuguese lettering since 1700. Interview in 2007. Klingspor link. Author of A Letra Portuguesa, a book about Portuguese calligraphy. Dino created these typefaces:

  • Access (1997).
  • Acta, Acta Display and Acta Poster (2011, +Poster swashes). A didone fashion mag family. First designed for Chilean newspaper La Tercera in 2010, DSType's Acta family is a clean information design type system. It includes Acta Symbols, an extensive dingbat family. Acta Var (2020) has two axes, weight and optical size.
  • Acto (2012). Acto is a type system designed as the sans serif counterpart of the previous released Acta. Both type families were designed in 2010 for the redesign of the Chilean newspaper La Tercera.
  • Andrade Pro (a modern) and Andrade Script Pro: based on the calligraphy of Andrade de Figueiredo, ca. 1722.
  • Anubis (2003): a unicase face.
  • Aparo (2013). A plumpish elegant high-contrast script face.
  • Apice (2022). A highly structured calligraphic typeface with five optical sizes.
  • Apud and Apud Display (2010): a high-contrast serif family.
  • Aquila (2004).
  • Ardina (2016). Done with Pedro Leal, this text typeface family has three optical sizes.
  • Boldina (2004). A fat informal poster family with 18 weights and styles.
  • Braga (2011, Dino dos Santos and Pedro Leal). This is a layered font design family. Dino writes: Braga is an exuberant baroque typeface, named after a portuguese city, also known as the baroque capital of Portugal. Our latest typographic extravaganza comes with a multitude of fonts designed to work like layers, allowing to insert color, lines, gradients, patterns, baroque, floral swashes, and many other graphic elements. Starting with Braga Base, you can add any of the twenty-three available styles, to create colourful typographic designs.
  • A type system from 2014: Breve News, Breve Display, Breve Slab Title, Breve Sans Title, Breve Title, Breve Slab Text, Breve Sans Text, Breve Text. The Breve system includes modern design elements in the skeleton and ball terminals, transional elements, almost wedge-serifs in the serifed styles. As with most of dos Santos's typefaces, even the sans and slab styles exhibit Latin warmth and exuberance.
  • Capsa (2008): a family that was inspired by, but is not a revival of the Claude Lamesle types Gros Romain Ordinaire and Saint Augustin Gros Oeil.
  • Ception (2001): a futuristic sans family.
  • Cimo (2017). A distinguished condensed sans.
  • Cultura, and its improved version Cultura New (2013), a text book typeface family.
  • Decline (1996).
  • Denso (2019). By Dino dos Santos and Pedro Leal: a great condensed variable font with weight, serif and optical size axes.
  • Digno (2022). A fuzzy text typeface family.
  • Dione (2003): a sans; redone in 2009 as Dobra at TypeTrust. See also Dobra Slab (2009).
  • Enorme (2020). Ultra massive and modular 3000-glyph mastodont of a constructivist font, by Pedro Leal and Dino dos Santos.
  • Esta (2004-2005): extensive (transitional) text and newsprint family.
  • Estilo (2005): a gorgeous and simple art deco-ish geometric headline face. This was accompanied by Estilo Script (2006), Estilo Text (2007, a 6-style rounded sans family), and later, Estilo Pro (2010, +Hairline).
  • Ezzo: a sans family.
  • Factor (1997).
  • Finura (2009): this typeface has hints of University Roman.
  • Firme (2014). A geometric sans for corporate use.
  • Fragma (2003): squarish techno family.
  • Girga (+Italic, +Engraved, +Banner, +Stencil) is a strong black Egyptian family designed in 2012 together with Pedro Leal at DS Type.
  • Glosa (2008): Glosa is a meaty multi-style didone family. Glosa Text and Glosa Headline all followed a bit later in 2008, and Glosa Display in 2009.
  • Hades (2012). A yummy and free blackletter typeface.
  • Hypergrid (2002): octagonal.
  • Ines (2015). A classic 7-style text typeface.
  • Isento and Isento Slab (2017). Both are loosely based on ATF's Times Gothic.
  • Lucius (Sans, Serif) (2022). The Lucius type family began as an attempt to reproduce the Principios Methodicos para as Letras Aldina e Roman---Typo Portuguez, but went went way beyond that in its multi-faceted execution.
  • The Quase family (2017): Quase is a very free interpretation of the types found in the Specimen of Printing Types by William Caslon from 1785. We wanted to start with Caslon and then transform it into an editorial typeface, hence the increase of the x-height and the radical reduction of the ascenders and descenders. Subfamilies: Quase Headline (12 styles), Quase Poster, Quase Display, Quase Text.
  • Idem and idem Display (2021).
  • Dino dos Santos and Pedro Leal published Jules in the summer of 2015---a fat fashion mag didone 45-style family inspired by several plates from Portuguese calligrapher Antonio Jacintho de Araujo; it comes in Big, Colossal and Epic. They followed up in 2017 with Jules Text.
  • Kartago (2005): based on Roman inscriptions from Cartago.
  • Keiss (2017) and Keiss Text (2021). A Scotch roman with a lot of contrast. Keiss Text comes in twelve styles and features short descenders and ascenders, along with three very distinct optical sizes. It was designed with contemporary newspapers in mind. In 2021, he added Keiss Title, Keiss Condensed, Keiss Big (14 styles) and Keiss Condensed Big.
  • Large (1999) and Large Pro (2006).
  • In 2020, Dino dos Santos and Pedro Leal designed Larga, which was inspired by the typefaces shown in the specimens of the Fundiçãao Typographica Portuense from 1874. Larga is a wide all caps family and comes with a variable opentype format.
  • Leitura, Leitura Headline, Leitura News, Leitura Sans, Leitura Symbols, Leitura Display (2007): the 31 styles were all made in 2007.
  • Logica (2016). A classical text typeface.
  • Maga (2012). A text family.
  • Methodo (2005): calligraphic penman typefaces.
  • Missiva (2004).
  • Monox and Monox Serif (1998-2000): a monospaced family.
  • Ni Sans, Ni Slab, Ni Serif (2018).
  • Musee (2006): a transitional family with ornaments and borders.
  • Nerva (2004). A subdued Trajan typeface with flaring.
  • Nitida (2017). A 114-font family with five optical sizes.
  • Nyte (2012). A serifed text family.
  • Otite (1995).
  • Outside (1996): grunge.
  • Parco (2021). A compact headline typeface with large x-height.
  • Plexes (2003). See also Plexes Pro (2006).
  • Pluma (2005): a series of three exquisite calligraphic flowing scripts called PlumaPrimeyra, PlumaSegunda and PlumaTerceyra). Inspired by the typographic work of Manuel de Andrade de Figueiredo that was published in 1722: "Nova Escola para Aprender a Ler, Escrever e Contar, offerecida a Augusta Magestade do Senhor Dom Jao V, Rey de Portugal".
  • Poesis (1999).
  • Pratico UI and Pratico Slab UI (2022).
  • Prelo (2008): A sans family for magazines, it has styles that include Hairline, Hairline Italic, Extra Light, Extra Light Italic, Light, Light Italic, Book, Book Italic, Medium, Medium Italic, Semi Bold, Semi Bold Italic, Bold, Bold Italic, Extra Bold, Extra Bold Italic, Black, Black Italic, Slab and Prelo Condensed.
  • Priva Pro (2006): a sans family that includes Greek and Cyrillic).
  • Prumo (2011-2012). A 92-font family originally created for the redesign of the Argentinian newspaper La Nacion. Released to the public in 2013, it covers low and high contrasts, and has slab serif styles as well as Scotch Roman styles. So, it is more a type system or type collection than one single typeface: Prumo Banner, Prumo Deck, Prumo Display, Prumo Poster, Prumo Slab, Prumo Text.
  • Quadricula (1998).
  • Quaestor and Quaestor Sans (2004). Roman inscriptional typefaces.
  • Recita (2019). A sturdy oldstyle text typeface family.
  • Resea (2004) and Resea Consensed: Bank Gothic style typefaces.
  • Solido (2012) is a versatile type system with five widths: Solido, Solido Constricted, Solido Condensed, Solido Compressed and Solido Compact. In total there are 35 fonts. In 2020, a variable font was added to Solido. Codesigned with Pedro Leal.
  • Synuosa (1999): an experimental typeface showing only the top half of the characters.
  • Tecla (2018). After Printype, a typeface developed in the early twentieth century for the Oliver Typewriter.
  • Terminal (1996).
  • Titan and Titan Text (2003).
  • User (2012), User Upright (2012), and User Stencil (2012). Monospace type families.
  • Velino (2010): an extensive family including Velino Text, Velino, Velino Condensed, Velino Compressed, Velino Poster, Velino Sans, Velino Sans Condensed, Velino Display (+Compressed Display, +Condensed Display). This didone superfamily is sure to win a ton of awards.
  • Ventura (2007): based on the calligraphy of Portuguese calligrapher Joaquim José Ventura da Silva, ca. 1802, who wrote Regras methodicas para se aprender a escrever os caracteres das letras Ingleza, Portugueza, Aldina, Romana, Gotica-Italica e Gotica-Germanica in 1820. It had a "Portuguese Script". Do not confuse Ventura with Dieter Steffmann's font by the same name made many years earlier. Ventura won an award at TDC2 2008).
  • Viska (2015, by Dino dos Santos and Pedro Leal) is designed for small print.
  • Volupia (2005): a connected advertising face.

DS Type also has typefaces by other type designers, such as Pedro Leal. They worked with leading companies, world scale events and well-known design agencies including: Appetite, Banco CTT, Banco Economico, BBDO, CondéNast, CTT Correios de Portugal, Electronic Arts, Errea Communicacion, Erste Bank, ESPN, Expo 2020 Dubai, Fifa World Cup 2018 Russia (the Ducha typeface), Garcia Media, Gatorade, Gruner + Jahr, Hearst, Innovation, King Games, McCann-Erickson, Meredith, Palmer Watson, Pentagram, Sagres, Starbucks, The New York Times (the Nyre typeface), Vox Media and Wolff Olins.

View Dino dos Santos's typefaces. DS Type's typeface library. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Duncan Glen

Author of Printing Type Designs - A New History from Gutenberg to 2000 (Akros Publications, Fife, Scotland, 2000). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Dunwich Type Founders
[James Walker Puckett]

Dunwich Type Founders (or: DTF) in Boulder, CO (was: New York City) is run by James Walker Puckett (b. 1978, Virginia), who graduated from the Corcoran College of Art and Design in Washington, DC. Blog. Behance link. Fontspring link. Type Library. Typefaces:

  • Armitage (2010). A grotesque sans family.
  • The squarish signpainting family Downturn (2009).
  • He is working on a (nice!) revival of Fry's Baskerville, which is based on a scan of types cut in 1768 by Isaac Moore.
  • Lorimer (2011) is a gothic sans serif that was inspired by 19th century inscriptions in the yard of New York's St. Mark's Church. Some weights are free. In 2011, this was followed by Lorimer No. 2 and Lorimer No. 2 Condensed. In 2012, there was an announcement that Lorimer was no longer being distributed. But that was contradicted in 2015, when James placed Lorimer No. 2 Stencil (2011) at the Dafont site for free download.
  • New Constructivist Beta (2007).
  • Recovery (2008, TypeTrust). The grunge version of Recovery is Black Monday (2009, with Silas Dilworth): it has several glyphs for randomization.
  • The 1829 specimen book of Alonzo W. Kinsley's Franklin Letter Foundry led James Puckett to develop the splendid ornamental didone fat face Sybarite (2011), which comes in many optical weights.
  • The friendly superelliptical black poster typeface Gigalypse (2012).
  • Becker Gothics (2013). A revival of five typefaces from Ornamental Penmanship (1854, George Becker): Egyptian, Egyptian Rounded, Stencil, Tuscan and Concave. All have Western and wood type influences.
  • Ironstrike and Ironstrike Stencil (2014). Ironstrike pays homage to industrial and constructivist lettering.
  • Uniblok (2015). A free blocky font.
  • Rhodium Libre (2015, free at Google Fonts), designed for use on screens at small sizes and the Latin and Devanagari scripts. Historical models for Rhodium's design are Fortune (aka Volta; by Konrad Bauer and Walter Baum) and Rex (by Intertype).
  • Padyakke (2015) is a libre Kannada font.
  • Antarctican (2017, Dunwich Type Founders): Antarctican hybridizes ruler and compass geometry and American wood type. Some styles are monospaced.
  • Barteldes (2018). A fashion mag typeface family.
  • Margherita (2021). A free sturdy typeface family based on urban lettering in Italy.

Creative Market link. https://fonts.ilovetypography.com/fonts/dunwich-type-founders">I Love Typography link. Github link. Fontsquirrel link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Dutch Alphabets
[Mathieu Lommen]

Dutch Alphabets (2016, Uitgeverij De Buitenkant) was written by Mathieu Lommen and designed by Peter Verheul. It is a portfolio containing 47 broadsides featuring new samples of lettering and writing by today's most significant Dutch lettering artists, type designers, calligraphers and sign painters. All contributors are working and/or educated in the Netherlands. This collection of lettering has been compiled by Mathieu Lommen (University of Amsterdam) & Peter Verheul (Royal Academy of Art, The Hague), and will be published in a limited edition. It showcases a wide variety of lettering and calligraphy, made especially for this project by Amsterdam Signpainters, Yomar Augusto, Jacques le Bailly, Donald Beekman, Françoise Berserik, Barbara BigosiÅ„ska, Frank E. Blokland, Erik van Blokland, Maria Doreuli, James Edmondson, Ramiro Espinoza, Martina Flor, Dave Foster, Fritz Grögel, Janno Hahn, Hansje van Halem, Berton Hasebe, Henry van der Horst, Ondrej Jób, Max Kisman, René Knip, Holger Königsdörfer, Paul van der Laan, Lida Lopes Cardozo, Niels Shoe Meulman, Ross Milne, Gerrit Noordzij, Diana Ovezea, Krista Radoeva, Trine Rask, Arthur Reinders Folmer, Donald Roos, Pieter van Rosmalen, Just van Rossum, Kristyan Sarkis, Florian Schick, Elmo van Slingerland, Heidi Sørensen, Nina Stössinger, Joost Swarte, Teo Tuominen, Underware, Gerard Unger, Peter Verheul, Bernd Volmer, Job Wouters and designed by Peter Verheul. It is a portfolio containing 47 broadsides featuring new samples of lettering and writing by today's most significant Dutch lettering artists, type designers, calligraphers and sign painters. All the contributors are working and/or educated in the Netherlands. [Google] [More]  ⦿

E. Ventris

Author of The Writer's Guide (1830, publ. G. Berger, London). [Google] [More]  ⦿

E. Wetzig

Editor of Ausgewählte Druckschriften in Alphabeten, which was published in Leipzig by the Verein Leipziger Buchdruckereibesitzer as an educational aid. The Bund für deutsche Schrift has scanned in a third of the pages and put it on one of their CDs. [Google] [More]  ⦿

E.A. Ducompex

Author of Modèles de Lettres D'Art Nouveau (Imp. Firmin Didot & Cie, Paris). This book of art nouveau alphabets inspired several digital recreations, such as Dick Pape's Lettres Majuscules Fantasie and Lettres Minuscules Fantasie in 2013. Download Pape's fonts here. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Eagle Reading Company

Publishers of a paperback of type specimen in 1931 called Specime Book Type Rules and Borders. Pictures here. Images: Cover, fists, typefaces, more typefaces, and more. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Eberhard Dilba

German author of Typographie-Lexikon (2005, in German). [Google] [More]  ⦿

E.C. Matthews

Author of Sign Painting Course (1954, 1958). Mike Jackson writes: This book is heavily illustrated with his layouts, letterstyles, and ornaments but the text which covers about half of each page is equally informative. Earlier, in 1928, he wrote How to Paint Signs and Sho' Cards. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Ed Cleary

Coauthor with Jürgen Siebert and Erik Spiekermann of The FontBook, published by FontShop International in 1998, with additions and updates in the following years. Robert Stacey situates Cleary in the history of Canadian design [because Cleary lived and died in Toronto], when he talks about the 1980s: Typographic design integrity continues to be defended, meanwhile, against trendiness and clutter by such private-press and fine-printing luminaries as Coach House Printing's Stan Bevington, Hemlock Press's David Clausen, Giampa Textware Corp.'s Gerald Giampa, Imprimerie Dromadaire's Glenn Goluska, Dreadnaught Design's Robert MacDonald, Canadian Art's John Ormsby, Aliquando Press's Will Rueter, and the late Ed Cleary, of the venerable Cooper&Beatty Typographers and the more recent Font Shop. As their work serves to remind us, the "democratization" of type and print through desktop publishing software and hardware, and the attendant access of thousands of typefaces, increases rather than decreases the need for taste, discernment and restraint to be brought to bear on the management of textual and visual materials. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Edgar Bond

Author of Showcard Layout & Design (1937, Third Edition, Blandford Press Ltd, London). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Editions 205
[Quentin Margat]

French foundry and publishing house, est. 2011 by Damien Gautier and Quentin Margat, and located in Villeurbanne. Their fonts:

  • Amiral. A stencil face by Damien Gautier.
  • Bloo. A geometric family by Damien Gautier.
  • Caporal. A semi-stencil by Damien Gautier and Quentin Margat.
  • Colonel. A stencil by Damien Gautier and Quentin Margat.
  • LeBeaune. A lapidary engraved roman caps font by Damien Gautier and Quentin Margat, originally intended for the wine city of Beaune. Le Beaune New was published in 2013.
  • LeChaufferie. A large multiline opentype typeface by Damien Gautier.
  • LeFrançois. A Peignotian titling face by Damien Gautier.
  • Beretta (2011-2012). A dot matrix typeface by Damien Gautier.
  • Alcala (2011). A roman typeface family by Damien Gautier and Quentin Margat.
  • Maax (2011). An information design sans typeface family. In 2013, Damien Gautier added Maax Mono and Maax Rounded, and in 2019 Maax raw.
  • Norr. A versatile family originally intended for the visual identity of the region of Valenciennes. It includes a round style, a slab style, a sans, and a didone style.
  • Robin (2010). An arrows dingbat typeface by Damien Gautier and Delphine Sigonney.

There is also a publishing component to Editions 205. Works published by them include Tout le monde connaît Roger Excoffon (2011), which was written by Alan Marshall (director of the Musée de l'imprimerie, Lyon), Tony Simoes Relvas, and Thierry Chancogne.

Behance link. Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Editions Alternatives

French publisher which has a nice series of books on writing. These include "Le Verbe géomètre Numérographies et écritures mathématiques" (Valère-Marie Marchand, 2004), "Lettres Latines Rencontre avec des formes remarquables" (Laurent Pflughaupt), "Les alphabets de l'oubli Signes et savoirs perdus" (Valère-Marie Marchand), "Le Bruissement du calame Histoire de l'écriture arabe" (Sophia Tazi-Sadeq), and "Entre Ciel et Terre Sur les traces de l'écriture chinoise" (Shi Bo). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Edmund Fry

British typefounder, d. 1835. Son of Joseph Fry, the founder of the Fry Letter Foundry in Bristol. Quoted from MyFonts: In 1784 he introduced a raised roman letter for the blind, and was awarded a prize by the Edinburgh Society of Arts. Louis Braille's system of lines and dots ultimately proved better. In 1787, he and his brother Henry took over the Fry Letter Foundry from their father. Credited with many great typefaces, including Fry's Baskerville (1768) and Fry Moxon (or Graisberry), a Gaelic typeface, Fry A Gothic Capitals (ca. 1819), an angular transitional Gaelic face, and Fry B Gaelic Capitals, a transitional Gaelic typeface (Everson mentions the date 1836, but that would be one year after his death...) and Priory Text.

Mac McGrew writes: Priory Text was the blackletter of the Fry Foundry in England, with some sizes dating back to about 1600, and most sizes shown in 1785. It was revived by Talbot Baines Reed for his History of the Old English Letterfoundries in 1887, and DeVinne used it for his edition of Philobiblon in 1889. The Dickinson foundry, a forerunner of ATF, issued it as Priory Text about that time. It is very similar to Caslon Text (q.v.). BB&S made a near-duplicate type, originally called Reed Text, but later shown as Priory Black Text. Although the latter was shown as late as 1925, these typefaces had generally been replaced earlier by Cloister Black (q. v.) and other Old English typefaces with more refined draftsmanship.

About the Gaelic types, Brendan Leen writes: In 1819, Edmund Fry cut a type once again commissioned by the British and Foreign Bible Society. The design of the Fry type signifies a departure from the angular minuscule toward the more rounded form of the half-uncial, a characteristic of Irish typography in the nineteenth century. Sample of Fry Irish type from The Two First Books of the Pentateuch.

Author of Pantographia (1799, Cooper&Wilson, London), a work that shows the scripts of many languages [a careful digitization of some can be found in the font family Pantographia (2010) by Intellecta Design]. The full title is Pantographia; Containing Accurate Copies of All the Known Alphabets in the World; Together with an English Explanation of the Peculiar Force or Power of Each Letter: To Which Are Added, Specimens of All Well-Authenticated Oral Languages; Forming a Comprehensive Digest of Phonology. Examples from that book: Bastard, Bengallee and Berryan, Bulgarian and Bullantic, Chaldean. Local download.

Author of Specimen of Printing Types by Edmund Fry, letter founder to the King, and Prince Regent, Type street, London (1816). Local download.

FontShop link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Edo Smitshuijzen

Author of the rather complete Arabic Font Specimen Book (De Buitenkant, Amsterdam, 2009). In 2013, he published Sculpting Type (Khatt Books), which deals with 3d type design. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Edoardo Cotti

Italian art nouveau painter, lettering artist and type designer, 1871-1940. Around 1898, a photomechanical engraving studio for zinc, copper, and wood engravings was established under the supervision of Edoardo Cotti at nebiolo.

Designer at Monotype in 1927 with Francesco Pastonchi of Pastonchi, a beautiful humanist text typeface with small bracketed serifs. Pastonchi MT is available from Monotype. The Monotype version of Pastonchi is due to Robin Nicholas.

Author of Origine della Scrittura e Derivazione Morfologica dell'Alfabeto (Turin, Regio Scuola Tipgrafica, 1917). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Eduardo Herrera Fernandez

Professor of typography at the Faculdad de Bellas Artes (FBA) of the Universidad del Pais Vasco (UPV) in Bilbao. Eduardo Herrera and Leire Fernández (a colleague at FBA UPV) developed a Bastarda based on work of Juan de Yciar. They wrote about it in Recuperación y digitalización de la letra bastarda de Juan de Yciar (GFM Grafema, No. 1, April 2009). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Edward C. Mills

Master of business writing and business penmanship, b. 1872, Illinois, d. 1962. He worked mostly in Rochester, NY first for The Williams & Rogers Company and later as an independent penman. Author of Modern Business Penmanship (1903, American book Company). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Edward Johnston
[Johnston's Underground Type]

[More]  ⦿

Edward Johnston

Born in Uruguay in 1872, he died in the UK in 1944. A medical doctor, he taught all his life at the Central School of Arts and Crafts in London and at the Royal College of Art in London. From 1910 until 1930, he designed fonts for the Cranach-Presse in Weimar, which was owned by Count Harry Kessler.

In 1916, he made a typeface for the London Underground (helped by Eric Gill). Johnston's London Transport type was reworked by Colin Banks in his New Johnston (1979), and again in 2016 by Malou Verlomme at Monotype, on commission for Transport For London (TfL), as Johnston100. Edward Johnston's fonts show a strong influence by Eric Gill.

Hamlet-Type (1912-27, designed for a Shakespeare edition, Cranach Press, 1929) was also called Kessler-Blackletter. It was designed by Edward Johnston and cut in three sizes (10, 12 and 18 pt) by Edward Prince for William Shakespeare's Hamlet (published by Harry Kessler's Cranach Press in Weimar in 1929). The type is based on the Durandus for the lowercases, and Sweynheim & Pannartz's Subiaco type for the capitals. For a digital revival, see Hamlet Tertia 18 and Hamlet Cicero 12 by Alexis Faudot and Rafael Ribas which was developed at a workshop in Weimar in 2018. Hamlet was revived by Manfred Klein and Petra Heidorn as HamletOrNot.

Johnston designed Imprint-Antiqua with Gerard Meynell and J. H. Mason in 1913. It includes Imprint Shadow. Digital descendants exist at Monotype [Imprint MT], URW [Imprint URW, preferred over the MT version by some of my correspondents], SoftMaker [I771], and Bitstream [Dutch 766<].

Johnston Sans Serif was done in 1916.

A version of the London Underground typeface (1997, by Richard Kegler) was digitized by P22. In 2007, Paul D. Hunt extended that typeface to a 21-style multilingual collection called P22 Underground Pro. At ITC, Dave Farey and Richard Dawson recreated a Johnston sans serif family with 3 weights, aptly called ITC Johnston. Nick Curtis created Underground NF in 1999. Jordan Davies called his revivals London Medium (2017) and London Heavy (2017). Many other designers aped Johnston's Underground as well. In 2012, Greg Fleming published Railway Sans as a free open source font at OFL. It is based upon Johnston's original drawings and work started by Justin Howes just before his death. In 2021, P22 added italics to P22 Underground Pro and now covers Latin, Cyrillic and Greek---help with this newest version came from Housestyle Graphics (Dave Farey; for the italics), James Todd, and Patrick Griffin (final mastering).

Edward Johnston is a book published by Priscilla Johnston (London, 1959). Author of Writing&illuminating,&lettering (1917, J. Hogg, London; original done in 1906). Writing Illuminating Lettering at Amazon.

Scans of some lettering by him: illuminations (1917), modernized half uncial (1906), Calligraphy by Johnston. Digital fonts based on alphabets from the 1906 book include Edward's Uncial 1904 (2011, David Kettlewell).

Links: Linotype, FontShop. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Edward Rondthaler

New Yorker, b. Bethlehem, PA, 1905. In 1928, Rondthaler and Harold Horman cofounded Photo-Lettering Inc in New York City---it started for real in 1936. An excellent typographer, he cofounded ITC in 1970 with with Herb Lubalin and Aaron Burns.

Editor/author of Life with Letters--As They Turned Photogenic, and Alphabet thesaurus; a treasury of letter designs (1960, Reinhold, NY). Volume 3 was published in 1971.

In 1975 he was awarded the TDC Medal, the main prize of the Type Directors Club. In 2007, House Industries made this funny clip. Sadly, Ed died in August 2009. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Edward Rowe Mores

Author of "A dissertation upon typographical founders and foundries" (1778) and "A catalogue and specimen of the type foundry of John James" (1782). These were published in 1961 at Oxford University Press, edited with an introduction and notes by Harry Carter&Christopher Ricks. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Edward Tufte

Edward Tufte has written seven successful books, including Visual Explanations (1997), Envisioning Information, The Visual Display of Quantitative Information, and Data Analysis for Politics and Policy. He writes, designs, and self-publishes his books on information design. He is Professor Emeritus at Yale University, where he taught courses in statistical evidence, information design, and interface design. His current work includes digital video, sculpture, printmaking, and a new book, Beautiful Evidence.

Designer in 2002 of ETBembo, about which he writes: ET Bembo is a Bembo-like font for the computer designed by Dmitry Krasny, Bonnie Scranton, and myself. It will be used in my next book, Beautiful Evidence. My earlier books on analytical design were set in lead (!) in Monotype Bembo, an excellent book font. When converted to an electronic font, Monotype Bembo became thin and spindly (the computer people ignored "squeeze," the slight spreading of ink when the lead type hits the paper). So we made our own computer version and also made a few design changes (ligatures, several problems with the pi font, some letterforms, creation of a semibold). ETBembo is used in "The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint." It is just our house font and I'm not in the type business so it will not be commercially available. Tufte goes on to say that he thinks that Yale should make Matthew Carter's Yale font available for free to the whole world.

Funny poster by Mark Goetz related to Tufte's stance on the typographic and infographic "qualities" of Powerpoint.

Tufte's CSS. Github link for Tufte CSS, where one can download the free font family ET Book, which is ET Bembo, renamed. However, inside the font files, we still find the original name ET Bembo. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Edward W. Lynam

Author of The Irish character in print, 1571-1923 (with an introduction by Alf MacLochlainn), New York: Barnes&Noble, 1924 (1969). The book was originally written in 1924. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Eldesign

A discussion of Russian typography books. In Russian. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Electronic Publishing

Nelson Beebe's bibliography of articles that appeared EPODD, the Electronic Publishing Journal. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Elisabeth Friedländer

German type designer (b. 1903, Berlin, d. 1984) who studied under Weiss. Sometimes her name is spelled Friedlander, without an umlaut. Pauline Paucker's book, New Borders The Working Life of Elizabeth Friedlander (Incline Press, 11A Printer Street, Oldham OLI IPN England), describes her life, including the story of her flight from Nazi Germany in 1936 (she was Jewish), to Italy. She had studied in Berlin with E.R. Weiss at the Berlin Academy. She joined the German fashion magazine Die Dame. In 1933 George Hartmann asked her to design a typeface for Bauersche Giesserei.

She designed Elizabeth at Bauersche Giesserei in 1934---a Roman and Kursiv and a Bold that was never completed or produced---but she was unable to name the typeface Friedlander, as she had wished, because it was a recognizably Jewish name. She was associated for some time with the Bauer foundry. Her typeface was finally cut in 1939 but she had already left Germany because of the war. She went on to Italy and then later to London where she eventually worked with Jan Tschichold at Penguin Books doing covers for Penguin books, and became a celebrated graphic designer.

Jim Rimmer's RTF Isabelle (roman and italic), made in 2006, is based on two delicate serif typefaces by Friedlander.

Elisabeth-Antiqua, Elisabeth-Kursiv (and swash letters) and Linotype Friedlaender borders were revived in 2006 by Ari Rafaeli, and at an unknown date by Reymund Schroeder as Friedlaender.

In 2005, Andreu Balius was commissioned to digitize the typeface now sold by Neufville Digital: Elizabeth ND (2007, 3 styles). Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Ellen Lupton

Ellen Lupton is a writer, curator, and graphic designer. She is director of the MFA program in graphic design at Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) in Baltimore. She also is curator of contemporary design at Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in New York City.

Author of Thinking with Type (Princeton Architectural Press, 2004). Visit also the interesting Thinking with type web page, which features a fun section on "crimes against typography", notes on type classification, a course outline, and tons of other educational material. See also here and here. Author of Laws of the Letter (with J. Abbott Miller).

Ellen Lupton was the keynote speaker at AypI2006 in Lisbon. In that talk, summarized here, Ellen Lupton discusses the benefits of truly free fonts (Perhaps the free font movement will continue to grow slowly, along the lines in which it is already taking shape: in the service of creating typefaces that sustain and encourage both the diversity and connectedness of humankind.) and provides key examples: Gaultney's Gentium, Poll's Linux Libertine, Peterlin's Freefont, Bitstream's Titus Cyberbit, and Jim Lyles' Vera family. She is the editor of D.I.Y.: Design It Yourself (2006).

In 2007, she received the AIGA Gold Medal. Her introduction to the major typefaces. Speaker at ATypI 2010 in Dublin. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Elmar Schmitt

Author of Die Drucker der Wagnerschen Buchdruckerei in Ulm 1677-1804 Band II Vignetten Signete Initialen (Universitätsverlag Konstanz, Konstanz, 1984). A typical vignette. Vignette 142. Vignette depicting Silvanus. The Wagnerschen Buchdruckerei issued this Schreibschrift in 1765. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Elsie Svennas

Swedish author of A Handbook of Lettering for Stitchers (1966). The English traslation was published by Van Nostrand Reinhold (NY) in 1973. Amazon link. PDF file [34MB]. [Google] [More]  ⦿

E&M Cohen

Dutch book shop active in the 19th century in Arnhem and Nijmegen, which was run by two brothers. In 1887, they published a lettering model book, Modelboek.

Reference: Nederlandse belettering negentiende-eeuwse modelboeken (2015, Mathieu Lommen, de Buitenkant, Amsterdam). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Emil F. Hornikel

Author of Design of Monograms, Inscriptions, and Alphabets (1904). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Emil Franke

Author of Das Neue Monogramm (1903) and Ecritures Modernes (1885, published by Orell-Füssli & Co in Zürich). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Emil Ruder

Swiss typographer (b. Zürich 1914, d. Basel, 1970), and type guru in the 50s and 60s. Ruder taught at the Basel School of Design (Kunstgewerbeschule), and founded the International Center for the Typographic Arts in New York, 1962.

Author of Typographie: Ein Gestaltungslehrbuch - A Manual of Design - Un Manuel de Creation (Teufen: Niggli, 1967), and Typographie. Ein Gestaltungslehrbuch. Mit über 500 Beispielen (7th edition in 2001, Niggli). The Road to Basel (Helmut Schmid) is an homage to Emil Ruder by Helmut Schmid, one of Ruder's students, who headed a group of other ex-students and organized their contributions. The former students who participated are Harry Boller, Roy Cole, Heini Fleischhacker, Fritz Gottschalk, André Gürtler, Hans-Jürg Hunziker, Hans-Rudolf Lutz, Fridolin Müller, Marcel Nebel, Åke Nilsson, Bruno Pfäffli, Will van Sambeek, Helmut Schmid, Peter Teubner, Wolfgang Weingart, and Yves Zimmermann. Karl Gerstner and Kurt Hauert also contributed. Paul Shaw reviews this book and Ruder's contributions.

Quotes from Shaw's piece:

  • It is clear that those lucky enough to study under Ruder found him as exciting and demanding as they had expected. With a few exceptions these former students quickly and permanently fell under the sway of the charismatic and ambitious Ruder.
  • Ruder promised a new functionalism derived from the Bauhaus. His was a new approach to typography that went beyond the technical fundamentals of metal type composition to embrace modern art (especially that of Paul Klee and Piet Mondrian). Ruder focused on the point, the line, the plane, and the way in which typography activated space. His article Die Flache (the plane or the space), following lessons he had learned from The Book of Tea by Kakuzo Okakura and from modern art, stressed the activation and destruction of space as the goal of typography as well as of art and architecture.
  • Ruders typography is defined by asymmetry and an emphasis on counter, shape, and negative space.
  • Harry Boller writes that Ruder and his students were Puritans on a mission, serious, humorless. We had been led to a morality, and strong convictions remain. Banality, lack of imagination, and swiping of ideas were all ridiculed, while sincerity of expression was encouraged. Gottschalk says that Ruder taught courtesy, ethics, and modesty as much as he taught typography.

IDEA Mag's special issue #332 entitled Ruder Typography Ruder Philosophy (2009), with articles by Leon Maillet (Tessin), Armin Hofmann (Lucerne), Karl Gerstner (Basel), Kurt Hauert (Basel), Lenz Klotz (Basel), Wim Crouwel (Amsterdam), Adrian Frutiger (Paris), Hans Rudolf Bosshard (Zurich), Andre Gutler (Basel), Juan Arrausi (Barcelona), Ake Nilsson (Uppsala), Fridolin Muller (Stein am Rhein), Harry Boller (Chicago), Maxim Zhukov (New York), Taro Yamamoto (Tokyo), Fjodor Gejko (Düsseldorf), Helmut Schmid (Osaka), and Susanne Ruder-Schwarz (Basel).

Article on Ruder by Shane Bzdok, 2008. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Emotional Digital

Great typography and design book by Alexander Branczyk, Jutta Nachtwey, Heike Nehl, Sibylle Schlaich, and Jürgen Siebert, Thames&Hudson, 1999. Now also on-line. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Encyclopedia Typographica

Book containing specimen of 6300 commercial digital typefaces, compiled by Paul Morency and josé Perez (2004). It comes with a handy on-line font database. Paul Morency has been in the advertising and printing field for more than 20 years. José Perez is a self-employed pre-press technician, providing services to printers, digital photography, page layout and printing services. Both are based in Montreal. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Enric Jardi

Born in Barcelona in 1964. Graphic design teacher at Elisava in Barcelona since 1988. Director of the Master on Advanced Typography at the Eina school of art and design, in collaboration with the Autonomous University of Barcelona. He also teaches a Master's course on art direction and advertising at Ramon Llull University. Author of Twenty-two tips on typography (that some designers will never reveal) and twenty-two things you should never do with typefaces (that some typographers will never tell you) (Actar).

At type-o-tones in Barcelona, Enric Jardi created Neeskens (1991-2007), Retorica Buida (1995, blackboard bold), Retorica-Plena (1995), Deseada (1995, a blurred roman), Escher, Magothic, Mayayo (1991, great children's book display font in Inline, Holes and Black styles), Peter Sellers (2007), Poca (1995, pixelish), Radiorama (1995), Verdaguera (1995, a classical weathered typeface)), Wilma (1995-2007: a chromatic type system), Xiquets Forever (1995, dingbats).

Interview by MyFonts.

Klingspor link. Type-o-tones link. FontShop link. Type-o-tones link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Epreuves de caractères et lettres de deux points...

The text Epreuves de caractères et lettres de deux points sur différens corps: dont les poinçons en acier ou matrices en cuivre seront vendus, le mardi 17 août 1824, Grande salle de l'Hôtel Bullion, rue J.J. Rousseau (1824) shows matrices and punches for typefaces that were originally part of the imprimerie royale in Paris. Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Eric Gill

British stone carver, wood engraver, essayist and type designer Arthur Eric Rowton Gill was born in Brighton, England in 1882. He died in 1940. He was a student of Johnston and worked for some time for the Golden Cockerell Press in London. He became one of the most influential English type designers of the 20th century.

The text book Eric Gill (Fiona McCarthy, Faber and Faber Ltd) describes his life. Publishers Weekly writes: An English artist-craftsman in the tradition of William Morris, Eric Gill (1882-1940) exemplifies the search for a lifestyle to heal the split between work and leisure, art and industry. He is remembered today for his fine engravings and stone carvings, his legendary typefaces and book designs for the Golden Cockerel Press. Yet there was another side to the man, downplayed by previous biographers: a fervent convert to Catholicism and leader of three Catholic arts-and-crafts communes, Gill had a hyperactive libido which extended to incest with his sisters and daughters, as well as numerous extramarital affairs, according to British writer MacCarthy. He rationalized his penile acrobatics by inventing a bizarre pseudoreligious theory. In MacCarthy's candid portrait, Gill, who preserved the outward image of a devout father-figure, was neither saint nor humbug, but a highly sexed creative artist trapped by his Victorian concept of masculinity. This charismatic firebrand was a renegade Fabian socialist, a bohemian friend of Augustus John and Bertrand Russell. His adventurous life, as re-created in this beautifully written, absorbing biography, is disturbingly relevant to our time. A follow-up article by McCarthy in The Guardian, 2006.

Canicopulus Script (1989, Barry Deck) is a font named to remember one of Eric Gill's favorite extracurricular activities.

Author of An Essay on Typography (1931, revised in 1936). For a French edition, see Eric Gill Un Essai sur la Typographie (Boris Donné and Patricia Menay, Ypsilon Editeur, 2011). Gill once said: There are now about as many different varieties of letters as there are different kinds of fools.

His typefaces include

  • Gill Sans (1927). Revivals include Bitstream's Humanist 521 and its Cyrillic extension Paratype's Humanist 521. An obscure style called Gill Sans Shadow 338 (1929, Monotype) was digitized by Toto in 2011 as K22 EricGillShadow. Image of Gill Sans by Katharina Felski. Image of Gill Sans's g by John Bakhan (Seoul). Image of Gill Sans by Tori Estes. Over at Infinitype and SoftMaker, the typeface sells under the name Chantilly or Chantilly Serial. Niteesh Yadav, a graphic designer in New Delhi, created a great PDF file on the topic of Gill Sans. For a major digital update and revival, see Gill Sans Nova (George Ryan, 2015, Monotype). It extends Gill Sans MT from 18 to 43 fonts. Several new display fonts are available, including a suite of six inline weights, shadowed outline fonts that were never digitized and Gill Sans Nova Deco that was previously withdrawn from the Monotype library. And it covers Greek and Cyrillic.
  • Golden Cockerell Roman (1929), forv the Golden Cockerel Press. Berry, Johnson and Jaspert write: Designed by Eric Gill, a rounder form of his Perpetua. It has the modest capitals, horizontal serifs and slight differentiation of colour of Gill's other romans. The M is somewhat splayed. The g has a rather large bowl. The t is very short. The italic, cut only for the 14 pt. size, is a sloped roman except for the a and with it are used the roman capitals, as in the case of Joanna.
  • Perpetua (Monotype, 1928-1929). This is the prototypical lapidary typeface. The Bitstream version is called Lapidary 333. The SoftMaker versions are called P700 and persistent. See also here. Images of Perpetua: i, ii, iii, iv, v, vi, vii, viii, ix, x, xi.
  • Solus (1929)
  • Cunard (1934; sold to L. E. Deval, Elkin Matthews Limited, and listed as Jubilee (1952) by Stephenson Blake)
  • Joanna (1930): a slab serif based on work by Granjon. Monotype's metal typeface Joanna dates from 1958. Berry, Johnson and Jaspert write: Designed by Eric Gill for Hague & Gill in 1930. A light roman with small horizontal serifs and little differentiation of colour. The type is remarkable for the smallness of the capitals, which do not reach the height of the ascenders, themselves not tall. The bowl of the g is rather large. The italic is the roman inclined except for a and g. The inclination is very slight. There are no specially cut capitals, but the modest roman capitals are used. This was the practice of Aldus, the first printer to use italic. Eric Gill's Essay on Typography, 1931 is printed in Joanna. In 2015, Monotype set out to remaster, expand and revitalize Eric Gill's body of work, with more weights, more characters and more languages to meet a wide range of design requirements. As part of that, it published a revival / extension in 2015 by Ben Jones, Joanna Nova. This 18-font series covers Greek and Cyrillic. There is an excursion into the sans world based on Joanna by Terrance Weinzierl, also in 2015, Joanna Sans Nova (2015, Monotype: 16 fonts).
  • Aries (1932): see the 1995 revival at FontHaus by Dave Farey.
  • Floriated Capitals (1932).
  • Bunyan (1934). See also Bunyan Pro (2016, Patrick Griffin and Bill Troop).
  • Pilgrim (1934), originally designed for a book published by the Limited Edition Club of New York. This serene typeface with incised features was re-cut by Walter Tracy for Linotype in 1950. For digital versions, see Pilgrim (Linotype, based on a cut by Walter Tracy), Palermo Serial (1999, Softmaker), Bunyan Pro (2016, Patrick Griffin and Bill Troop), and perhaps OPTI Porque (Castcraft).
  • Kayo (1936). In 1980, it was redone by Esselte (and Monotype?). In digital form, we have Gill Kayo Condensed by ITC.
  • Corporate typefaces such as this one for W.H. Smith&Sons (1903-1907). Revivals or derived typefaces include Gill Facia (1996, Monotype) and Dear Sir Madam (2011, Radim Pesko).
  • Gill (ca. 1932): While Gill was living in Israel, he designed a Hebrew alphabet which he cut into walls. After Gill's death in 1940, the carvings were used by Moshe Spizer to design the Gill typeface, which was then cut by Alphonso Ioso. The typeface Gill, however, never caught on.

Klingspor link. FontShop link. Linotype link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Eric Gill: An Essay on Typography

Eric Gill wrote An Essay on Typography in 1931 (Second Edition, 1936). It was published by Sheed and Ward, London. Reprinted in 1993 by David R. Godine. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Eric Kindel

Eric Kindel is a designer, writer and Lecturer in the Department of Typography&Graphic Communication at The University of Reading. He lives in London. Eric Kindel's project at Central Saint Martins College of Art&Design (London) includes an on-line survey of typeforms.

At ATypI in Rome in 2002, he spoke about stencil letters ca. 1700. This talk was followed by a talk on the same topic at ATypI 2006 in Lisbon (with Fred Smeijers). His research (jointly with Fred Smeijers, James Mosley and Andrew Gillmore) involves stencil making, ca. 1700 according to an apparatus escribed in a late seventeenth-century text compiled by Gilles Filleau des Billettes for the French Royal Academy of Sciences. He also researches the Parisian stencil maker Gabriel Bery, from whom Benjamin Franklin purchased a large set of letter stencils and decorative borders in 1781. The stencil set survives in the collections of the American Philosophical Society (APS) in Philadelphia, and was first examined in 2001 as part of the project described above. Editor of Typeform dialogues: a comparative survey of typeform history and description, compiled at Central Saint Martins College of Art&Design (Hyphen Press, 2004), which has articles by himself and Catherine Dixon (who writes on type classification). He describes his research on stencil letters at Reading as follows: The period under consideration begins in the sixteenth century and ends in the present day. The intention is to recover, if possible, a relatively continuous history of stencil letters and stencilling (in the Americas and Europe) by drawing together artefacts and practices that are in many cases now largely forgotten. In addition to forming a broad view of how stencil letters have been designed, made and used over the past five centuries, specific practices will also be examined through an on-going series of articles and papers. The first, Marked by time, was published in issue 40 of Eye magazine: it offered two contrasting instances of stencil letter-making in Germany and the United States in the mid-twentieth century. Another, Stencil work in America, 1850-1900, was published in Baseline 38 and unearths innovations in the manufacture and use of stencils in America in the second half of the nineteenth century, and the stories of some of their makers. The article also draws on the writings of Mark Twain for whom stencils served as a literary device on several occasions. And a third, longer, article Recollecting stencil letters has been published in Typography papers 5. It discusses the many forms stencil letters take, and how their form is influenced by a number of factors. The article is based on the study of period writings and MSS., patent specifications, collected artefacts and other primary documents and materials. See also Patents progress: the Adjustable Stencil (Journal of the Printing Historical Society, no. 9, 2006). In Typography papers 7, he wrote about another stencil method in a paper entitled The Plaque Découpée Universelle: a geometric sanserif in 1870s Paris (2010).

Speaker at ATypI 2011 in Reykjavik on the topic of stencils. Speaker at ATypI 2013 in Amsterdam: Futura Black, circa 1860. Speaker at ATypI 2016 in Warsaw on The stencilled poster in Paris in the 19th century. Speaker at ATypI 2018 in Antwerp on the geness of the French stencil style.

In 2013, Christopher Burke, Eric Kindel and Sue Walker co-edited the wonderfully informative book Isotype Design and Contexts 1925-1971 (Hyphen Press), which includes a full discussion of Otto Neurath's work. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Eric Olivares

Author of Caligrafia inglesa. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Erich Alb

Erich Andreas Alb was born in Zürich in 1945. He trained as compositor (lead) and as Monotype keyboard operator, and studied typography and type from 1969 until 1971 at the Basel Gewerbeschule under Robert Büchler (the director was Emil Ruder) and André Gürtler. He has been an instructor for type apprentices in Basel, and a free-lance book designer in Zürich and Cham/Zug since the 80s. He also is owner, publisher and editor at Syntax Press (which he founded in 1964) and later at Syndor Press Cham/Switzerland (from 1996 until 2002). He sold Syndor Press in 2002 to Niggli Verlag Sulgen.

Editor of several books by Adrian Frutiger, Hans Ed. Meier and René Groebli (a photographer). Author of "Adrian Frutiger Formen und Gegenformen/Forms and counterforms" (Cham, 1998), "Adrian Frutiger Lebenszyklus/Life cycle" (Cham, 2000), and An Introduction to the History of Printing Types (London, 1998; the original publication was in 1961). He spent much of his time assisting Frutiger, André Gürtler, H.E. Meier, Alfred Hoffmann and other important figures in Swiss typography who are/were also his close friends. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Eric-Jean Müller

Author of 50 Alphabete fuer Techniker und Fachschulen. Flickr link. Digital typefaces that are based on some of these alphabets include Eleckatrical Banana JNL (2021, Jeff Levine), Strike (ca. 2019, by Nick Sherman) and Simula Sans (2018, by Jillian Kaimo). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Erik Brandt

Erik Brandt teaches typography and visual communication at Virginia Commonwealth University in Doha, Qatar, and has been active in university teaching since 1998. Educated internationally, his research interests focus on issues of globalization that affect and drive the complexities of inter-cultural visual communication systems. His career began as a cartoonist in Japan, and has since found focus largely in print media. He maintains a small graphic design studio, Typografika, and has also received recognition for his short films. He is currently Chair of the Design Department and Professor of Graphic Design at MCAD (Minneapolis College of Art and Design) in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Author of Ficciones Typografika (2019).

Speaker at ATypI 2006 in Lisbon. Designer of these experimental typefaces at FontStruct in 2008: Pixel System 26 (an update of Zirkel System (1999), a circle font also by Brandt). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Erik Lindegren

Erik Lindegren (Swedish calligrapher and typographer, 1918-1996) ran the Erik Lindegren Grafisk studio in Askim, Sweden, and is the author of "ABC of Lettering and Printing Types". [Google] [More]  ⦿

Erik Schmitt

Erik Schmitt grew up in Seattle and the San Juan Islands but moved to the Bay Area to study design and photography at the California College of the Arts where he received a B.F.A. in 1993. Author of American Bauhaus (2022), which is about Black Mountain College in San Francisco. The school is credited with shaping some of the greatest artists in American history such as Willem de Kooning, John Cage, Merce Cunningham, Buckminster Fuller, Franz Kline, and Robert Rauschenberg. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Erik Spiekermann

German type designer and graphic designer par excellence, born in 1947 in Stadthagen. He set up MetaDesign in Berlin in 1979. In 1988 he set up FontShop, home of the FontFont collection. He holds an honorary professorship at the Academy of Arts in Bremen, is board member of ATypI and the German Design Council, and president of the ISTD (International Society of Typographic Designers). In July 2000, Erik left MetaDesign Berlin. He now lives and works in Berlin, London and San Francisco, designing publications, complex design systems and more typefaces. He collaborated on the publication of the comprehensive FontBook. Author of Stop Stealing Sheep & Find Out How Type Works (2nd Edition) (Adobe Press, Second Edition, 2002, First Edition, 1993). He taught typography at the Art Academy in Bremen, and is guest-lecturer at several schools around the world.

In October 2003, he received the third Gerrit Noordzij Prize, which is given every other year to a designer who has played an important role in the field of type design and typography. It is an initiative of the postgraduate course in Type&Media at the Hague Royal Academy of Art with the Meermanno Museum (The Hague).

His essay on information design.

Biography. Bio at Linotype. Laudatio by John Walters of Eye Magazine. Blog.

Presentation at ATypI 2006 in Lisbon. Presentation at ATypI 2008 in St. Petersburg. Interviewed in 2006 by Rob Forbes. Speaker at ATypI 2010 in Dublin.

He made the following typefaces and type families:

  • Lo-Type (1913, Louis Oppenheim) was digitally adapted by Spiekermann for Berthold in 1979-1980. BERTLib sells it as Adlon Serif ST.
  • PT 55 (1986), the precursor of FF Meta.
  • Berthold Block
  • Berliner Grotesk (1979-1980, Berthold): based on an old Berthold AG typeface from 1923.
  • FF Govan (2001, by Ole Schaefer and Erik Spiekermann).
  • The huge families FF Meta1, FF Meta2, FF Meta3 (2003), FF Meta Condensed (1998) and FFMetaCorrespondence. The FF Meta families (1985) were originally designed for Bundespost, which did not use it--it stayed with Helvetica for a while and now uses Frutiger. Meta comes with CE, Cyrillic, Greek and Turkish sets as well. Weights like Meta Light (Thin, Hairline) Greek are available too. Spiekermann is a bit upset that Linotype's Textra (2002, a typeface by Jochen Schuss and Jörg Herz) looks like a cloned of Meta. FF Meta Condensed won an award at Modern Cyrillic 2014.
  • Meta Serif (2007) by Christian Schwartz, Kris Sowersby and Erik Spiekermann. Later extensions by Ralph du Carrois and Botio Nikoltchev.
  • ITC Officina in versions Sans Book (1989-1990) and Serif Book (1989-1990).
  • Boehringer Sans and Antiqua (1996): custom types.
  • Grid, which appeared in FUSE 3.
  • Codesigner with Ole Schaefer (FontShop, 2000) of FF InfoDisplay and FF InfoText in 1997 and of FF InfoOffice in 2000.
  • NokiaSans and NokiaSerif (2002, company identity family). This was in cooperation with Jelle Bosma. Before Nokia Sans and Serif, Nokia used Rotis. Nokia Sans and Serif were replaced by Nokia Pure (Bruno Maag) in 2011.
  • Glasgow Type (1999), for the city of Glasgow, taking inspiration from the Rennie Macintosh types.
  • Heidelberg Gothic (1999).
  • Symantec Sans and Serif (2003): custom types.
  • FF Unit (2003-2004; see also here), another sans family, which won an award at TDC2 2004. This was followed by FF Unit Rounded. And FF Unit Rounded started according to Erik as Gravis, the largest Apple dealer in Germany. FF Unit Slab (2009) is the product of a cooperation between Kris Sowersby, Christian Schwartz, and Erik Spiekermann.
  • ITC Officina Display (2001).
  • FF Meta Thin Light and Hairline (2003) and FF Meta Headline (2005). Developed jointly with Christian Schwartz and Josh Darden.
  • Bosch Sans and Bosch Serif (2004).
  • The SeatMeta family (2003) for Seat.
  • DB Type in six styles (Serif, Sans, Head, Condensed, Compressed, News): designed in 2005 in collaboration with Christian Schwartz for the Deutsche Bahn (train system in Germany). Some typohiles say that it reminds them of Bell Gothic and Vesta.
  • A Volkswagen company family based on a correction of Futura.
  • The DWR House Numbers Series (2006): four fonts with numerals for house numbers: Contemporary House Numbers, Tech House Numbers, Classic House Numbers (based on Bodoni), Industrial House Numbers (stencil). DWR stands for Design Within Reach.
  • Tech (2008, FontStruct), a rounded squarish headline face.
  • Axel (2009): developed jointly with Erik van Blokland and Ralph du Carrois, it is a system font with these features:
    • Similar letters and numbers are clearly distinguishable (l, i, I, 1, 7; 0, O; e, c #).
    • Increased contrast between regular and bold.
    • High legibility on the monitor via Clear Type support.
    • Seems to outperform Courier New, Verdana, Lucida Sans, Georgia, Arial and Calibri, according to their tests (although I would rank Calibri at or above Axel for many criteria).
  • In 2012-2013, Ralph du Carrois and Erik Spiekermann co-designed Fira Sans and Fira Mono for Firefox / Mozilla. This typeface is free for everyone. Google Web Font link. Open Font Library link. It is specially designed for small screens, and seems to do a good job at that. I am not a particular fan of a g with an aerodynamic wing and the bipolar l of Fira Mono, though. Mozilla download page. CTAN link. Google Web Fonts download page. Google web Fonts published Fira Sans Condensed (2012-2016) and Fira Sans Extra Condensed in 2017.
  • In 2013-204, Erik created HWT Artz, a wood type published in digital form by P22, which is based on early 20th century European poster lettering. Named after Dave Artz, a Hamilton Manufacturing retiree and master type trimmer, the proceeds of the sales will go to the Hamilton Wood Type and Printing Museum.
  • In 2015, Fontfont published FF Real, in 13 weights each for FF Real Text and FF Real Head. This typeface family by Erik Spiekermann and Ralph Olivier du Carrois is influenced by the German grotesques from ca. 1900 by foundries such as Theinhardt and H. Berthold AG.
  • In 2022, Erik Spiekermann, Anja Meiners, and Ralph du Carrois published the neo-grotesque superfamily Case at Fontwerk. It includes Micro and Text subfamilies.

Picture of Eric Spiekermann shot by Chris Lozos at Typo SF in 2012.

FontShop link.

View Erik Spiekermann's typefaces. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Ernst Bentele

German author of Schrift geschrieben, gezeichnet und angewandt. Ein Lehrbuch für Schriftenmaler, Graphiker und sonstige schriftgestaltende Berufe (1952, Karl Gröner Verlag, Ulm-Söflingen), a guided tour of writing styles from constructed and calligraphed blackletter to written and drawn oldstyle, ornamented letters, and geometric grotesques. Some of his alphabets are shown in Hoffmann's Schriftatlas (1952). Alphabets by Bentele include Frankengold and Wechselstrich Handschrift. His alphabets provided inspiration to many digital era type designers:

  • AR Types designed Bentele Unziale.
  • Minjoo Ham revived Freely Drawn Italic and then went on to develop that typeface further into a layerable multi-color typeface, Teddy (2017, Fust & Friends).
  • Alejandro Paul (Sudtipos) revived Freely Drawn Italic as Bowling Script in 2014.
  • Alejandro Paul has another revival, Semilla (2011).
  • Perigord (David Nalle, 1993) is inspired by a Carolingian alphabet drawn by Bentele.
[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Essential Books on Type

Don Hosek reviews the major books on typography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Esterbrook Pen Company

Publisher of Alphabets and Lettering with Esterbrook Drawlet Pens (1918; local download) and Drawlet Portfolio (1930s). Drawlet pens were Esterbrook's answer to the popular Speedball lettering pens, and the booklet was an instructional manual on hand lettering with the pen nibs.

Digital typefaces influenced by Drawlet Portfolio include Jeff Levine's Art Class JNL (2014) and Technopen JNL (2013). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Estudio CH
[Cristóbal Henestrosa]

Cristóbal Henestrosa (Estudio CH, Tlalpan, Mexico) is the Mexican designer (b. 1979, Mexico City) who co-founded Círculo de Tipógrafos in Mexico. He is professor at four universities in Mexico and an award-winning type designer [read on for details]. Henestrosa has a bachelor's degree in graphic communications from the National School of Plastic Arts (ENAP) of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), where his student project in 2003 was Espinosa, and a Master's degree in typographic design from the Center for Gestalt Studies, Veracruz, August 2009, where his thesis was entitled Fondo. La familia del Fondo de Cultura Económica. He is professor of typography and type design at UNAM. He has also taught at the National Fine Arts Institute's School of Design. In 2012, Cristobal Henestrosa, Laura Meseguer and José Scaglione coauthored Como Crear Tipografias (Brizzolis S.A., Madrid, Spain). He lives in Heroes de Padierna, Mexico.

Designer of Espinosa, mentioned here.

Author of Espinosa. Rescate de una tipografía novohispana (México, Designio, 2005), a book about Antonio de Espinosa, a 16th century Mexican typographer, who in all likelihood cut the Espinosa type.

The commissioned text family Fondo (2007) won an award in the TDC2 2008 competition and at Tipos Latinos 2008 (for extensive type family).

Creator of the angry hand-printed typeface Prejidenjia (2008, with Luis Novoa).

Speaker at ATypI 2009 in Mexico City, where he introduced the work of 16th century printer Antonio de Espinosa to the world. Espinosa Nova (2009) won an award at TDC2 2010 and a grand prize at Tipos Latinos 2010.

Guaca Rock (2009) is a stone chisel typeface based on the logotype of the rock band Botellita de Jerez.

Gandhi (jointly designed with Raul Plancarte) won an award at Tipos Latinos 2012.

Soberana Sans (Raúl Plancarte and Cristóbal Henestrosa), made for the Mexican Government in 2012-2013, won an award at Tipos Latinos 2014.

Ayotzinapa (2015, by Raul Plancarte and Cristobal Henestrosa) won an award at Tipos Latinos 2016.

His titling typeface Royal Charter won an award at Tipos Latinos 2018. This is a digital revival by Cristobal Henestrosa based on an experimental typeface named Charter, designed yet never fully finished by William Addison Dwiggins. It is an upright italic, unconnected script typeface, whose main features are a pronounced contrast, condensed forms and exaggerated ascenders. While Dwiggins worked on this project from 1937 to 1955, he only completed the lowercase and a few other characters. However, it was used to set a specimen in 1942 and a short novel in 1946. The sources that Cristobal used for Royal Charter (and later, Mon Nicolette) were the original sketches by WAD as well as printing trails kept at the Boston Public Library, and a copy of the 1946 edition of The Song-Story of Aucassin and Nicolette. This gorgeous typeface can be used successfully in headlines, subheads and short passages of text from 12 points onwards. It was published in 2020 as Mon Nicolette at Sudtipos, where the help of Oscar Yanez was acknowledged.

Fontsy link. Mon Nicolette also comes in a variable format with weight and optical size axes. Dafont link. Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Eugen Nerdinger

German type and graphic designer (b. 1910, Augsburg, d. 1991, Augsburg) who created this text family in 1945. Coauthor with Lisa Beck of Schriftschreiben Schriftzeichnen (1977, München) and Kalligraphie (1988, München). Older texts by him include Alphabete (1974, München), Zeichen, Schrift und Ornament (1960, Callwey, München), and Buchstabenbuch (1954, Callwey, München). Nerdinger was active in the German resistance against the Nazis and was arrested in 1942 by the Gestapo and convicted to three and a half years of prison and forced labor. After the war, he worked chiefly at the Augsburger Kunstschule.

One of his alphabets led to Lola (2013, Laura Meseguer). The workhorse Newbery Sans Pro (2018, Alejandro Paul) and the skyline didone Rigatoni (2017, Alejandro Paul) are also based on Nerdinger's examples. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Excellence in Lettering&Typography

Lettering book edited by Kevin Horvath&Jerry Lobato (1988). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Excelsior Publishing

New York-based publisher of Scroll Book (1876), which showcases some ornaments and borders. [Google] [More]  ⦿

F. Arthur Pearson

Author of Ticket and Show Card Designing (1924, publ. Sir Isaac Pitman and Sons, London). [Google] [More]  ⦿

F. Schweimanns

Independent type designer who created typefaces for D. Stempel when he lived in Hannover, Germany. His typefaces, all published by D. Stempel AG, include

  • Biedermeier Reklame (1906).
  • Diana (1909) and Diana halbfett (1910).
  • Frankfurt Serie I and Frankfurt Serie II (1905). Blackletter types.
  • Graziella, Graziella fett and Graziella schmalfett (1905).
  • Korso (1913). Cursive style.
  • Künstlerschrift (1902) and Künstlerschrift halbfett (1901). Art nouveau.
  • Maria Antoinette (1905).
  • Moderne Reklame (1901). Art nouveau style.
  • Propaganda (1901). Art nouveau style.
  • Wodan schmalfett (1902) and Wodan licht (ca. 1905). Revived by Oliver Weiss in 2020 as WF Dahlia.

Fr. Ad. Becker and F. Schweimanns coauthored Die moderne Schrift.

Camera (1936, Intertype) is described by McGrew as a novel cursive letter with light, monotone strokes suitable for use on personal stationery and announcements. The design is based on Korso (1913). Korso was revived in digital form by Coen Hofmann at URW++ in 2016 as Marli. It is a vintage script that feels a bit forced. [Google] [More]  ⦿

F. Weber & Co

Publisher of Neues Vollständiges Monogramm Alphabet (1886). [Google] [More]  ⦿

F.A. Duprat

French author of Histoire De L'imprimerie Impériale De France, Suivi Des Spécimens Des Types Étrangers et Français De CetÉtablissement (Paris, l'Imprimerie Impériale, 1861).

This 578 page tome is descrbed by Bigmore and Wyman as follows: An account of the different state printers of France from the time of Francis I, who instituted the distinction of Printer to the King. Robert Estienne was one of the first royal printers before he went to Geneva. The history of the printing establishment originally known as L'Imprimerie Royale is then detailed, and an account of its successive directors follows. To this succeeds an elaborate description of the present establishment, its system of business, its productions, machinery, materials etc, even to the associations for charitable or educational purposes which have been formed by the workpeople. In an appendix there is a statement of the French laws relating to printing and statistics as to the position of the art. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fabrizio Serra

Author of Regole editoriali, tipografiche & redazionali (Publishing, Typographical & Editorial Rules) (Istituti Editoriali e Poligrafici Internazionali, Pisa - Roma, 2004), with a Preface by Martino Mardersteig and a Postscript by Alessandro Olschki. Professor at the Istituti Editoriali e Poligrafici Internazionali, Pisa - Roma. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Face Photosetting

Photo era foundry set up in the 1960s by John McConnell and Chris Dubber in London. I could only find Pluto Outline, the art nouveau typeface Desdemona (a digital version was created in 1992 by David Berlow at Font Bureau and in 1994 by Richard Beatty; Letraset showed Desdemona in its 1981 and 1986 catalogs; the original is from the late 19th century by Karl Brendler&Soehne, Vienna), Stack, and Oxford (a multiline face) on-line. Steve Jackaman worked in the studio in Newman Street and Hanway Place, and recalled El Paso (a Western/Mexican simulation face) when he created El Paso Pro (2011, Red Rooster). In 2017, Steve Jacakaman (Red Rooster) designed Lodestone Pro, which is based on Marvin (1969, by Michael Chave).

According to Wes Wilson's web site, Face Photosetting led the way by launching a number of Art Nouveau revivals which were taken from Ludwig Petzendorfer's "A Treasury of Authentic Art Nouveau Alphabets". A selection of these, which included Arnold Böcklin, Edel Gotisch and Eckmann Schrift, were made more widely available when Letraset produced them for their dry transfer product. They published a number of books and catalogs, ca. 1976-1977: Face headline catalogue [1981/82] (1977), Specimens of Delittle's wood type, Face book of typefaces, Type catalogue (1976). Some of the typefaces were Cyrillicized, such as Bullion Shadow (1970; Cyrillic version by Victor Kharyk, 1978). Bully Pulpit Plain NF (2014, Nick Curtis) is a revival of Bullion Shadow. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fachliteratur

Fraktur.de gives information on books on Fraktur writing. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fat Faces: origins
[Sebastien Morlighem]

On February 22, 2021, Sebastien Morlighem gave a great Zoom talk in a seminar series hosted by The Cooper Union in New York. In it, he described the beginnings of fat types from around 1780 until their zenith of fatness and development around 1825, all in London. Here is a summary of the exposition for those who have no access to the video at The Cooper Union.

Sebastien started with quotes from famous type experts and type historians:

  • Paul Barnes, upon publishing Isambard in 2019: The fat face is the joyful expression of an idea---to make something as bold as can be---executed with real vigour and the utmost conviction. (Not really a definition)
  • Talbot Baines Reed, in "Old and new fashions in typography", Journal of the Society of Arts, 1890, p. 534: The new Roman was barely established as the prevailing fashion, when a vulgar taste for fatter faces asserted itself. The demand was promptly responded to by the founders of the day, Robert Thorne leading the way. Others outstripped him in the race; and about 1820, or rather before, a face like that before you was both fashionable and popular for certain works. (A condescending view)
  • Joseph Moxon, in "Mechanick Exercises Volume 2", 1683: A fat face is a broad stemmed letter.

Without a good definition, but eager to tell us the story, Sebastien showed examples of gradual thickening of the stems and increase of contrast from bold to fat, starting in Thomas Cottrell's foundry, where Robert Thorne (1754-1820) was employed. After Cottrell's death, Robert Thorne bought his foundry in 1794 and replaced the types by his own. Already in 1774, Thomas Cottrell had shown big fat letters in his A Specimen of Printing Types, very much related in shape to the Caslon types, as Cottrell had previously worked for the Caslon foundry. Similar large letters were also shown in broadsides by William Caslon in 1785. This was the time that a need arose for advertizing via posting bills and large lettering on buildings and coaches. Not to be outdone, Edmund Fry showed a very bold Ten Lines Pica in 1787 and S&C Stephenson had a sixteen lines pica in 1796. Thorne in his 1794 book, A Specimen of Printing Types, shows for the first time lower case versions of the letters. Still, serious mechanical challenges remained, as the early types of posting bills were often sand cast. Sometimes printers would use wood types, and in rare instances, even fill in the fat letters by hand.

The period from 1805 until 1810 saw the rise of the fat face; Sebastien showed us examples, in particular, of great use by the Liverpool-based printer G.F. Harris. Type historian Daniel Berkeley Updike (Printing Types: Their History, Forms and Use, Harvard University Press, 1922, vol. 2, p. 196) wrote: Thorne [...] is responsible for the vilest form of type invented up to that time. Thorne's specimen book of "Improved (!) Types" of 1803 should be looked at as a warning of what fashion can make men do. Stanley Morison, for whom Sebastien showed little respect, even wrote Thorne's "fat grotesque" [sic] was the first original English design to make an impression abroad. [...] With Thorne was produced a letter during 1800-1803 which was a novelty, distinct and dreadful. [Memorandum on Revision of the Typography of "The Times" [1930], Selected Essays on the History of Letter-forms in Manuscript and Print. Edited by David McKitterick, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980, vol. 2, p. 305]

Great progress was made in the genre by Caslon & Catherwood ca. 1810, who slowly evolved fatter types from bold typefaces. In 1812, William Caslon Juior (William Caslon IV) introduced a new production method, which he called the sanspareil matrices. They would allow for more accurate and crisper letters, and more efficient production of very large lettertypes. And so, the race was on, to make bigger and fatter typefaces. Other, newer foundries also started showing the popular fat types, including Vincent Figgins in 1815, caslon & catherwood in 1820, and Thorowgood in 1821, a year after he bought Thorne's foundry after Thorne's death in 1820. Nicolete Grey in XIXth Century Ornamented types and Title Pages [1938, London: Faber and Faber Limited] had this to add to a fat face by Fry and Steele from 1808: In this letter of Fry [...] the process seems to have reached a norm. It is a superb, wide, generous letter, magnificently roman, but with a good deal less of order and more of pomp than Trajan's classic. [...] It is a letter which falls into no category. In the process of fattening, Cottrell's ordinary eighteenth-century capital has changed, the modelling has been exaggerated and the shading become uniformly vertical and the forms of the letters have grown softer and rounder, yet it is not a modern face, for the shading is quite gradual and the bracketing very full, nor are the thick strokes thick enough, nor are the thin strokes thin enough, for it to be a fat face.

Sebastien wrote tthis all up in a booklet, Robert Thorne and the origin of the fat face (2021). The video of his talk is at Type@Cooper in the Lubalin series. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Faythe Levine & Sam Macon

[More]  ⦿

Fernand Baudin

Belgian typographic expert and writer (b. Bachte-Maria-Leerne, 1918, d. Grez-Doiceau, July 16, 2005), and author of "How Typography Works (and why it is important)" (New York: Design Press). This is a translation of La Typographie au Tableau Noir (Retz, Paris, 1984), a book entirely written by hand! Uitgeverij de Buitenkant published "Fernand Baudin, typograaf, typographiste, book designer". Baudin wrote "L'Effet Gutenberg" (1974, Editions du Cercle de la Librairie). He was active in the Rencontres de Lure, the ATypI, and was instrumental in the creation of the curriculum of the Plantin Genootschap in Antwerp. Another reference. Exposition Fernand Baudin from April 14 until May 27, 2000 at the Royal Library of Belgium. In 2004, he received the Laureate Honoris Causa award from the Plantin Society's Institute of Printing and Graphic Arts. CV (doc file in French). CV (txt file in French). Elly Cockx-Indestege et Georges Colin wrote Fernand Baudin ou La typographie au service du lecteur (2000, Bibliothèque royale de Belgique, Brussels). [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Fine Art in Print

Books on graphic design and typography. This store is located in New York (159 Prince Street, Soho), and takes electronic orders (free shipping in the USA). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fiona G.E. Ross

Dr. Fiona Ross, is a typographic consultant, typeface designer, lecturer and author, specializing in non-Latin scripts. Fiona holds a BA in German; a Postgraduate Diploma in Sanskrit and Pali; and a PhD in Indian Palaeography from SOAS (London University). From 1978 to 1989, Fiona Ross worked for the British arm of Linotype, Linotype Limited, where she was responsible for the design of their non-Latin fonts and typesetting schemes, notably those using Arabic and Indic scripts such as Devanagari. Since 1989 she has worked as a consultant, author, lecturer, and type designer. In 2003 Fiona joined the Department of Typography and Graphic Communication at the University of Reading, England as a part-time sessional lecturer on non-Latin type. Fiona Ross is the recipient of the 2014 SOTA Typography Award. In 2018, Fiona Ross received the TDC Medal.

The Adobe Thai typefaces were commissioned from Tiro Typeworks and collaboratively designed by Fiona Ross, John Hudson and Tim Holloway in 2004-2005 for use with Adobe Acrobat (production by Tiro Typeworks). Vodafone Hindi (2007, with Tim Holloway and John Hudson) won an award at TDC2 2008.

Co-designer with Robert Slimbach and Tim Holloway of Adobe Devanagari.

Between 1978 and 1982, Tim Holloway and Fiona Ross designed Linotype Bengali based on Ross's research for her doctoral studies in Indian palaeography. In 2020, Fiona Ross and Neelakash Kshetrimayum were commissioned by Monotype to update that popular typeface, still called Linotype Bengali.

In 2018, Borna Izadpanah, Fiona Ross and Florian Runge co-designed the free Google Font Markazi Text. They write: This typeface design was inspired by Tim Holloway's Markazi typeface, with his encouragement, and initiated by Gerry Leonidas as a joint University of Reading and Google project. The Arabic glyphs were designed by Borna Izadpanah and design directed by Fiona Ross, they feature a moderate contrast. It takes its cues from the award-winning Markazi typeface, affording a contemporary and highly readable typeface. The complementary Latin glyphs were designed by Florian Runge. It keeps in spirit with its Arabic counterpart, echoing key design characteristics while being rooted in established Latin traditions. It is an open and clear design with a compact stance and an evenly flowing rhythm. Four weights are advertized at Google, but only the Regular is available.

Bio at ATypI. Her books and/or essays:

  • The printed Bengali character and its evolution (1999, Curzon Press, Richmond, UK), reviewed by John Hudson.
  • Fiona's essay on Non-Latin Type Design at Linotype (2002).
  • Coauthor with Robert Banham of Non-Latin Typefaces at St Bride Library, London and Department of Typography&Graphic Communication, University of Reading (2008, London: St Bride Library).

Speaker at ATypI 2010 in Dublin and at ATypI 2018 in Antwerp. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Flashfonts
[Leslie Cabarga]

Flashfonts is Zavier Leslie Cabarga's Los Angeles-based foundry. Leslie Cabarga is a baby boomer from New Jersey and author of The Lettering and Graphic Design of F.G. Cooper, the Illustrator/Fontographer/Fontlab resource book, Logo Font&Lettering Bible (2004), and Learn Fontlab Fast (2004, with Adam Twardoch). He runs Leslie Cabarga Design in Los Angeles. His lettering prowess is apparent in this drive-in sign for "Betty Boop's Drive-In" (which inspired Nick Curtis to make Drive-Thru NF), FontShop link. MyFonts link.

Leslie Cabarga's typefaces:

  • Raceway (1995), a famous retro script.
  • Casey (2007), a fat-bottomed script at Font Bureau.
  • Streamline. Another fifties diner or Chevrolet grille font.
  • Kobalt and Kobalt Kartoon (at Font Bureau), great for displays.
  • Ojaio, a beautiful art deco font.
  • Central Station, an original display face.
  • The retro script Magneto.
  • Neon Stream (1995, Font Bureau). Connected retro nightclub letters.
  • Peace: an original psychedelic 60s font based on an alphabet copyright 1997 by Wes Wilson, creator of the classic 1960s Fillmore Poster Lettering style; see here.
  • Saber (2002), a mix of uncial, Fraktur, gothic and Exocet.
  • Love, a psychedelic 60s font also based on Wes Wilson's lettering. In Solid, Open and Stoned styles. At Font Bureau, 1997.
  • Esselte's Cabarga Cursiva. Cabarga Cursive was jointly designed in 1982 by Leslie Cabarga and his father Demetrio.
  • Cocoanut, Grassy Knoll, Straight Light, Straight Medium, Rocket (1995), Progressiv, Cymbal Regular, Dotcom Medium, Generik Regular, Graffiti Regular, Angle, Badtyp, Haarlem (2000), Margarete, Primitiv, Progressiv, Rocket, Rocket Gothic, Straight, Bellbottom, Hihat, Baseball. Jo the Webmistress on Cabarga.

Abstract Fonts link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Flickriver: Nike's photosets

Scans and photographs of old type specimen books. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fonderie Normale
[Jules Didot]

Foundry in Brussels, which published a specimen book entitled Specimen des caractères de la Fonderie Normale à Bruxelles, provenant de la fonderie de Jules Didot et de son père Pierre Didot (1819). Like so many printers in Belgium at the time, its foundry was heavily influenced by and dependent upon Didot.

In 1914, Enschedé republished it with a foreword that tells the story of the Fonderie Normale: i, ii, iii. Some sample pages from that book: Ecriture, Ecriture, Fantaisies, Gothique, Gothique Ornée No. 1489, Grec, Romain, Didot. Link to the 1914 text. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Font Book

A fantastic (and huge) book by Erik Spiekermann, J&uul;rgen Siebert&Mai-Linh Thi Truong, showing over 24,000 fonts. A must for every serious font person. Publisher: FontShop International [June 1998] ISBN: 3-930023-02-4. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fontador (was: Arne Freytag)
[Arne Freytag]

German type designer in Hamburg (b. 1967) who studied at Kunstschule Alsterdamm Hamburg (1992-1996). Arne designed Arne Freytag (1998), Linotype Freytag Regular (2002) and Linotype Freytag Pro (2012).

His Manometer (2014) is a pneumatic ultra-black slab serif typeface with soft corners and fine counters. Manometer Sans (2014) is the sans version.

His Quitador (2014) will make even the most zealous bureaucrat boringly happy. Quitador Sans followed in 2016.

In 2015, Arne published Curve, a fashion didone.

Author of Toward a new typeface A type design project (Comedia, 2005, vol. 2).

Typefaces from 2016: Punto (dot matrix font), Signage (dot matrix style).

Typefaces from 2017: Quador (squarish serif), Ador (humanist sans).

Typefaces from 2018: Ador Hairline, Punto Poly (a stackable dotted stroke font), Quador Display.

In 2019, Arne published the soft serif family Bionik and the minimalist geometric sans typeface family Object.

Linotype link. FontShop link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Fontarte
[Magdalena Frankowska]

Magdalena Frankowska is the cofounder, with Artur Frankowski, of Fontarte in Warsaw, Poland, in 2004. Fontarte developed several typefaces including contemporary new designs as well as Polish avant-garde revivals. Graphic designer and type designer. Her M.A. from Warsaw University dealt with women artists in the surrealist movement (1997). Creator of these typefaces:

  • FA Cindy (2002): shoe dingbats.
  • FA Desiconz (2005): dingbats.
  • FA Domestic Godess (2005): domestic dingbats.
  • Saturator FA (2007): hand-made lettering and signs from the Polish communist republic period. See also Saturator Serif FA (2016).
  • Mobie FA (2008). A decorative fat face.
MyFonts link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Fontbook
[Samvado Gunnar Kossatz]

Samvado Gunnar Kossatz collects over 2000 font families in a book. [Google] [More]  ⦿

FontBook online

Searching for a designer or a font? Look no further than the FontBook. It has over 25,000 fonts listed. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fontographer: Type by Design

MIS Press book by Stephen Moye: a complete guide on typeface design using Fontographer. ISBN 2-55828-447-8. July 1995. 30USD. Out of press, but since the entire book is on the web, who cares? [Google] [More]  ⦿

FontShop's new font book

Nice specimen book with hundreds of fonts. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fontsite bookstore

Sean Cavanaugh's huge selection of books on fonts and typography, offered in cooperation with Amazon. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Formatting Font Formats

A research article published in 1993 by Luc Devroye at EuroTeX. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fotosetter Type Faces

A book by Intertype Corporation with one-line specimens, dated 1954. It is a catalog of their typefaces for the Intertype Fotosetter composing machine. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fr. G. Knudtzons Bogtrykkeri

Fr. G. Knudtzons Bogtrykkeri operated in Copenhagen, Denmark. The type specimens from their printing house were published in a 330-page book, Prøvebog fra Fr. G. Knudtzons Bogtrykkeri (ca. 1900). [Google] [More]  ⦿

François Chastanet

François Chastanet (b. 1975, Bordeaux) is an architect and a graphic designer in Toulouse, France. He specializes in signage systems for transportation networks. Graduate of the École d'Architecture et de Paysage de Bordeaux, he pursued research in 2001 at the Atelier National de Recherche Typographique in Nancy, and completed a DEA in architectural&urban history at the École d'Architecture de Paris-Belleville in 2002. He currently teaches graphic design and typography at the École Supérieure des Beaux-arts de Toulouse. At ATypI 2006 in Lisbon, he spoke on Pixaçao letterforms, the shantytown graffiti letterforms found in the 1990s in Sao Paulo. In 2009, he and Alejandro Lo Celso cooperated with two students, Laure Afchain and Géraud Soulhiol, on an identity type for the city of Toulouse called Garonne. At ATypI 2009 in Mexico City, he and Catherine Dixon spoke on Cholo writing: The term cholo derives from an Aztec word xolotl meaning dog that was later turned on its head and used as a symbol of pride by the Mexican-American community in the context of the ethnic power movements of the 1960s from wich emerged the idea of La Raza or Chicano nationalism. Cholo writing originally constitues the vernacular handstyle created by the Latino gangs in Los Angeles as far back as the 1940s: it is probably the oldest form of the graffiti of names in the 20th century, with its own aesthetic, evident long before the explosion in the early 1970s in New York. Cholo writing can be seen as a cousin of the baroque gothic calligraphies typical of Mexico, as a genuine expression of a border culture between Mexico and the United States. This survey explores the genesis of these specific letterforms that paradoxically gave a visual identity to the LA infinite suburbia. For the first time ever a historical series of photographs from the early 1970s in LA is presented together with a contemporary collection, which gives a unique insight in the history of Cholo writing from an aesthetic point of view. See Placas in Los Angeles, the first suburban blackletters?, Baseline, vol. 55, 2008. In 2003-2004, he created Pontam Black: Pontam Black is a typographic project based on some letterforms observed on sewer plates destined for wordwide sidewalks, from Paris to Los Angeles, produced in Pont-a-Mousson, France. This idea was copied by Jack Usine in 2007 in his Trottoir typeface. Interview by Le Typographe.

Author of Pixaçao: Sãp Paulo Signature (2007, XGPress), and Cholo Writing: Latino Gang Graffiti in Los Angeles (2009, Dokument Press). [Google] [More]  ⦿

François Thibaudeau
[Thibaudeau's classification]

[More]  ⦿

François Thibaudeau: La Fonderie Typographique Française Album d'alphabets (1920)

Specimen of typefaces from La Fonderie Typographique Française showcased by François Thibaudeau in his 1920 book, Album d'alphabets pour la pratique du croquis-calque, édité spécialement pour le Manuel français de typographie moderne (imp. G. de Malherbe, Paris). The alphabets in this book:

  • Algériennes
  • Ascot
  • Canadiennes
  • Cheltenham Romain, Cheltenham Romain Large, Cheltenham Italique , Cheltenham Gras Italique, Cheltenham Gras, Cheltenham Gras Etroit, Cheltenham Gras Large
  • Chicago, Chicago Large
  • Cleveland
  • Elzevir Plantin, Elzevir Plantin Italique
  • Estienne
  • Excelsior
  • Garamond
  • Gravure Taille-Douce
  • Gravure Timbrage
  • Latines Françaises
  • Latines Modernes
  • Lyonnaises
  • Marocaines, Marocaines étrroites
  • Moscovites
  • Pittoresques droites, Pittoresques penchées
  • Provençales
  • Washington
  • Zenith
  • Antiques Litho (No. 1 through No. 4)
  • Blanches Saint-Germain
  • Engravers
  • Taille douce azurée droite, Taille douce azurée penchée
[Google] [More]  ⦿

Frances Wakeman Books

Vendor of old type books, based in Nottingham, UK. Type specimen books. Books on typography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Francis Meynell

British book designer (b. London, 1891, d. Lavenham, Suffolk, 1975). He ran Nonesuch Press (founded in 1923) using Monotype machines. Coauthor with Herbet Simon of Fleuron Anthology (1973, London: Ernest Ben Limited), which contains many of the journal The Fleuron's best articles. [Note: Stanley Morison edited The Fleuron, which appeared as a series in the 1920s.] [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Francisco Galvez Pizarro

Graphic designer from IPEVE, Universidad Diego Portales, Chile. He teaches typography at Universidad Católica de Chile and Diego Portales University. He was a design consultant for Santiago de Chile public transport's information system (2003-2006) and author of the book Educación tipográfica, una introducción a la tipografía (published in Chile in 2004 and Argentina in 2005). He made his mark in the type design world in 2002 when his lively modern typeface Australis (see also here) won the gold medal at the Morisawa 2002 competition. Speaker at ATypI 2009 in Mexico City. His typefaces:

  • At tipografia.cl in Santiago de Chile: TCL Elemental Serif, TCL Elemental Sans (1997, launched in 2001), TCL Uniprint, TCL Llanquihue (gorgeous), TCL Deluxe.
  • Galvez Sans.
  • Kinetika Grotesk.
  • Metrotipo.
  • Australis (2002) is now available from Latinotype. Australis Pro was published in 2012. Australis Swash (2013) adds a cursive touch to this splendid typeface family.
  • Amster (2008) and Queltehue Regular won awards in the extensive text and text family categories at Tipos Latinos 2008. Amster was published as Amster Pro by Pampa type in 2014.
  • He made font families for newspapers such as La Discusión (Chillán, 2008), and La Tercera in collaboration with Rodrigo Ramírez (Santiago, 2007-2008).
  • At Latinotype: Elemental Sans Pro (2010). This is a redesign of his earlier typeface by the same name. The letters in the words men and him have been smacked on the right cheek by their partners.
  • Chercan (2016, Pampa Type). A sans typeface family with a swinging g, a lapidary mood, Latin passion, and copperplate feet.
  • Otta, which won a grand prize at Tipos Latinos 2018.
[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Frank Adebiaye
[Velvetyne Type Foundry (or: VTF)]

[More]  ⦿

Frank Chouteau Brown

Author (b. 1876) of Letters&Lettering: A Treatise With 200 Examples (1921, Bates&Guild Co, Boston). This book shows many decorative alphabets. Alternate URL. Yet another URL.

Examples from that book: Alphabet after Serlio, An outline caps face, A Roman caps face. The best page on Chouteau Brown, complete with all images from his 1921 book. Some of Chouteau Brown's own lettering from that 1921 book: Incised English Script, 15th Century English Gothic Blackletter, 16thCentury German Blackletter, Capitals adapted from Renaissance era medals, Classic Roman Capitals, English Gothic Letter 15th Century, English Incised Script from a tombstone in Westminster Abbey, 18th Century French Script Capitals, German Blackletter (from brass), Italian Renaissance Capitals from a Marsuppini tomb, Italian Renaissance Capitals from Santa Croce, Florence, Italian Uncial Gothic Capitals from the 14th century, Modern American Letters, Modern American Letters for rapid use, Modern American Lowercase, Modern German blackletter, Modern German capitals, Spanish Script from the latter part of the 17th century, Spanish Script capitals, early 18th century, Uncial Gothic Capitals 13th century, Uncial Gothic Capitals 14th century, Uncial Gothic Initials 12th century, Venetian Gothic Capitals 15th century.

The Siamese style in Brown's 1912 book inspired Nick Curtis's digital font Owah Tagu Siam (2007). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Frank Denman

Author of The Shaping of our Alphabet (1955, Alfred A. Knopf, New York), a 228-page type history book. His oeuvre. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Frank Heine
[UORG]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Frank J. Romano

Author of Typencyclopedia: A User’s Guide to Better Typography. A type guru, he is Professor emeritus of Rochester Institute of Technology and founder of Electronic Publishing Magazine in 1976. He occasionally writes on early printing technology, such as here. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Frank Romano

Rochester Institute of Technology Professor Emeritus Frank Romano had a long career in the printing and publishing industries. He was the editor and publisher of TypeWorld between 1977 and 1990, and later Electronic Publishing, Computer Artist, and Color Publishing magazines.

He is the author of sixty books, including the 10,000-term Encyclopedia of Graphic Communications (with Richard Romano). His books were among the first on digital printing, computer-to-plate, workflow, PDF, QuarkXPress, InDesign, and new media. His latest books include History of the Linotype Company (RIT Press, 2013) and History of the Phototypesetting Era (California PolyTechnic Institute GRcL Press, 2014).

He is president of the Museum of Printing in Haverhill, MA which houses the only collection of cold type systems. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Frank Steeley

Author of Lettering for School and Colleges (1902, G.W. Bacon, London). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Franklin Gage Delamotte

Author of The Signists Modern Book of Alphabets (1906). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Franklin Photolettering

Photolettering foundry in the 1970s, located at 211 43rd Street, New York City 10017. One of my correspondents explains: Franklin Photolettering was the smaller film type joints catering to the major publishing and advertising industries in New York City in the 60s and 70s. They started out with a few originals to get into the game, but within a year or so they started putting out copies or slight modifications of existing stuff from Photolettering and VGC (you can see how that happens---someone comes in for some ad copy in Barker Flare, for example, and he asks if they have something like Eightball, so they say "sure, we can do that"). Even though they did have a bit of original stuff, they didn't have not enough to stand out like PL, Mecanorma, VGC or Letraset---also the sheer number of film fonts available on the market by the mid-70s meant that unless you dumped a lot of money on marketing, big-time design would ignore you----so not much room was left for smaller film type houses.

Their catalog is published in binder form in Film Alphabet Compendium Franklin Photolettering. In 1974, Paul E. Kennedy published Modern Display Alphabets: 100 Complete Fonts Selected and Arranged from the Franklin Photolettering Catalogue (Dover).

Typefaces by them included

  • Barker Flare, one of their early 1970s retro typefaces. Digitally revived as Plywood (2007, Patrick Griffin, Canada Type).
  • Pinto Flare. Digitized as Jazz Gothic (2005) by Patrick Griffin at Canada Type.
  • Urban (early 1970s), a Curvy Blocked Lettering typeface in the Alfred Roller / Wes Wilson style popular in the hippie era. Digital revivals include Rebecca Alaccari's Jonah (2005) at Canada Type.
  • Viola Flare. Digitized as Omaha Bazoo NF in 2007 by Nick Curtis and in 2005 by Canada Type as Tomato.
[Google] [More]  ⦿

Fred Afrikyan

Aka Fred Africkian. Yerevan, Armenia-based architect, letterer and type designer who wrote The Art of Letter-Type by Fred Africkian. 120 Tables of Armenian decorative types (1984). See also here. Taboo (Canada Type) is a Latin typeface inspired by lettering from Africkian's book. Patrick Griffin of Canada Type writes: Virtually unknown in the West, Africkian was one of the most talented eastern block artists. Though mainly a calligrapher working with traditional tools, he embraced geometry on multiple occasions for the sake of drawing simple modern Armenian and Cyrillic alphabets. Though he normally tried to maintain in his work a certain homage to Mesrop Mashtots (5th century Armenian monk who invented the Armenian alphabet), his late 1970s experiments made use of so many modern elements that the results were hailed as "real art mingled with science." [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fred Smeijers
[OurType]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Frederic Goudy
[Typologia]

[More]  ⦿

Frederic Warde

Born in Wells, Minnesota as Arthur Frederick Ward, 1894, d. New York, 1939. He enlisted in the United States Army in 1915 and attended the Army School of Military Aeronautics at the University of California, Berkeley during 1917-1918. On demobilisation he worked as a book editor for Macmillan&Co before undergoing training on the Monotype machine, after which he worked for the printers Edwin Rudge. He had met Beatrice Becker in 1919 and they married in December 1922. Warde was Printer for Princeton University (1922-1924). The couple moved to England in late 1924 for Warde had been offered work by the typographer Stanley Morison, designing for The Fleuron and the Monotype Recorder. The marriage did not last; they separated in 1926, and quickly divorced, though the break-up was an amicable one. Afterward Warde lived in France and Italy, where he became involved in Giovanni Mardersteig's Officina Bodoni. In 1926 Mardersteig printed The Calligraphic Manual of Ludovico Arrighi - complete Facsimile, with an introduction by Stanley Morison, which Warde issued in Paris while working for the Pleiad Press. He had his name changed several times, first his last name to Warde, and then his first name first to Frederique and then to Frederic. Warde returned to America permanently and he worked again for Edwin Rudge from 1927 to 1932, and also designed for private presses such as Crosby Gaige, the Watch Hill Press, Bowling Green Press, the Limited Editions Club and Heritage Press. Warde worked as production manager for the American office of the Oxford University Press from 1937 until his death in 1939.

His typographic work:

  • Based on the fifteenth century letters of Nicolas Jenson, Centaur (originally called Arrighi) was first designed by Bruce Rogers in 1914 for the Metropolitan Museum, and parts of the typeface (like the italic) were done by Warde in 1925. This was called Arrighi Italic (a smooth version of Blado) but became Centaur Italic (Monotype, 1929). Warde was inspired by the italic forms on the Italica of Ludovico Vicentino, a 16th century typeface. However, his capitals are more freely formed (not vertical, for example). Warde designed a revival of the chancery cursive letter forms of Renaissance calligrapher Ludovico degli Arrighi. This italic, titled Arrighi, was designed as a companion to Bruce Roger's roman typeface Centaur.

Author of Monotype Ornaments (1928, Lanston Monotype Corp) [this book is freely available on the web thanks to Jacques André]. Many ornaments in this book have been digitized; see, e.g., Arabesque Ornaments (for the 16th century material) and Rococo Ornaments (for the 18th century ornaments). Warde also published the following privately in 1926 with Stanley Morison: The calligraphic models of Ludovico degli Arrighi, surnamed Vicentino---a complete facsimile and introduction by Ludovico degli Arrighi.

Digital fonts based on his work include LTC Metropolitan (Lanston), Centaur (Monotype and Linotype versions) and Arrighi BQ (Berthold; this font has romans by Bruce Rogers and an italic by Frederic Warde).

Wiki page. Linotype link. FontShop link. Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Frederich Friedl

In 1998, Frederich Friedl, Nicholas Ott and Bernard Stein wrote the voluminous book, Typography: An Encyclopedic Survey of Type Design and Techniques Through History (Black Dog & Leventhal). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Frederick William Hamilton

Author of many books on grammar and writing. These include Word Study and English Grammar, Abbreviations and Signs, Division of Words, Punctuation, Books Before Typography, Compound Words, Capitals (1918, United Typothetae of America Chicago, IL), and The Uses of Italic (1918, United Typothetae of America Chicago, IL). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fredrick S. Copley

Author of Copley's Plain & Ornamental Alphabets (1870). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Freeman Gage Delamotte

Author, artist, photographer and wood engraver, b. Sandhurst, 1814, d. London, 1862. He published The Book of Ornamental Alphabets, Ancient and Mediaeval (1879, Crosby Lockwood and Co., London), which has plenty of 8th to 11th century alphabets and initials. See also here, here, and here. Another book is Examples of Modern Alphabets, Ornamental and Plain (1864, C. Lockwood and Co, London), which was scanned in and can now be downloaded here, here (locally), and here (the latter link has the 1891 version printed by Crosby Lockwood and Son, London). Further texts: The Book Of Ornamental Alphabets Ancient & Modern (1858, publ. E.F.N. Spon, London), The book of ornamental alphabets, ancient and modern, from the eighth to the nineteenth century, with numerals (1859, E. and F.N. Spon), Medieval alphabets and initials for illuminators (1861, E. and F.N. Spon; see here or here (locally) for a PDF), and A primer of the art of illumination for the use of beginners (1860, E. and F.N. Spon). Most of his lettering is typical of the Victorian tradition of adding ornaments to simple silhouettes. Example: 16th century wood engaving. An Italian alphabet (1864).

Digital typefaces based on his work include New Saxon Initials (David Nalle, 2016), Delamotte Initials One (2016, David Nalle), Delamotte Initials Two (2016, David Nalle), Museum Initials (2007, John B. Wundes) and Bad Situation (Intellecta Design, 2007: based on an 1864 design called Example Alphabet). [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Friedrich Bauer

German type designer (b. Dorste, 1863, d. Schönberg, 1943). In 1882, he becomes the type director at the foundry of Schelter&Giesecke in Leipzig, until 1890, and again from 1896-1898. From 1898 until 1911, he is the head of printing at Genzsch&Heyse, first in München and then in Hamburg. From 1911 until 1924, he taught at the Staatlichen Gewerbeschule Hamburg. At Genzsch&Heyse, he designed Albingia (1906), Bürgerschafts Fraktur (1907; Schnelle claims 1913), Genzsch Antiqua (1906), Genzsch Kursiv (1906), Genzsch Antiqua halbfett (1908), Genzsch Kursiv halbfett (1908), Genzsch Antiqua fett (1910), Genzsch Antiqua schmallfett (1910), Genzsch Fraktur (1931), Genzsch Fraktur halbfett (1932), Heyse Antiqua (1921), Heyse Antiqua halbfett (1924), Heyse Kursiv (1921), Senats Fraktur (1907), Senats Fraktur halbfett (1908), Germanische Antiqua (1911), Germanische Antiqua halbfett (1912), Germanische Kursiv (1911), Hamburger Druckschrift (1904; halbfett and fett in 1908).

The first appearance of Nordisk Antiqua (or Genzsch-Antiqua) was in 1906 with a single weight under the name of "Nordisk Antiqua". In 1912 a family of seven weights was announced under the name "Genzsch-Antiqua" honoring the foundry in Hamburg where Bauer had been the manager of composing and printing since 1900. As the foundry Genzsch&Heyse had a lot of customers in Scandinavia, their Nordisk Antiqua became widely spread over the north of Europe.

All his other typefaces appeared at J.D. Trennert&Sohn: Fortuna (1930), Friedrich-Bauer-Grotesk (1933), Friedrich-Bauer-Grot. kräftig (1934), Friedrich-Bauer-Grot. halbfett (1934), Friedrich-Bauer-Grotesk fett (1934), F.-Bauer-Grot. schmalhalbfett (1934), Friedrich-Bauer-Grotesk licht (1934), Trennert Antiqua (1926), Trennert Kursiv (1927), Trennert Antiqua halbfett (1927), Trennert Antiqua fett (1929), Trennert Kursiv fett (1930), Trennert Antiqua schmalhalbfett (1929), Trennert Latein (1932).

For a digital revival of Friedrich Bauer Grotesk, see FF Bauer Grotesk (2014, Thomas Ackermann and Felix Bonge for Fontfont).

Digital revival of Senats Fraktur: Senatsfraktur (2020, Raph M. Unger).

Digital revivals of Genzsch Antiqua:

  • Genzsch Antiqua by Gerhard Helzel. In mager, halbfett and kursiv.
  • Nordische Antiqua (2000) by Gisela Will.
  • Nordik (1992) by Bo Berndal, released by Monotype.
  • LD Genzsch Antiqua (2017-2020) by Michael Wörgötter at Lazydogs Type Foundry.

Author of Chronik der Schriftgiessereien in Deutschland und den deutschsprachigen Nachbarländen (1928, Offenbach am Main). A PDF file exists that was made and expanded by Hans Reichardt in 2011. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Friedrich Forsmann

In 2002, Friedrich Forssman and Ralf de Jong published Detailtypografie: Nachschlagewerk für alle Fragen zu Schrift und Satz (Verlag Hermann Schmidt). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Friedrich Groegel
[Fritz Grögel]

[More]  ⦿

Friedrich Neugebauer

Austrian scribe and calligrapher, born in 1911. Harald Suess wrote about him in die Deutsche Schrift in 1996: I, II, III. The story goes that as a prisoner of war in Egypt, he wrote with toothpaste when all else failed.

Author of The Mystic Art of Written Forms: An Illustrated Handbook for Lettering (Salzburg: Neugebauer Press, 1980), and Bibliophile, Buchgraphik, Schriftgraphik (Salzburg, Austria: Verlag Neugebauer Press, 1983).

Typefaces influenced by his style:

  • Avalon (1995), a calligraphic typeface family by Richard Lipton.
  • Frauen [Roman, Script] (2015, Lucas Sharp, Incubator). A calligraphic pair. The Roman is partially based on the calligraphy of Friedrich Neugebauer [on the cover of an almanac of Berlin debutantes published in 1945 titled, Die schönsten Frauen der Welt], and partly Lucas's own creation. Production assistance from Wei Huang.
[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Friedrich Soennecken

Friedrich Soennecken (b. 1848, Iserlohn-Dröschede, Sauerland; d. 1919, Bonn) was an entrepreneur and inventor. He was the founder of Soennecken, a German office supplier. In 1875 he founded F. Soennecken Verlag, a commercial enterprise in Remscheid, Westphalia. His main invention is the round writing style of calligraphy and the pen nib associated with it.

In 1878, Soennecken developed a method for creating glyphs, based on metal elements that are arcs or straight lines. The center lines of the glyphs are aligned with a grid. This was introduced in the German educational system in 1913. He wrote didactic texts on his construction method and on penmanship for the classroom. For example, he authored Methodical Text Book to Round Writing, A. Eltzbacher & Co., 1879. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Frits Knuf Antiquarian Books

Dutch/French book seller with hundreds of old type books for sale. Their outlet is at 26, Rue des Béguines, 41100 Vendôme, France. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fritz Funke

Author of Schrift mit Zirkel und Richtscheit (Leipzig, 1955). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fritz Genzmer

Author of Das Buch des Setzers (1948), an overview of the hand composition typefaces available by German type foundries at the end of World War II:

  • From Frankfurt: Bauersche Giesserei, Ludwig&Mayer, D. Stempel.
  • From Berlin: H. Berthold, Norddeutsche Schriftgiesserei.
  • From Hamburg: Genzsch&Heyse.
  • From Offenbach: Gebr. Klingspor.
  • From Leipzig: J.G. Schelter&Giesecke, Ludwig Wagner.
  • From Dresden: Brüder Butter.
  • From Altona: J.D. Trennert und Sohn.
  • From Stuttgart: C.E. Weber.
[Google] [More]  ⦿

Fritz Grögel
[Friedrich Groegel]

Fritz Grögel (b. Wassertrüdingen, Germany, 1974) studied graphic design and typography at the University of Applied Sciences in Potsdam, Germany. In his graduation work French Délice, he explored the history of French letterpainting. After several years of work as a corporate designer, he attended the TypeMedia master course of KABK The Hague where he researched the German letterpainting tradition. Together with Elena Albertoni, he founded the studio LetterinBerlin in 2011. The following year he conducted extensive research at Berlin's Kunstbibliothek on the history of German lettering which is the subject of his talk at ATypI 2013 in Amsterdam. That talk is based on the content of the book Karbid From lettering to type design (2013) by Verena Gerlach and Fritz Grögel published by Ypsilon Éditeurs and released on the occasion of the Amsterdam conference.

His project for the Masters in type design program at KABK in 2010 led to the signage family Hinterland (2010), and to Builderdyke (2010), a revival project with Paul van der Laan: a digital reinterpretation of Johann Michael Fleischmann's Mediaan Romein.

Other typefaces by him include Glupsisch (2010, is a round piano key typeface created with the help of Typecooker), Fritzskript (a flowing connected script that was done at the Ecole supérieure Estienne, Paris), and Estelita (a calligraphic hand that was inspired by the titles of a French art deco silent movie by Marcel L'Herbier called L'Inhumaine).

Flickr page. Old URL for Fritz Grögel. [Google] [More]  ⦿

From Old Books

Great service in which many old books woith alphabets have been fully scanned. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Fundición Tipográfica Bauer (or: Bauertypes)

Distributor in Barcelona of Neufville fonts, est. 1995. The fonts can also be bought at MyFonts. Ownership: the successors of Georg and Carlos Hartmann: Wolfgang and Vivian Hartmann. Digital type production director is Antoni Amate. Bauertypes also has a nice set of books and type catalogs for sale. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Futura: The Typeface

In 2016, Petra Eisele, Annette Ludwig and Isabel Naegele published Futura: Die Schrift (in German). The English version Futura: The Typeface (Laurence King) followed in 2017. This book includes essays by Steven Heller, Erik Spiekermann, Christopher Burke and others, and was edited by Petra Eisele (Professor of Design History and Design Theory at the University of Mainz), Annette Ludwig (Director of the Gutenberg Museum) and Isabel Naegele (Professor of Typography at the University of Mainz).

The publisher's blurb: Celebrating its 90th anniversary this year, the story of Futura is a fascinating one. Charting its Bauhaus origins to its use as the first font on the moon in 1969, this book tells the story of how the typeface went from representing radicalism in design to dependability. It is durable and timeless, and is worthy of being rediscovered and celebrated. [Google] [More]  ⦿

G. Scott Clemons

Coauthor with H. George Fletcher of Aldus Manutius A Legacy More Lasting Than Bronze (2015, The Grolier Club). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gail Anderson

Gail Anderson is well-known for her typography at Rolling Stone magazine. Coauthor with Steve Heller of New Ornamental Type and Type Speaks: A Lexicon of Expressive, Emotional, and Symbolic Typefaces (2021). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gavin Ambrose

Coauthor with Paul Harris of The Fundamentals of Typography (AVA Publishing SA, 2006). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gérard Blanchard

Influential French type activist, b. Le Florez, 1927, d. Paris, 1998. Author of Aide au choix de la typo-graphie (Atelier Perousseaux, Reillanne, 1998) and Pour une sémiologie de la typographie (1979). Well-known for leading the Rencontres internationales de Lure for many many years.

In 2014, Sabrina Ekecik developed a typeface, Blanchard, that is based on Blanchard's handwriting. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Gebr. Klingspor: Schriftkartei

In 1950, Gebr. Klingspor published a nice small booklet simply called Schriftkartei. The images below are from that book. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Geen Bitter
[Thom Janssen]

Geen Bitter (Den Haag, The Netherlands) consists of Thom Janssen (b. 1984, Maastricht), Jorn Henkes and Rogier van der Sluis. All three are graduates of the Graphic Design course at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, The Netherlands. Thom Janssen is a graduate of the TypeMedia program at the KABK in The Hague in 2017. The work of Geen Bitter has a strong typographical influence and covers designing typefaces, books, websites and identities, all with a typographic approach. Late in 2014, Geen Bitter disbanded. Thom currently works as a freelance type designer and as a researcher at PXL, Hasselt University, Belgium.

In 2013, they published Gewone letters Gerrit's early models. The blurb: A couple of years back, while cleaning the letterpress workshop at the KABK in The Hague, we had an amazing find. A package that hasn't been opened for some time. We opened it and found eighteen printing plates in mint condition. The printing plates, we soon found out, were made by Gerrit Noordzij and date back to the late 1960s. They contain a brief lesson about writing with the broad nib and, once familiar with this basis, writing and drawing some different techniques. Since it seemed the plates are never published before, we decided to do so and made a book containing prints from the plates. Next to the plates we asked former students if they still had old work and sketches with comments by Gerrit Noordzij. The result is a collection of sketches and material, together with five writings about the plates, Gerrit Noordzij and his contribution to the field of type and typography. The text has contributions by Albert-Jan Pool, Frank E. Blokland, Aad van Dommelen, Huug Schipper, and Petr van Blokland. It was published in 2013 by Uitgeverij De Buitenkant, Amsterdam.

Thom's graduation typeface in 2017 at KABK was Rikhard. He wrote: A variable font project with letter shapes inspired by English letter forms from around the 1780s, mainly Richard Austin, hence the name. With a weight axis for hierarchy in texts and an optical size axis in order to make small and larger text sizes look good. This project is an exploration in variable fonts. The goal was to learn about it, build workflow solutions, and have fun. This project is meant for typography on the screen. Browsers can take advantage of variable fonts, optical size can be automated and with CSS and JavaScript all the styles of the variable font can be accessed. One font, many styles: the future.

Their commercial typefaces:

  • Bex (2013). This sans typeface family is based on Thom Janssen's graduation project.
  • Cramp (2012). A casual hand-printed typeface by Rogier van der Sluis.
  • Herman (2013, Rogier van der Sluis). An elliptical monospaced signage typeface family with possibilities of layering and shadow effects. It is quite attractive and one of the finest typefaces in its genre.
[Google] [More]  ⦿

Gems of Penmanship by Williams&Packard

Penmanship book written in New York in 1867 by D. Williams and S.S. Packard. It has a few blackletter and other alphabets, and many freehand drawings of birds and animals. Selected alphabets: Grand Capitals, Italian Capitals, Ladies Hand, Roman Capitals, Italian, Half Block, Williams Style German Text, Williams and Packard's Steel Pen German Text, Old English, Williams and Packard's Church Text [this inspired C. Lee's Ornate Alphabet], Beveled Alphabet, Ribbon Alphabet, (continued), Soft and Twisted Alphabet, (continued), Rustic Alphabet, (continued). Selected drawings: a hand, a bird, a deer, a swan.

Digital revivals include Vintage Ornamental (2016) and Gothic Ornamental (2016) by Ludmila Riumina. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gene Gable
[The Best Type Book with No Typesetting]

[More]  ⦿

Geoffrey Dowding

Author of An Introduction to the History of Printing Types (London, 1998). The original publication was in 1961.

He also wrote Finer Points in the Spacing & Arrangement of Type (Classic Typography Series) (Hartley & Marks; Revised edition, 1998). [Google] [More]  ⦿

George Bickham

UK engraver and penman, 1684-1769, who wrote the manual The Universal Penman (published in parts from 1733 to 1741, reprinted in its entirety in 1743). The full title is The Universal Penman Or the Art of Writing Made Useful To the Gentleman and Scholar, as well As the Man of Business . . . Written With the friendly Assistance of several of the most Eminent Masters And Engraved by Geo. Bickham. That book also contains work by Bickham's collaborators, such as Joseph Champion, Wellington Clark, Nathaniel Dove, Gabriel Brooks, and William Leckey. Book cover. Other books by Bickham include Penmanship in its utmost Beauty and Extent (Overton & Hoole, London, 1731).

A free interpretation of the copperplate script styles of The Universal Penman can be seen in the monumental font Penabico (2010, Intellecta Design). Images: From The Universal Penman, Roundhand Script (ca. 1740), Greek Writing (1743).

Digital typefaces based on Bickham's scripts include 1739 Bickham (2010) and 1741 Bickham (2013) by Klaus-Peter Schäffel, Bickham Script (1997, Richard Lipton), Bickham Script 3 (2014, Richard Lipton), Penabico (Intellecta Design), and loose interpretations such as Poem Script (Sudtipos). [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

George J. Becker

Philadelphia, PA-based author of The American system of penmanship ... In ... ten numbers (1842, Uriah Hunt and Son, Philadelphia), Becker's System of Penmanship, Comprising Manual and Elementary Excercises, Business and Epistolary Writing, and Ornamental Penmanship. In Twelve Numbers. No. 10 (1856, Uriah Hunt and Son, Philadelphia), Becker's Ornamental Penmanship (1854), and Ornamental Penmanship Analytical and Finished Alphabets (1854, Uriah Hunt and Son), a lettering manual.

In 2013, James Puckett (Dunwich Type Founders) revived five typefaces from this manual as digital typefaces in his Becker Gothics collection. They include Egyptian, Egyptian Rounded, Stencil, Tuscan and Concave. All have Western and wood type influences. In 2009, Becker's 1854 book was used by Monogram Fonts Co in the creation of Noir Monogram (2009), which was based on Becker's Pearl type.

Downloads of his 1854 book: University of Michigan scan. For a Facsimile, see Becker's ornamental penmanship. A series of analytical and finished alphabets [FACSIMILE]. Free PDF file of the latter book.

In 1993, Dover reprinted 23 complete alphabets in Ornamental Calligraphy [With 50 Plates] (Dover Books on Lettering, Graphic Arts & Printing). Local download of his 1854 book. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Georgia Mansbridge

Author of Bruce Rogers: American Typographer (New York, The Typophiles, 1997). Afterword by Ronald, Jane, and Bruce Mansbridge. Distributed for the Typophiles by Oak Knoll Press. Oak Knoll writes: Short biography of Bruce Rogers (1870-1957), a reprint of the 1965 Masters Thesis by Mansbridge, who was acquainted with Mr. Rogers during the last decade or so of his life. (Facing the title page is a photo of the author and Mr. Rogers.) There is no discussion of books designed by Mr. Rogers, but a concluding chapter quotes various comments, positive and negative, by others on the work of Rogers. Concludes with notes, primary and secondary bibliographies (not updated since the original publication). Printed at the Stinehour Press. Bruce Rogers' colophon device is gilt-stamped on the front cover. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Georgina Llados

Designer in Barcelona, who published a small booklet enttled Sixties and Type. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gerald Cinamon

Gerald Cinamon was born in Boston, received his MFA Degree in Design at the School of Art and Architecture, Yale University, and has lived in London since 1961. He freelanced for numerous publishers and eventually became Chief Designer at Penguin Books for almost 20 years. His books regularly were chosen for the Best Books of the Year shows. He has written studies of designers and is now especially interested in lettering and design history.

He wrote Rudolf Koch: Letterer, Type Designer, Teacher (2000, Oak Knoll Press and The British Library), E.R. Weiss: The Typography of an Artist (Oldham: Incline Press, 2011) and German Graphic Designers in the Hitler Period. He spoke about Koch at ATypI 2003 in Vancouver. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gerard Unger

Dutch type designer, born in Arnhem, The Netherlands, in 1942, d. 2018. He studied at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam, and taught at the Rhode Island School of Design, the University of Reading, and at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam. From 1974 on, he designed type, starting his career at Hell in Kiel in 1986. Until the end of his career, he taught at Reading and Rietveld. Unger designed stamps, coins, magazines, newspapers, books, logo's, corporate identities, annual reports and many other objects. But he was best known for his typefaces:

  • Markeur (1972), not available as digital type. Unger's first typeface, designed for Enschedé's Pantotype system.
  • M.O.L. (1974), not available as digital type. M.O.L. is the type used in the Amsterdam subway.
  • Demos (1975-1976, Linotype). Unger said once that this was his first face, and that he made it at Hell in Kiel in 1974 (but I am confused then as to the date of Markeur then).
  • Demos (new version 2001), available from Visualogik. In 2015, Gerard published Demos Next (done together with Monotype's Linda Hintz and dan Reynolds) at Linotype.
  • Praxis (1976, Linotype). Revived in 2017 as Praxis Next, also at Linotype. Linotype writes that the design is by Gerard Unger, Linda Hintz and the Monotype Design Studio.
  • Hollander (1983, Linotype).
  • Flora (1984). There is also ITC Flora (1980-1984). Named after Unger's daughter, this is an upright sans italic.
  • Swift (1985). This sturdy transitional typeface is his most popular design. It is used by many Dutch and Scandinavian newspapers, and got Unger the Gravisie-prijs in 1988. In 2009, Linotype published Neue Swift (a 1995 design by Unger), i.e., Swift with old style figures thrown in. See also Swift 2.0 (1995).
  • Amerigo (1986), available from Bitstream. This was originally designed for 300dpi laserprinters. It is a tapered almost lapidary typeface family. In the Bitstream collection, Amerigo is called Flareserif 831.
  • Oranda (1987), available from Bitstream. This is a slab serif originally drawn for the European hardware manufacturer Océ in 1968.
  • Cyrano (1989).
  • Argo (1991), available from Dutch Type Library.
  • Delftse Poort (1991), a stencil typeface not available as digital type.
  • Decoder (1992), available from Font Shop. This was a font from the FUSE 2 collection.
  • Gulliver (1993). This typeface was used by USA Today and the Stuttgarter Zeitung. Can be bought from URW++ from 2009 onwards.
  • OCW Swift (1995-1997, for Ministerie van OC en W, Zoetermeer - NL, by Visualogik Technology&Design).
  • ANWB fonts (1997), available from Visualogik.
  • Capitolium (1998). Capitolium was designed in 1998 at the request of the Agenzia romana per la preparatione del Giubileo for the Jubilee of the Roman Catholic Church in 2000. It was not used though for the millennium celebrations. In 2002, Capitolium was picked as the serif font for the material of ATypI in Rome. It was accompanied in that advertising by Unger's sans serif font Vesta (2001), loosely based on the lettering at the Vesta temple in Tivoli. He developed Capitolium futher to make Capitolium News and Capitolium News 2 (2011, Type Together), so that the adapted glyphs would be more legible (large x-height) and fit better on a page (more glyphs per line). The modern typeface Capitolium News 2 was published by Type Together in 2011.
  • Paradox (1999), available from Dutch Type Library. This is a Didone font done in 1999, for which he won a Bukvaraz award in 2002.
  • Coranto (2000). In 2011, Coranto2 was published at TypeTogether: Coranto 2 is originally based on Unger's typeface Paradox, and arose from a desire to transfer the elegance and refinement of that type to newsprint.
  • Vesta (2001). The sans serif Vesta (designed as a possible candidate sans serif for the Rome 2000 project) won an award at Bukvaraz 2001. It is available now as Big Vesta (2003).
  • Linotype Library is the licenser of the German government's new corporate design typefaces Neue Demos (Antiqua, 2004) and Neue Praxis (sans-serif, 2004) by Unger. The typefaces are to be used for all official correspondence, brochures and advertisements.
  • Allianz (2005) is a corporate type system with sans and serif typefaces developed with the firm of Claus Koch of Düsseldorf. The typefaces were designed in collaboration with Veronika Burian, London, and were produced as fonts by Visualogik, 's-Hertogenbosch.
  • Alverata (2013). A lapidary flared typeface with a huge x-height influenced by roman ("romanesque") lettering from the XIth and XIIth centuries. Alverata consists of three different fonts: Alverata, Alverata Irregular and Alverata Informal. For the development of the Greek letterforms, Unger collaborated with Gerry Leonidas (University of Reading) and Irene Vlachou (Athens). He cooperated with Tom Grace for the Cyrillic letterforms. Alverata was published by Type Together in 2014 and 2015. It appears to have Vesta's skeleton and dimensions. Alverata won the type design prize at Tokyo Type Directors Club 2016. PDF file.
  • Sanserata (2016, Type Together). The blurb: Sanserata is an articulated sans that mirrors Alverata's creativity and concept. Its bright and unflappable nature make it perfect for positive and casual brands, and its accentuated terminals improve legibility in text, especially on screens where light emission tends to round off the endings of glyphs.

Gerard Unger lived in Chicago and Bussum, The Netherlands. Besides the awards mentioned in the list above, he received global prizes for his typography, such as the H.N. Werkman Prize (1984), the Maurits Enschedé-Prize (1991), the 2009 SOTA Typography Award and the TDC Medal (2017).

Author of Terwijl Je Leest (Amsterdam, 1997) and Theory of Type Design (2018).

Books about Gerard Unger include Gerard Unger Life in Letters (2021, by Christopher Burke, De Buitenkant).

Interview by John L. Walters. At ATypI 2004 in Prague, he spoke about type for dailies, and also on Neue Demos and Neue Praxis. At ATypI 2008 in St. Petersburg, he spoke about letterforms in inscriptions from the 10th, 11th and 12th centuries. FontShop link. Klingspor link.

View Gerard Unger's typefaces. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Gerlach & Schenk
[Martin Gerlach]

Martin Gerlach is the author of Allegorien und Embleme (1882, Leipzig) and Das Gwerbe Monogramm (1881). At Gerlach & Schenk, he published Gerlach & Schenk Brochure (1888). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gerrit Noordzij

Gerrit Noordzij (b. 1931, Rotterdam; d. 2022) was a Dutch graphic designer, typeface designer, author, teacher, calligrapher, and design artist who made drawings, wood and copper engravings, and postage stamps. From 1960 until 1990 he taught writing and type design at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague. One of his many students there was Lucas de Groot. Noordzij has worked as graphic designer for various Dutch publishers. Since 1978 he has been the house designer for the publishing company Van Oorschot. His intellectual influence is matched by his physical heritage, in the form of two talented sons in the field of type design, Christoph and Peter Matthias. The Gerrit Noordzij Prize, a prize given to typographers and type designers for extraordinary contributions to the field, is named after him. He was also the first person to receive this prize in 1996. In 2013, Gerrit Noordzij reveived the TDC Medal at the ATypI in Amsterdam.

The influence he had on Dutch type design is based on a theoretical system he called The stroke of the pen, and his position as the main teacher of type design in the country for three decades. Books on his system include The stroke of the pen: fundamental aspects of western writing (1982), and De Streek: Theorie van het schrift (1985) (translated by Peter Enneson in 2005 at Hyphen Press in London: The Stroke: Theory of Writing). His point in his oeuvre is that letterforms are rooted in handwriting.

Other publications: Letterletter (Vancouver, Hartley&Marks Publishers, 2000), De Staart van de Kat (1988,GHM, Leersum), De Handen van de Zeven Zusters (with Willem Dijkhuis: Van Oorschot, Amsterdam, 2001), Das Kind und die Schrift (Typographische Gesellschaft, München, 1985).

His typefaces:

  • Gerrit designed what some consider the perfect font, Ruit, but it is nowhere to be had.
  • Dutch Roman (1980).
  • Batavian (1980).
  • Remer.
  • Ruse: a huge text family that started out based on Gerrit's own handwriting, published at TEFF, or The Enschedé Font Foundry. He writes: From 000 to 100 the family is divided into 11 variants of increasing contrast. Each variant contains four different kinds of figures (supplied in four font layouts - HgTb, HgTx, LnTb and LnTx) and a special version for ligatures (Lig). HgTb is a version that has old style figures with identical widths, HgTx has old style figures with individual widths, LnTb has lining figures with identical widths and LnTx has lining figures with individual widths. Any typesetting job for figures, whether it be in tables or plain text, can be carried out easily with Ruse. Each variant is available in roman, italic and small capitals. The complete family consists of 154 fonts.
  • The bastarda typeface Burgundica (1983, TEFF). He writes: The design of Burgundica emerged from analyzing the elongated version of the Burgundian Bastarda appearing firstly in manuscripts from the calligraphic workshop of Jacquemart Pilavaine in Bergen (Hainaut) in 1450. The Burgundian bookproduction of the time owed much of its splendor to this elegant script. In Burgundica I followed the shapes of the Burgundian bastarda rather closely. Of course, there was no use for the shapes of the bastarda in the roman and italic fonts of Tret; instead I adapted the spatial proportions of the calligraphic pattern to the shapes of that typeface. (Note: Tret is to be released by TEFF, currently in production). In the last quarter of the 15th century the first bastarda typefaces were cut in Bruges. Many similar typefaces followed that were founded on the typefaces by such predecessors as Caxton, Mansion and Brito. Contrarily Burgundica has its origin in the script itself.

In 2013, Geen Bitter (Thom Janssen, Jorn Henkes and Rogier van der Sluis) copublished Gewone letters Gerrit's early models at Uitgeverij De Buitenkant, Amsterdam. The text has contributions by Albert-Jan Pool, Frank E. Blokland, Aad van Dommelen, Huug Schipper, and Petr van Blokland. The blurb: A couple of years back, while cleaning the letterpress workshop at the KABK in The Hague, we had an amazing find. A package that hasn't been opened for some time. We opened it and found eighteen printing plates in mint condition. The printing plates, we soon found out, were made by Gerrit Noordzij and date back to the late 1960s. They contain a brief lesson about writing with the broad nib and, once familiar with this basis, writing and drawing some different techniques. Since it seemed the plates are never published before, we decided to do so and made a book containing prints from the plates. Next to the plates we asked former students if they still had old work and sketches with comments by Gerrit Noordzij. The result is a collection of sketches and material, together with five writings about the plates, Gerrit Noordzij and his contribution to the field of type and typography.

Scan of a 1974 postage stamp by Noordzij. Klingspor link. Letterror link. Flickr group with Noordzij photographs. Interview by Robin Kinross, 2001. The Enschedé Font Foundry link. Video from 2014 by TYPO Berlin. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Gerrit Noordzij Prize: Books

Books published about the Gerrit Noordzij Prize:

  • Mathieu Lommen, Anno Fekkes, Jan Willem Stas (et al.): Het primaat van de pen: een workshop letterontwerpen met Gerrit Noordzij, The Hague (2001).
  • Fred Smeijers (ed. by Robin Kinross): Type now: a manifesto, plus work so far, London (2003).
  • FontShop Benelux (ed.): Erik Spiekermann, The Hague/De Pinte (2006).
  • Dawn Barrett, David Berlow, Matthew Carter (et al.): Tobias Frere-Jones Gerrit Noordzij Prize Exhibition, Amsterdam (2009).
  • Ben Bos, Tony Brook, Tobias Frere-Jones, Karel Martens, David Quay: Wim Crouwel - Gerrit Noordzij Prize, The Hague (2012).
[Google] [More]  ⦿

Gerry Leonidas' reading lists

Type reading lists compiled by Gerry Leonidas, who teaches at the University of Reading. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gert Wiescher
[Wiescher Design]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Giambattista Bodoni
[Manuale Tipografico: 1818 (full)]

[More]  ⦿

Giambattista Bodoni
[Manuale Tipografico: 1818 (partial)]

[More]  ⦿

Gilbert Powderly Farrar
[Intertype]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Giovambattista Palatino
[Libro di M. Giovambattista Palatino cittadino romano]

[More]  ⦿

Giovanbattista Palatino

Or Giovanni Battista Palatino. Giovanbattista Palatino, b. Rossano, Italy, d. ca. 1575, Naples. The calligrapher's calligrapher, was the most prolific designer in the first half of the sixteen century. Palatino designed 29 different scripts, and also designed, not only Latin but, German, Hebrew, Chaldee, Arabic, Greek, Egyptian, Syrian, Indian, Cyrillic and several other alphabets. In 1540 he published a writing instruction and lettering book entitled Libro nuovo d'imparare a scrivere. In 1566, he wrote Compendio dl Gran Volume.

Palatino is also the name of a famous typeface designed in 1948 by Hermann Zapf at Linotype. Akira Kobayashi, the Palatino typeface family was expanded. Linotype released the Palatino Nova in 2005 and Palatino Sans and Palatino Sans Informal in 2006 as a joint effort of Hermann Zapf and Akira Kobayashi. Copies or near-copies of Zapf's Palatino include Book Antiqua (by Monotype, distributed by Microsoft---this typeface did not have Zapf's blessing and may well have led Zapf to resign from ATypI), URW Palladio L (on which Zapf collaborated), TeX Gyre Pagella (free), Zapf Calligraphic 801 (by Bitstream, approved by Zapf), Zapf Renaissance Antiqua (by Scangraphic), Paltus (URW), Palladium (Compugraphic), Palm Strings (Corel), Parlament (Scangraphic), Patina (Alphatype), pal (GoScript), Palladio (by SoftMaker), palazzo (by SoftMaker), and FPL Neu (based on URW Palladio L).

View various digital implementions of Zapf's Palatino. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Giovanni Tonso

Author of Modelli Di Calligraphia (1898). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Giuseppe de Lama

Italian author of Vita del cavaliere Giambattista Bodoni: tipografo italiano, e catalogo cronologico delle sue edizioni, Volume 1 (1816), a biography of Giambattista Bodoni, and a catalog of his work. Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Glossary of Typesetting Terms

Glossary of Typesetting Terms (1994, University of Chicago Press) was written by Richard Eckersley, Charles M. Ellertson, Richard A.ngstadt and Richard Hendel. Downloads: i, ii, iii. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Google Books

Google's book scanning project. Books available starting in August 2006 include Jan Middendorp's Dutch Type and hundreds of others. The pages come in low quality JPG format, about 90k per page. Furthermore, the right-click download function is disabled. The only way to get an entire book is to click on every page in the browser, and then check the cache on your computer, which should have each page in its JPG format---a painful process that will take a good hacker to automate. Text pages are sometimes in PNG format. Grabbing text for quotations, as one can do in PDF files for example, is impossible. So, in summary, Google Books is useful for advertising purposes, to make one buy the book. It is useless for those wishing to do some serious reading or those interested in the fine details of type specimen or other images. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Graham Moss and Kathy Whalen

Authors of A Collation of Specimens Displaying the Types&Typography of Broadsheets and some other Ephemeral Printing all now hung out to dry (2007, Incline Press, Oldham). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Greg Ruffa

New Jersey-based author of The Art of Wood Type (2008), which is easily the most valuable---and beautiful---text on wood type ever written. Born in Raritan, NJ, in 1925, he served in the US Air Corps in 1943 and strudied at Michigan State College and the Aret Career School (New York City), class of 1949. He settled in Scotch Plains, NJ in 1964 and set up Gergory Ruffa Advertising. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gregor Stawinski

Author of Retrofonts (2010, Mark Batty Publ.), a 560-page book that comes with a CD that contains 222 fonts. These are basically old freeware and shareware fonts by Dieter Steffmann, Nick Curtis, and others---all easily found on web archives. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gruso

Gruso Schriftenmappe: Eine Auswahl schöner Gebrauchsschriften für Maler, Graphiker, Schaufensterdekorateure und verwandte Berufe. Heft 3 and Heft 4 (1952) are booklets with tens of alphabets. They were scanned in by Michael Stoll. I cleaned up a subset of the scans, reorganized the set, and commented on them. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gunnar Klack

Author of Neubau Akademie Study of a Grotesque Typeface in its Historical and Sociocultural Context (2020). This is a translation of Neubau Akademie, Historische und soziokulturelle Kontextualisierung einer Groteskschrift (2016). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gunnlaugur Briem

Briem is a fantastic Icelandic calligrapher and type designer. His typefaces:

  • Briem Akademi (1997-2002, Adobe).
  • Briem Gauntlet (1997).
  • Briem Mono (2001). A typewriter typeface.
  • Briem Operina.
  • Briem Script (Adobe). a multiple master font.
  • Briem Times (1990). This was the basis for Times Millenium, used by The Times. Read about the controversy at that page.
  • HS Headline (2015). He teamed up with Hasan Abu Afash for this fat calligraphic didone display typeface. Briem contributed the Latin part, while Afash took care of the Arabic, which is based on the simple lines of Naskh calligraphy.

Author of these [free] books:

  • Tenniel's Alice. The complete set of 92 illustrations for Alice in Wonderland (1866) and Through the Looking Glass (1870). by Sir John Tenniel (1820-1914), the most famous Victorian book artist. His drawings for the Alice books were engraved by the Brothers Dalziel, and are reproduced here in a 300-dpi resolution.
  • Briem at the Type Archive. Fifty pieces, reproduced in one-fourth of original size.
  • Briem in Tipoteca Italiana. Fifty pieces, reproduced in one-fourth of original size.
  • The Briem Report 2012 (2013). The book ranges from from pyrography to stonecarving. It deals with low-resolution hinting and handwriting therapy for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. It contains over a hundred entries of work samples and notes by leading letterforms practitioners.
  • Cursive Italic News. The Barchowsky Report on Handwriting, Vol. 2 No. 3.
  • Handwriting Models. Handwriting Models is a facsimile of the first Icelandic copperplate copybook by Benedikt Gröndal. This is a brief instruction in a new style that was introduced in Icelandic schools in 1875. Blackletter cursive had been replaced by the documentary hand of the British Empire. Italic handwriting succeeded it in 1984.
  • Handwriting Repair.
  • Italic Persuasion.
  • Model Sheets for Arts and Crafts 1. Model sheets for Arts and Crafts: Johann Theodor de Bry's Neiw Kunstliches Alphabet, 1595 is a reprint of Vorlagen für das Kunstgewerbe, Herausgegeban von Carl Hrachowina. 1. Band. Künstliches Alphabet von J. Th. de Bry, Wien, Verlag von Carl Graeser, 1886.
  • Modern Alphabets. Facsimile copy of F. Delamotte's Examples of Modern Alphabets Plain and Ornamental, Crosby Lockwood and Son, London 1913. The book was first published in 1859.
  • Arrighi's Operina. Operina (1522) is a slim volume of 32 pages. Each page was printed from a separate woodcut by Ugo da Carpi, who is best known as a master of chiaroscuro engraving. The author, Ludovico Arrighi, was a copyist, papal scribe, publisher and type designer.
  • Russian Calligraphy. A lighthearted look at calligraphy and decades of teaching by Leonid Pronenko the author of Calligraphy for Everybody (in Russian). Many of his students at the Kuban State University in Krasnodar have gone on to successful careers in design and calligraphy.
  • We're doomed; what else is new? Briem's keynote address at ATypI 2011 in Reykjaví.

Keynote speaker at ATypI 2011 in Reykjavik. FontShop link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Gunnlaugur S.E. Briem
[The Icelandic Method]

[More]  ⦿

Gustav Behre

Author of Farbe und Form in der Reklamegestaltung, München, 1936. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gustav Mori

Type designer (1872-1950) who reconstructed Gutenberg-Textura (1928, Stempel).

In 1916, he published a book on the Frankfurt-based foundry of Benjamin Krebs, Nachfolger, Die Schriftgiesserei Benjamin Krebs Nachf., Frankfurt a.M. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Frankfurter Schriftgiesser-Gewerbes.

Die Hochdeutschen Schriften aus dem 15ten bis zum 19ten Jahrhundert der Schriftgiesserei und Druckerei was published in 1919 at Elsevier. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gustave Mayeur
[Mayeur Type Foundry]

[More]  ⦿

Gustavo Machado
[Type for Change]

[More]  ⦿

Gutenberg Bible

The Gutenberg Bible on-line, free! This is a book with an unreadable layout and annoying typography, an example of what not to do when you set a book. Its only interest is that it was a historical milestone. At the British Library. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Günter Schuler

Günter Schuler is a German author interested in good typography. Among the things he seels are the Cleverprinting DTP-Typomter (a handy sheet for measuring type sizes, both absolute and relative), TypeSelect Schriftenfächer (a wall paint-style foldout with typefaces), and Grundkurs Typografie und Layout (an introductory book on typography). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Guy Oring

Coauthor with Paul Carlyle of Letters and Lettering (1938), Layouts and Letterheads (1938) and Learning to Letter (1939).

The former book was a big source of inspiration for Nick Curtis. For example, he created the typeface Shishka Bob NF (2005) based on the experimental calligraphy in that book. Type designers who were inspired by, revived or extended alphabets shown in Letters and Lettering include:

[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Gwyn Headley

London-based larger than life Welsh bon vivant, and author of Encyclopaedia of Fonts (December 2005, Cassell Illustrated, London), a book that can be considered as a digital successor of Jaspert, Berry & Johnson. The coverage is up to the present. The fonts are classified in one of about 40 styles, and are shown in chronological order within each style. Gwyn has worked on it for four years. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Gyöngyi Bujdosó

Hungarian professor at the Department of Computer Graphics and Library and Information Science, Institute of Mathematics and Informatics, University of Debrecen, Debrecen, Hungary. She is a frequent speaker on Hungarian typography at EuroTEX and TUG metings. Author of Contemporary Hungarian Types and Designers (TUGboat, vol. 24, 2003, pp. 527-529). [Google] [More]  ⦿

György Haiman

Author of Nicholas Kis. A Hungarian Punch-Cutter and Printer, 1650-1702. The creator of the Janson Type, San Francisco / Budapest, 1983. [Google] [More]  ⦿

H. George Fletcher

Coauthor with G. Scott Clemons of Aldus Manutius A Legacy More Lasting Than Bronze (2015, The Grolier Club). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Hackberry Font Foundry (Was: NuevoDeco Typography, or: Bergsland Design)
[David Bergsland]

In 2009, Hackberry Font Foundry grew out of NuevoDeco Typography, which in turn was a commercial foundry that formed part of Bergsland Design located in Mankato, MN, and before that, Las Lunas, NM, and run by David Bergsland (b. 1944, Buffalo, NY), a 1971 graduate of the University of Minnesota. Author of Practical Font Design: 2nd Edition: Rewritten for FontLab 5. Klingspor link. Creative Market link, as Radiqx Press. His fonts:

View David Bergsland's typefaces. Behance link. Creative Market link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Handwriting Models
[Benedikt Gröndal]

Handwriting Models An Icelandic Manual, 1883 [fre download] was written by Benedikt Gröndal (1826-1907), an Icelandic poet, painter, draftsman, calligrapher and library historian. After a master's degree in Scandinavian Studies from the University of Copenhagen in 1863, he taught, wrote, and published a periodical, Gefn. In 2007, a foreword and useful introduction to handwriting models was added by Gunnlaugur Briem, and he placed all on his web site for free download. I quote: In 1875, Denmark changed handwriting models, replacing blackletter cursive by copperplate. This extended to its Icelandic dominion, where copybooks and model sheets in the new style were in short supply. Eight years later, a much needed handwriting manual by Benedikt Gröndal was published. The old style and the new are similar in appearance but have different letterforms. This picture shows the old blackletter cursive (top) and the new copperplate (bottom)---it was taken from Almanak Hins íslenzka þjóðvinafélags, Copenhagen (1877). Gröndal's copperplate and Gröndal's ronde. The foreword by Briem also shows a Danish ronde that appeared in Rundskrifts-Bogen; til Skolebrug og Hjemmeøvelse, ca. 1880. He also grabs the opportunity to showcase the most handsome of all Icelandic copperplate models done by Jón Þórarinsson in Skrifbók með forskriftum, 1. hefti (Reykjavík, ca. 1896). The American Palmer method, more open but less gracious, is illustrated in this alphabet from 1922 by Steingrímur Arason (from Litla skrifbókin, Reykjavík. Variants of this are shown in the alphabets of Guðmundur I. Guðjónsson, published between 1939 and 1953. Briem concludes: Handwriting based on copperplate was largely abandoned in Icelandic schools in 1984. It was replaced by italic, a modern monoline version of renaissance handwriting that owes much to Ludovico Arrighi's approach. A large selection of model sheets in this style is available for free download from the internet. He also shows Italiuskrift05, his own suggestion for schools. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Hans Adolf Halbey

Author of Karl Klingspor Leben und Werk, Offenbach, 1991. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Hans Lijklema

Graphic design graduate of the Academy of Fine Arts Minerva, Groningen, The Netherlands. With Karolina Lijklema, he runs the studio Lijklema Design in Warsaw, Poland. Author of Free Font Index (2008, The Pepin Press, Amsterdam). It contains comprehensive letterproofs of more than 500 fonts from 35 type foundries in 17 countries and interviews with 6 font designers. All fonts contained in the book are included on the accompanying CD and are licensed for personal and commercial use. The following have contributed fonts to this CD: Astigmatic One Eye Typographic Institute, Brain Eaters Font Co, Brode Vosloo, Bumbayo Font Fabrik, Dieter Steffmann, Fenotype, Flat-it type foundry, Fonthead Design Inc., GUST e-foundry, Grixel, Igino Marini, Janusz Marian Nowacki, La Tipomatika, Larabie Fonts, Manfred Klein Fonteria, MartinPlus, Misprinted Type, Nick's Fonts, Objets Dart, Reading Type, Rob Meek, SMeltery, Shamfonts, Sonntag Fonts, Typedifferent, Typodermic Fonts, VTKS DESIGN, Vic Fieger, WC Fonts, Yanone, boodas.de, defaulterror, eightface, exljbris, pizzadude.dk. As far as I can tell, all these fonts can be downloaded for free from the usual web archives. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Hans Peter Willberg

Co-author with Friedrich Forssman of "Erste Hilfe in Typographie. - Ratgeber für den Umgang mit Schrift," Mainz: Hermann Schmidt, 1999. He wrote 15 books in all, including, e.g., Wegweiser Schrift, "Schriften erkennen" (with Monika Müller, Ravensburg, 1981), "Buchkunst im Wandel" (Frankfurt, 1984), "Lesetypografie" (with Friedrich Forssman, Mainz, 1997), and was an influential figure in the German printing scene. Willberg died on 30 May 2003 in Eppstein near Frankfurt. Obituary by Erich Alb. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Hans Reichardt

Type historian in the Frankfurt area who is associated with the Klingspor Museum in Offenbach, Germany. He has diligently compiled information on most German typefaces ever made. In 2008, Spatium Magazin has just released a DVD containing a collection of 3,000 images scanned from the pages of many 20th century German type foundry catalogs. The news announcements and forum discussions are positive. Four DVDs in all are planned. Included are scans of type specimen cards, brochures, and catalogs from various foundries, such as Bauer, Klingspor, Ludwig & Mayer, Stempel, C. E. Weber, Berthold, Genzsch & Heyse, Joh. Wagner, Flinsch and Schelter & Gieseke. In addition, books like Seemann's Handbuch der Schriftarten, Abraham Horodisch's Die Schrift im schönen Buch unserer Zeit, and Emil Wetzig's Ausgewählte Druckschriften in Alphabeten are scanned as well. Table of contents. All images on the DVD are at 150 dpi resolution.

Author of Bleisatzschriften des 20. Jahrhunderts aus Deutschland (2008, Offenbach) and Bleisatzschriften des 20. Jahrhunderts International (2009, Offenbach), both in DVD format. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Hans Rudolf Bosshard

Born in 1929 in Balm/Lotstetten, Germany. He studied typefounding in Schaffhausen from 1944-1948, and worked as typesetter in printing shops in Zürich and Stockholm from 1951-1959. From 1959 until 1994, he taught typographic design in various schools, and from 1993-1998, he was a free-lance book designer associated with Niggli. Author of "Der typografische Raster The Typographic Grid" (Zürich, 2000), and "Typografie Schrift Lesbarkeit" (Verlag Niggli AG, Switzerland, 1996). The latter (highly recommended) book surveys legibility issues in type choices, and closes with a classification of post-1945 typefaces. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Hans-Jürgen Wolf

Born in Berlin in 1938, Hans-Jürgen Wolf studied graphic arts and painting with Richard Blank at the Design Institute of Berlin. As a graphic artist, he joined the studio of Schering AG in Berlin. Author of Geschichte der Typographie (Historia, 1999) and Geschichte der graphischen Verfahren (Historia, 1990), a detailed work on the history of typesetting and printing machine companies.

Designer of Wolf Antiqua (1966, VGC). This typeface is available as Justine (NovelFonts) and OPTI Julie (Castcraft). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Harald Haarmann

Author of Universalgeschichte der Schrift (Campus-Verlag, Frankfurt, 1991), a book that deals with the history of type and many typeface systems. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Harald Süß

Author of Deutsche Schreibschrift, Lehrbuch (2002). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Harold Holland Day

In Modern Brush Lettering (1931), we find these art deco alphabets by Harold Holland Day: Novelty Gothic, Strength Characteristics (a modified Futura), Broadway, Modern Bulletin. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Harry B. Wright

Author of the instruction book Lettering 60 Plates in a Variety of Alphabets (1950, Pitman Publishing Corporation. New York, NY). Reprinted in 1962.

Digital revivals were undertaken by Jeff Levine. These include

[Google] [More]  ⦿

Harry C. Pears
[Typeface Research Pty Ltd]

[MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Harry Carter

Father of Matthew Carter, typographic historian, and archivist of the Oxford University Press, who lived in the UK from 1901-1982. Author in 1969 of "A view of early typography: up to about 1600". This will be reissued by Hyphen Press in 2002 and is reviewed by Andy Crewdson. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Harry Lawrence Gage

Harry Gage lived in the village of Annisquam on Cape Ann, Massachusetts after he left corporate and academic life in the printing business. He produced a great deal of fine art in his later years---watercolors, designs for commemorative medals, and designs for the Christmas cards that were sent out by the village committee.

Author of Vel Vet Show Cards (1924). Some of his alphabets can be seen in Thomas Woods Stevens's book Lettering (1916). All of the alphabets in the latter book were digitized by Dick Pape in 2012 and 2013, and are free and downloadable from this site: TWS Heavy Capitals 49, TWS Italian Gothic Caps 80 (Lombardic), TWS Renaissance Alphabet 39, TWS Robinson Caps 23, TWS Roman Caps 13, TWS Slab Capitals 22, TWS The Japanese 32. Futher digitizations of the 1916 alphabets include Jeff Levine's Tenement JNL (2020: of the Cooper Black style alphabet TWS Heavy Capitals 49), Da ABF Mafia's Yoshi Toshi (2003) and David Nalle's Yoshitoshi (2003), both of TWS The Japanese 32. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Harry W. Jacobs

Director of art education in Buffalo, NY. In 1924, he published several lettering alphabets in his book, Alphabets and Letters for Lettering (Milton Bradley Co, Springfield, MA). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Hartley E. Jackson

Author of the technical textbook Newspaper typography, Stanford University Press, Stanford, CA, 1942. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Haruta Design Studio
[Yukari Haruta]

Haruta Yukari is a graphic designer. Author of Kawaka Ikehara, A Hundred Vistas of Letters #98 (Robundo, 2000), Kawaka Ikehara: A Man between Calligraphy and Type, Japanese Modern Type: Shozo Motoki And His Surroundings (the Committee of the Japanese Modern Type: Shozo Motoki and His Surroundings and NPO Modern Printing Preservation Society, 2003), and a thesis titled Early Modern Hiragana Type and Its Designer: Kawaka Ikehara and His Surroundings (Japan Society of Typography Journal #09, 2016). She is the principal of Haruta Design Studio and a lecturer at Robundo Shinjuku Private Typography School from 2006 to 2018.

Speaker at ATypI 2019 in Tokyo. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Hazeltine Typesetting Inc

Publishers of Library of Type (1959). This book showcases ornate fonts, dating from the 8th to the 16th century, include German Arabesque and Old English Riband. For some samples, see Jaime Henderson's scans at this page (some are reproduced below). [Google] [More]  ⦿

H.C. Martin

Author of

  • Martin's Complete Ideas (1930s).
  • Martin's Idea Books 1-4 (1935-1937). Mike Jackson writes: This group of four Speedball-sized booklets showcased Martin's later work with even more zest and eye appeal than the original book. #4 was produced in 1937. Book One (1935). Book Two (1936). Book Three (1937). Book Four (1935).
  • 1000 Showcard Layouts (1928, 1930, 1984). Mike Jackson writes: An amazing book if only from the realization of the effort it took to produce it! H.C. Martin, a frequent contributor to Signs of the Times Magazine, was commissioned to produce a book of 1000 showcard layouts specifically to be used in a book.

Creator of the art deco alphabet Modern Thick and Thin. For a digital revival (with more rounded terminals) and extension of this font, see Rodney Vicik's Fats Deco (2020). [Google] [More]  ⦿

H.D. Smith

Author of Plain & Ornamental Alphabets (1898). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Hebrew Calligraphy

Book by Jay Seth Greenspan. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Heidrun Osterer

Heidrun Osterer (b. 1966, Switzerland) is a graphic designer and CEO of Feinherb Visuelle Gestaltung. She is also the co-founder of the Swiss Foundation Type and Typography. In addition, she is a part-time lecturer of screen typography at the Vocational School of Design in Zürich. Consultant of the Swiss Typographic Magazine STM. Since 2001, she carried out research on the professional career of Adrian Frutiger. Her book, coauthored with Philipp Stamm, on Frutiger's life is Adrian Frutiger - Typefaces The Complete Works (2009, Birkhäuser). She spoke about this work at ATypI 2008 in Petersburg. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Heinz Hantschke

Author of Meisterliche Typographie (Saarbrücken, 1952). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Helmut Schmid

German type designer, b. 1942, Austria, d. 2018, Japan. He started out apprenticing as a typesetter. In the 1960s, he studied in the Basel School of Design in Switzerland under the direction of Emil Ruder, Kurt Hauert and Robert Buchler. Schmid went on to West Berlin and then Stockholm (where he created covers for journal Grafisk Revy). Schmid traveled extensively and worked in Canada, Germany, Sweden, and Japan, before relocating to his permanent home in Osaka in 1977. This was where he developed his iconic design aesthetic that blends European and Japanese elements. One of his most notable works was the brand identity for Japanese sports drink Pocari Sweat, which is still in use in East Asia, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East today.

Schmid wrote several essays about typography for global design magazines including Baseline, Idea, and Typografische Monatsblätter. His books include Typography Today, Helmut Schmid: Design is Attitude and Japanische Typographie und Schweizer Typographie, published in Comedia, edition 03-1, 2003. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Hendricus Theodorus Wijdeveld

Hendrik Wijdeveld was a Dutch architect and art deco paper artist (1885-1987). He founded the trendsetting art deco magazine Wendingen in 1918 and remained its chief editor until 1931.

Wijdeveld designed many letter types for special projects, such as book covers, buildings, and letterheads. Examples include a poster entitled Architectuur Tentoonstelling (1931), a poster entitled Internationaal Theater Tentoonstelling (1922), and an illustration for De Bijenkorf (1922).

In 2003, Hans Oldewarris published Wijdeveld---Art Deco Design on Paper at 2010 Publishers. That book shows stencil-like art deco typefaces such as Wendingen and Amsterdam Deventer, both designed in the 1920s.

Wijdeveld's lettering and alphabets inspired these digital typefaces:

  • AF Wendingen (1998, Christian Küsters for ACME Fonts). An LED simulation typeface named after Wijdeveld's art deco magazine.
  • Architectuur NF (2006, Nick Curtis).
  • Hendrikus Wijdeveld (2010). By swiftw5 at FontStruct. Based on the poster entitled Architectuur Tentoonstelling Frank Lloyd Wright (1931).
  • Wijdeveld by Matthew Bardram of Atomic Media.
[Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Hendrik D.L. Vervliet

Prolific Belgian type expert (b. 1923, Antwerp; d. 2020) who graduated in philology from the University of Leuven. He became adjunct director of the Museum Plantin-Moretus in Antwerp and was on the board of governors of the Plantin Instituut voor Typografie, which he helped renovate after the second worrld war together with Albert J.M. Pelckmans. Vervliet became librarian and lecturer at the University of Antwerp, and professor at the University of Amsterdam. Obituary that uses a text by Ludo Simons at the Plantin Instituut voor Typografie. Considered as the world's top expert on 15th and 16th century typography, Vervliet leaves a wealth of books on type from the renaissance era, and book history in general. Author of

  • Sixteenth-Century Printing Types of the Low Countries. With a Foreword by Harry Carter, Amsterdam: M. Hertzberger, 1968. This book has 267 facsimile-illustrations depicting 147 typespecimens. It was translated from the Dutch manuscript by Harry Carter.
  • Civilité Types (with Harry Carter, 1966, Oxford, University Press), for The Oxford Bibliographical Society).
  • Cyrillic & oriental typography in Rome at the end of the sixteenth century: an inquiry into the later work of Robert Granjon (1578-90) (1981, Berkeley Poltroon Press, 55+3 pages).
  • The Palaeotypography of the French Renaissance Selected Papers on Sixteenth-Century Typefaces (Library of the Written Word, 2008, and Leiden: Koninklijke Brill NV, 2008). This is a 565-page 2-volume oeuvre about which the publisher writes: This collection of thirteen essays examines sixteenth-century type design in France. Typefaces developed during this period were to influence decisively the typography of the centuries which followed, and they continue to influence a great many contemporary typefaces. The papers' common goal is to establish the paternity of the typefaces described and critically to appraise their attributions, many of which have previously been inadequately ascribed. Such an approach will be of interest to type historians and type designers seeking better-documented attributions, and to historians, philologists, and bibliographers, whose study of historical imprints will benefit from more accurate type descriptions. The papers and illustrations focus on the most important letter-cutters of the French Renaissance, including Simon de Colines, Robert Estienne, Claude Garamont, Robert Granjon, Pierre Haultin, and also include a number of minor masters of the period.
  • French Renaissance Printing Types: A Conspectus (New Castle, Delaware, and London: Oak Knoll Press, The Bibliographical Society, and The Printing Historical Society 2010). This conspectus aims at surveying exhaustively and regardless of aesthetics, all Roman, Italic, Greek, Hebrew, and Arabic typefaces made in France during the sixteenth century. Such a survey will be of interest to historians, bibliographers, and philologists wishing to identify the types used in the imprints they are investigating, as well as to type historians or type designers wishing to base their attributions on documentary evidence. The conspectus consists of introductory chapters on the sources available, the evolution of sixteenth-century type-casting and letter-engraving, biographical notices of 17 punchcutters (both famous ones, such as Colines, Garamont, Granjon, and lesser known ones, such as Vatel, Gryphius, or Du Boys) and the methodology used. The main part of the book consists of the facsimiles of 409 typefaces (216 Romans, 88 Italics, 61 Greeks, 41 Hebrews, 2 Arabics, and one phonetic) each with a short identifying notice, describing their letter family, size, punchcutter (or eponym), their first appearance in books or type-specimens, the surviving materials such as punches or matrices, and finally (for about two-thirds of them), the recent literature. Every typeface has been illustrated, several with multiple examples of their use.
  • Vine Leaf Ornaments in Renaissance Typography: a survey (2012, New Castle, Delaware: Oak Knoll Press and HES & DE GRAAF Publishers). Oak Knoll writes about this 416-page book: This new survey deals with the birth and early history of the typographical ornament commonly known as a vine leaf or Aldine leaf. Starting in 1505, the introduction sketches the fleurons beginnings in handwritten form onwards to printed epigraphical handbooks. These small ornaments originated as type-cast sorts in the first decade of the sixteenth century in Augsburg and Basle at presses that attended to the interests of a humanist reading public. From the 1520s onwards, the design evolved into an all-purpose decorative motif fitting for any publication. Venice and Paris designers, such as Garamont and Granjon, cut new designs that can still be found in most digital fonts today. The main part of this book is a comprehensive catalogue of all sixteenth-century type-cast vine leaf designs. It provides a descriptive notice of each fleuron, irrespective of its aesthetic merit or country of origin.
  • Robert Granjon, letter-cutter, 1513-1590: An oeuvre-catalogue (New Castle, Delaware: Oak Knoll Press, 2018, 200 pages).
  • Granjon's Flowers Am Enquiry into Granjon's, Giolito's, and De Tournes' Ornaments, 1542-1586 (New Castle, Delaware: Oak Knoll Press, 2016, 248 pages). The contents include a chronology of Granjon's ornaments (1544-1586), ornaments used by Gabriele Giolito in Venice (1542-1550), and flowers and ornaments used by de Tournes in Lyons (1544-1577). Appendices include illustrated lists of ornaments by size, width, and date.
  • Post-incunabula en hun uitgevers in de Lage Landen: een bloemlezing gebaseerd op Wouter Nijhoff's L'art typographique. Post-incunabula and their publishers in the Low Countries: a selection based on Wouter Nijhoff's L'art typographique (Den Haag-Boston-London: Martinus Nijhoff, 1978, 205 pages).
  • Gutenberg of Diderot? De typografie als factor in de wereldgeschiedenis (Deventer: Van Loghum Slaterus, 1977, 33 pages). This is the speech he gave when he became professor of book history at the University of Amsterdam on May 16, 1977.
  • Liber librorum : 5000 jaar boekkunst (by Hendrik D. L. Vervliet, Fernand Baudin and Herman Liebaers, Brussel: Uitgeverij Arcade, 1972). The French translation: Liber librorum: cinq mille ans d'art du livre., Bruxelles: Arcade, 1972. Engelse vertaling: The book through five thousand years London-New York: Phaidon, 1972. Duitse vertaling: Liber librorum: 5000 Jahre Buchkunst, Genève: Weber, 1973.
  • Reproductions of Christopher Plantin's Index sive specimen characterum 1567 & Folio specimen of c. 1567, together with the Le Bé-Moretus Specimen, c. 1599 (by Hendrik D. L. Vervliet ans Harry Carter, London: Bodley Head, 1972).
  • The type specimen of the Vatican Press 1628. A facsimile with an introduction and notes by H.D.L. Vervliet (by Andrea Brogiotti and Hendrik D. L. Vervliet, Amsterdam: Menno Hertzberger, 1967).
  • Orientaliste [1882-1967] Specimen (by Hendrik D. L. Vervliet and René Draguet, Leuven: Drukkerij Orientaliste, 1967, 64 pages).
  • Danfrie Reconsidered. Philippe Danfrié's (d. 1606) Civilité Types, in: The Library, vol 21:1, pp. 3-45, 2020.

Wikipedia link. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Henri Fournier

Author (1800-1888) of Traité de la typographie (1825, imp. de H. Fournier, Paris). Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Henry Caslon

British typefounder from the famous Caslon family. Author of Specimen of Printing types (1841), which showcases the typefaces of Caslon, Son and Livermore. PDF file of that book. Excerpts: Albion No. 1, Double Pica No. 3, Five Line Pica Open, Four Line Pica Shaded, Italian [this is a famous Western face, dating from 1821, and entitled the Italian Monstrosity by James Clough (who considers it not a monstrosity at all---the title refers to bad reputation of Caslon's Italian in the eyes of type critics such as T.C. Hansard and Nicolete Grey)], Nine Line Pica, Ornament No. 113, Ornament No. 159, Seven Line Pica Italian, Sixteen Line Pica Compressed, Ten Line Pica Compressed, Two Line Letters No. 4, Two Line Pica Chessmen.

Images of some type specimen from Henry Taylor Wyse's book of 1911: AngloSaxon, Antique Old Style, Baskerville, Black No. 4, Cheltenham, Cheltenham Bold Outline, Cheltenham Heavy Italic, Cheltenham Old Style, Cheltenham Old Style, Lining Carlton, Morland, Morland Italic, Old Face, Old Face Heavy, Old Face Italic, Original Black, Ornaments. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Henry Shaw

Author (1800-1873) of The Handbook of Mediaeval Alphabets and Devices (Bernard Quaritch, London, 1853; and Henry George Bohn, London, 1856), Alphabets, Numerals and Devices of the Middle Ages (1845, William Pickering, London) and Alphabets&Numbers of the Middle Ages (London, 1845). cover page. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Henry Sylvester Jacoby

Author of A text-book on plain lettering (1901, The Engineering News Publishing Company). [Google] [More]  ⦿

Henry Taylor Wyse

Scottish author of Modern type display and the use of type ornament (1911, Edinburgh), a book which can be found in full on the web. See also here. PDF of that book, and the text file. Most of the specimens discussed in the text are from H.W. Caslon Typefounders, Stephenson Blake, Charles Reed and Miller & Richard. [Google] [More]  ⦿

Herbert Spencer

Herbert Spencer (1924, London-2002, Falmouth) was a designer, editor, writer and photographer. Working in London, Spencer launched Typographica in 1949 and wrote for it for 18 years. He is the author of The Visible Word: Towards a new alphabet. Visual Communication Books (Hastings House Publishers, 1968-1969) and Pioneers Of Modern Typography (1969).

Creator of the De Stijl like alphabet NPL, Epps+Evans in the former book, which was digitized in 1997 by Michael Hernan.

New York Times obituary. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Hermann Delitsch

Typography professor in Leipzig, b. Leipzig, 1869, d. Leipzig, 1937. He taught at Leipzig's Akademie für Graphische Künste und Buchgewerbe. One of his students was Jan Tschichold (in 1919). His typefaces:

  • Delitsch Antiqua (1911, J. Klinkhardt). This is Antiguo Manuscrito at the Richard Gans Foundry. The latter was digitized by Paulo W (Intellecta Design) as Gans Antigua Manuscrito (2006). Other typefaces based on Delitsch Antiqua were created by Manfred Klein (Delitsch Initialen, 2004) and Petra Heidorn (Delitsch Antiqua, 2004). Both could be found here (dead link).
  • Kanzlei Fraktur, or Delitsch Kanzlei (1913, J. Klinkhardt).
  • Ramses Antiqua (1912, J. Klinkhardt). This Antiqua typeface was revived in 2012 by Chiron as TbC Ramses-Antiqua.

Author of Schribschriftnormen (1928, K.W. Hiersemann), Delitzsch-Antiqua: eine künstlerische Schriftgarnitur mit Initialen und Schmuck für zeitgemässe Buchausstattung (1915). Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Hermann Hoffmann

German type designer, b. 1856, Hildesheim, d. 1926, Berlin. He settled in the 1890s in Berlin and founded Maschinenfabrik Heidenheim & Hoffmann. In 1895 he became head of H Berthold AG in Berlin. His designs:

  • Bloc (Berthold, 1908). Digitization and Cyrillization by Tafir Safayev, 1997 as Bloc (Paratype). See also Bloc Berthold at BertholdTypes, and FB Hermes (1995, Matthew Butterick at Font Bureau). FB Hermes was extended by Butterick in 2010. Bloc was similar to Hermes at Schriftguss and Woellmer. Bitstream's Gothic 821 (1990) is based on Bloc. The Softmaker version is called Boulder. Grauna (2018, Gabriel Figueiredo at Typeoca) revives Bloc Heavy, but has smoother outlines.
  • Herold Reklameschrift (1901, Berthold (Berlin)). An art nouveau advertising typeface developed until 1907 with schmal, fett and Kontur substyles. Digitizations of this:
  • Kaufhaus-Fraktur (1906, Berthold).

Books: Das Haus Berthold 1858-1921 (1921, Berlin) and Der Schriftgiesser (1927, Leipzig).

FontShop page. Klingspor link. FontShop link.

Oddity: The names Heinz Hoffmann and Hermann Hoffmann are used by two subcommunities. MyFonts, Font Bureau, etc. use Heinz, while Erik Spiekermann, Klingspor, and the German media use Hermann. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

Hermann Zapf

Prolific master calligrapher and type designer, born in Nuremberg in 1918. Most of his life, he lived in Darmstadt, where he died in 2015. He is best known for Palatino, Optima, Melior, Zapf Dingbats, Zapfino, and ITC Zapf Chancery. He created alphabets for metal types, photocomposition and digital systems.

He studied typography from 1938 until 1941 in Paul Koch's workshop in Frankfurt. From 1946 until 1956, he was type director at D. Stempel AG type foundry, Frankfurt. In 1951 he married Gudrun von Hesse. From 1956 until 1973, he was consultant for Mergenthaler Linotype Company, Brooklyn and Frankfurt. From 1977 until 1987, he was vice president of Design Processing, Inc., New York (which he founded with his friends Aaron Burns and Herb Lubalin), and professor of Typographic Computer Programs, Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, New York. Students at RIT included Kris Holmes and Charles Bigelow, who together created the Lucida type family. Other prominent students include calligrapher/font designer Julian Waters and book designer Jerry Kelly. From 1987 until 1991, he was chairman of Zapf, Burns&Company, New York. He retired in Darmstadt, Germany, but consulted on many font projects until a few years before his death. In the 1990s, Zapf developed the hz program for kerning and typesetting. It was acquired by Adobe who used ideas from it in InDesign.

Awards:

  • 1969 Frederic W. Goudy Award, Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, New York.
  • 1973 Gutenberg Prize, City of Mainz.
  • 1975 Gold Medal, Museo Bodoniano, Parma.
  • 1985 Honorary Royal Designer for Industry, Royal Society of Arts, London.
  • 1987 Robert Hunter Middleton Award, Chicago.
  • 1994 Euro Design Award, Oostende.
  • 1996 Wadim Lazursky Award, Academy of Graphic Arts, Moscow.
  • 1999 Type Directors Club award for Zapfino (1998), New York.
  • 2010 Bundesverdienstkreuz 1. Klasse.

Some publications by Hermann Zapf:

  • Feder und Stichel (1949, Trajanus Presse, Frankfurt)
  • About Alphabets (1960)
  • Manuale Typographicum (1954 and 1968). Only 1000 copies were printed of the original.
  • Typographic Variations (1964), or Typografische Variationen (1963, Stempel), of which only 500 copies were printed.
  • Orbis Typographicus (1980)
  • Hermann Zapf and His Design Philosophy (Chicago, 1987)
  • ABC-XYZapf (London, 1989)
  • Poetry through Typography (New York, 1993)
  • August Rosenberger (Rochester, NY, 1996).
  • Alphabet Stories (RIT Cary Graphic Arts Press, Rochester, 2008). Review by Hans Hagen and Taco Hoekwater.
  • My collaboration with Don Knuth and my font design work [just an article], TUGboat 22:1/2 (2001), 26-30. Local download.

    List of his typefaces:

    • Alahram Arabisch.
    • Arno (Hallmark).
    • Aldus Buchschrift (Linotype, 1954): Italic, Roman. Digital version by Adobe.
    • Alkor Notebook.
    • Attika Greek.
    • Artemis Greek.
    • Aurelia (1985, Hell).
    • AT&T Garamond.
    • Book (ITC New York). Samples: Book Demi, Book Demi Italic, Book Heavy, Book Heavy Italic, Book Medium Italic. The Zapf Book, Chancery and International fonts are under the name Zabriskie on the SoftMaker MegaFont XXL CD, 2002.
    • Brush Borders.
    • Comenius Antiqua (1976, Berthold; see C792 Roman on the SoftMaker MegaFont XXL CD, 2002).
    • Crown Roman and Crown Italic (Hallmark).
    • Chancery (officially called ITC Zapf Chancery): Bold, Demi, Italic, Light, Liht Italic, Mediu Italic, Roman.
    • Civilité (Duensing). Mac McGrew on the Zapf Civilité: Zapf Civilite is perhaps the latest typeface to be cut as metal type, having been announced in January 1985, although the designer, Hermann Zapf, had made sketches for such a typeface as early as 1940, with further sketches in 1971. But matrices were not cut until 1983 and 1984. The cutting was done by Paul Hayden Duensing in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The first Civilité typeface was cut by Robert Granjon in 1557, based on a popular French handwriting style of the time. Other interpretations have been made from time to time, notably the Civilité (q.v.) designed by Morris Benton in 1922 for ATF. The new Zapf design has the same general character but with a more informal and contemporary feeling. A smooth flow between weights of strokes replaces the stark contrast of thick-and-thin in older interpretations. There are several ligatures, and alternate versions of a number of characters, including several terminals. Only the 24-point Didot size is cut or planned.
    • Charlemagne (Hallmark).
    • Digiset Vario (1982, Hell): a signage face.
    • Edison (Hell), Edison Cyrillic. Scans: Bold Condensed, Book, Semibold Italic, Semibold, Book Italic.
    • Euler (American Mathematical Society). Zapf was also consultant for Don Knuth on his Computer Modern fonts. In 1983, Zapf, Knuth and graduate students in Knuth's and Charles Bigelow's Digital Typography program at Stanford University including students Dan Mills, Carol Twombly, David Siegel, and Knuth's computer science Ph.D. students Scott Kim and John Hobby, completed the calligraphic typeface family AMS Euler for the American Mathematical Society (+Fraktur, Math Symbols, +script). Taco Hoekwater, Hans Hagen, and Khaled Hosny set out to create an OpenType MATH-enabled font Neo-Euler (2009-2010), by combining the existing Euler math fonts with new glyphs from Hermann Zapf (designed in the period 2005-2008). The result is here. The Euler digital font production was eventually finished by Siegel as his M.S. thesis project in 1985.
    • Firenze (Hallmark).
    • Festliche Ziffern (transl: party numbers).
    • Frederika Greek.
    • Gilgengart Fraktur (1938, D. Stempel). Some put the dates as 1940-1949. It was released by Stempel in 1952. Revivals include RMU Gilgengart (2020, Ralph M. Unger), and Gilgengart by Gerhard Henzel.
    • Heraklit Greek (1954). A digital revival was first done by George Matthiopoulos, GFS Heraklit. Later improvements followed by Antonis Tsolomitis and finally in 2020 by Daniel Benjamin Miller.
    • Hunt Roman (1961-1962, Pittsburgh). A display typeface exclusively designed for the Hunt Botanical Library (Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation since 1971), situated on campus of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, to accompany their text typeface Spectrum. Review by Ferdinand Ulrich.
    • International (ITC, 1977). Samples: Demi, Demi Italic, Heavy, Heavy Italic, Light, Light Italic, Medium, Medium Italic.
    • Janson (Linotype).
    • Jeannette Script (Hallmark).
    • Kompakt (1954, D. Stempel).
    • Kalenderzeichen (transl: calendar symbols).
    • Kuenstler Linien (transl: artistic lines).
    • Linotype Mergenthaler.
    • Melior (1952, D. Stempel; see Melmac on the SoftMaker MegaFont XXL CD, 2002). Samples: Bold, Bold Italic, Italic, Roman.
    • Michelangelo (1950, D. Stempel, a roman caps face; a digital version exists at Berthold and at The Font Company).
    • Marconi (1975-1976, Hell; now also available at Elsner&Flake and Linotype; according to Gerard Unger, this was the first digital type ever designed---the original 1973 design was intended for Hell's Digiset system; Marconi is a highly readable text face).
    • Medici Script (1971).
    • Musica (Musiknoten, transl: music symbols; C.E. Roder, Leipzig).
    • Magnus Sans-serif (Linotype, 1960).
    • Missouri (Hallmark).
    • Novalis.
    • Noris Script (1976; a digital version exists at Linotype).
    • Optima (1955-1958, D. Stempel--Optima was originally called Neu Antiqua), Optima Greek, Optima Nova (2002, with Akira Kobayashi at Linotype, a new version of Optima that includes 40 weights, half of them italic). Samples: Poster by Latice Washington, Optima, Demibold Italic, Black, Bold, Bold Italic, Demibold, Extra Black, Italic, Medium, Medium Italic, Regular, Italic. Digital clones: Zapf Humanist 601 by Bitstream, O801 Flare on the SoftMaker MegaFont XXL CD (2002), Opus by Softmaker, Columbia Serial by Softmaker, Mg Open Cosmetica, Ottawa by Corel, October by Scangraphic, CG Omega by Agfa compugraphic, Chelmsford by URW, Classico by URW and Optus by URW.
    • Orion (1974).
    • Palatino (1948, D. Stempel; the original font can still be found as Palazzo on Softmaker's XXL CD, 2002), Palatino Nova (2005, Linotype), Palatino Sans (2006, Linotype, with Akira Kobayashi), Palatino Greek, Palatino Cyrillic. Palatino was designed in conjunction with August Rosenberger, In 2013, Linotype released Palatino eText which has a larger x-height and wider spacing. Palatino samples: black, black italic, bold, bold italic, italic, medium, roman, light, light italic. Poster by M. Tuna Kahya (2012). Poster by Elena Shkarupa. Poster by Wayne YMH (2012). Zapf was particularly upset about the Palatino clone, Monotype Book Antiqua. Consequently, in 1993, Zapf resigned from ATypI over what he viewed as its hypocritical attitude toward unauthorized copying by prominent ATypI members.
    • Phidias Greek.
    • Primavera Schmuck.
    • Pan Nigerian.
    • Quartz (Zerox Corporation Rochester, NY).
    • Renaissance Antiqua (1985, Scangraphic). Samples: Regular, Bold, Book, Light Italic, Swashed Book Italic, Swash Italic.
    • Saphir (1953, D. Stempel, see now at Linotype).
    • Sistina (1951, D. Stempel).
    • Scriptura, Stratford (Hallmark).
    • Sequoya (for the Cherokee Indians), ca. 1970. This was cut by Walter Hamady and is a Walbaum derivative.
    • Linotype Trajanus Cyrillic (1957).
    • Textura (Hallmark).
    • URW Grotesk (1985, 59 styles), URW Antiqua, URW Palladio (1990).
    • Hallmark Uncial (Hallmark).
    • Virtuosa Script (1952, D. Stempel). Zapf's first script face. Revived in 2009 as Virtuosa Classic in cooperation with Akira Kobayashi.
    • Venture Script (Linotype, 1966; FontShop says 1969).
    • Winchester (Hallmark).
    • World Book Modern.
    • ITC Zapf Dingbats [see this poster by Jessica Rauch], Zapf Essentials (2002, 372 characters in six fonts: Communication, Arrows (One and Two), Markers, Ornaments, Office, based on drawings of Zapf in 1977 for Zapf Dingbats).
    • Zapfino (Linotype, 1998, winner of the 1999 Type Directors Club award), released on the occasion of his 80th birthday. This is a set of digital calligraphic fonts. Zapfino Four, Zapfino Three, Zapfino Two, Zapfino One, ligatures, Zapfino Ornaments (with plenty of fists). Poster by Nayla Masood (2013).

    Books and references about him include:

    Pictures of Hermann Zapf: with Lefty, with Rick Cusick, in 2003, with Frank Jonen, with Jill Bell, with Linnea Lundquist and Marsha Brady, with Rick Cusick, with Rick Cusick, with Stauffacher, a toast, with Werner Schneider and Henk Gianotten, with Chris Steinhour, at his 60th birthday party. Pictures of his 80th birthday party at Linotype [dead link].

    Linotype link. Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

  • Hibernia Type
    [Christopher Burke]

    Christopher Burke (b. 1967) is a British type designer, typeface designer and type historian. He worked at Monotype Typography in the UK, before studying for a PhD in Typography&Graphic Communication at the University of Reading, England, where he planned and directed the MA in typeface design from 1996 until 2001.

    Hibernia Type is run by Christopher Burke. The oeuvre of Burke contains typefaces that blend in the background---legible, book types, magazine types that want to go unnoticed:

    • The text typeface FF Celeste (FontFont, 1994-1995) and FF Celeste Sans (1994-2004).
    • His humanist sans serif text typeface Pragma ND (1992-1995) is available from Neufville.
    • In 2002, he finished the angular text typeface FF Parable.

    Author of Gerard Unger Life in Letters (2021, De Buitenkant) and Paul Renner: The Art of Typography, Hyphen Press, 1999 (U&LC review). His essay Jan Tschichold&Sabon, written in the specimen book Linotype Sabon Next (Linotype, 2002), is is a must for anyone wishing to understand Tschichold. In 2013, Christopher Burke, Eric Kindel and Sue Walker co-edited the wonderfully informative book Isotype Design and Contexts 1925-1971 (Hyphen Press), which includes a full discussion of Otto Neurath's work.

    FontFont bio. FontShop link. MyFonts listing. Chris lived (still lives?) in Barcelona.

    Klingspor link.

    View Christopher Burke's typefaces. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Hildegard Korger

    Calligrapher (b. 1935, Reichenberg, d. 2018) and professor of calligraphy and writing at HGB Leipzig (Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst Leipzig) since 1968. Her typefaces:

    Author of Handbook of Type and Lettering (1992, Design Press, or Lund Humphries), a translation of The Sixth Edition of Schrift und Schreiben (Fachbuchverlag GmbH Leipzig, 1971), which has been lauded as the best books ever on type and typography. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Hiroshi Komiyama

    Hiroshi Komiyama is a representative of Japan's Sato Typography Design Institute, type design adviser to DynaComware Corp. in Taiwan and Samsung Electronics and a special reviewer of Tokyo TDC's Type Design Department. He studied type design under Sato Kenosuke, Komiyama is a recognized authority in Japanese type design and Japanese typographical history. He has designed several fonts including the Heisei Mincho font, and Ryobi's phototypesetting font. His publications include The Basics of Type Design (2010), The History of Movable-Type Printing (2009), The Open Type Version of Japanese Movable Type Collection (2007), and Chronicles of Book and Movable-Type Printing (2000). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Histoire de la typographie

    French books on the history of typography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    H.M. Lambert

    Author of Introduction to the Devanagari script (London: Oxford University Press, 1953). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Honoré de Balzac
    [Imprimerie H. Balzac]

    [More]  ⦿

    Horacio Gorodischer

    Argentinian typography expert. In 2020, he co-authored Legibilidad y tipografia: la composicion de los textos (Campgrafic, Spain) with José Scaglione. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Howard B. Jeremy

    Author of A Guide to Lettering (1947). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    H.R. Plomer

    Author of English Printers' Ornaments, 1924, Burt Franklin, New York. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès

    Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès, was born in Beirut in 1965. Author of Arabic Typography A Comprehensive Sourcebook (Saqi Books, London, 2001), Experimental Arabic Type (Saatchi&Saatchi, Dubai, 2002), Typographic Matchmaking (BIS Publishers, Amsterdam 2007), Arabic Type Specimen Book (2008), Typographic Matchmaking in the City (2010) and Arabic Type Design for Beginners (2013), and a number of articles on multilingual communication in the Middle East such as Arabic Type: a challenge for the 2nd millennium (1998). She holds degrees in graphic design from Yale University School of Art and Rhode Island School of Design, and specializes in bilingual typographic research and design. She has worked as a designer for a number of years, in the USA, Amsterdam, France and Beirut. She has taught typography and graphic design at the American University of Beirut. She was the Chair of the Visual Communication Department for three years at the American University in Dubai and founded the Khatt Foundation, Center for Arabic Typography in Amsterdam. She curates exhibitions, organizes collaborative design research projects between Europe and the Middle East, and is editor of the Khatt Foundation online network of Arab/Middle Eastern designers (www.khtt.net). She is currently pursuing a PhD at Leiden University while working between Europe and the Middle East as a typography and design consultant on projects of cultural relevance. She has art directed and collaborated on the design of several contemporary Arabic fonts for magazines like Aleph (London) and companies in the Gulf. Typefaces include Alef Caps (2008), done with Pascal Zoghbi. KHTT link. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Huda Smitshuijzen AbiFarès
    [Typographic Matchmaking]

    [More]  ⦿

    H.W. Caslon&Co Ltd
    [Justin Howes]

    H.W. Caslon&Co Ltd was Justin Howes' foundry based in Rushden, UK, with one product, Founders Caslon, in several optical ranges: 1776, Text and Display are the main subfamilies (PC and Mac, truetype, type 1 and opentype). Justin Howes' Lino page.

    Justin (b. Solihull, 1963; d. London, 2005) was director of the Type Museum until 2005, when he moved to the Plantin-Moretus Museum, and then to Reading for postgraduate work. He published "Johnston's Underground Type" for the London Transport Museum in 2000. Justin was a typographer as well as a printing historian. He was responsible for designing many books. He was chair of the Friends of St. Bride from 1998-2003. He died in February 2005 at age 42. Obituary. Quote by Nick Shinn: "Founders Caslon is a trompe l'oeil masterpiece, a carefully crafted amalgam of subtle judgements as to what will best mimic the desired patina of 18th century typography." Obituary at St. Bride. Old URL (now occupied by squatters). [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    H.W. Kibbe

    Author of Kibbe's Alphabets (1900), which shows all caps decorative alphabets he drew between 1885 and 1890. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Hyphen Press

    Books on type. See also here. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    I Love Typography
    [John D. Boardley]

    Type information site and blog run since 2007 by graphic designer and web developer John D. Boardley from Kagawa, Japan. Now based in the UK, I Love Typography became a font vendor in 2020 under a junta that comprises John Boardley, Nadine Chahine and Julia Hines. Glossary. Examples of inspiring use of display/poster type.

    John Boardley is the author of Typographic Firsts (2019, Bodleian Library, University of Oxford). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Iampeth

    Free copies in PDF format of many rare books on calligraphy and penmanship, typically from the 19th century:
    Ames' Guide to Self-Instruction in Practical and Artistic Penmanship, Daniel T. Ames, Author and Publisher, 1884
    Ames - The Daniel T. Ames Notebook, A wonderful collection of penmanship from the early 1860s from one of America's preeminent penmen and teachers
    Arm Movement Method of Rapid Writing, The, Charles Paxton Zaner, 1904
    Art of Penmanship, Eleazer Huntington, 1821
    Art of Writing, The, John Jenkins, 1813
    Bible Pearls of Promise, Real Pen-Work Publishing, 1867
    The Blue Book, Compiled by L.E. Stacy, 1907  Text-converted PDF
    C.C. Canan Collection of Penmanship - The Canan Book, Canan/Zanerian College, 1921, Copyright by Zaner-Bloser, Inc.
    Champion Method of Practical Business Writing, Mary L. Champion
    Clinton Clark Scrapbook, Clinton H. Clark: Part One, Part Two, Part Three.
    Compendium of Spencerian or Semi-Angular Penmanship, Platt Rogers Spencer, Sr., 1866
    Complete Compendium of Plain Practical Penmanship, Lloyd M. Kelchner, 1901
    Francis B. Courtney Scrapbook, F.B. Courtney, courtesy of Bob Hurford
    Gaskell's Compendium of Forms (the section on writing), G.A. Gaskell, 1883
    Gems of Flourishing, Charles Paxton Zaner, 1888
    Gems of Penmanship, John S. Duncun, 1858
    Gems of Penmanship, J.D. Williams and S.S. Packard, 1867
    How To Become A Good Penman, An advertising packet by F.W. Tamblyn
    IAMPETH Scrapbooks, A remarkable collection of Golden Age penmanship: Scrapbook 1, Scrapbook 2.
    L'écriture Américaine par D'Avignon - "American Writing" by D'Avignon, circa 1840
    Lessons in Advanced Engraver's Script, penned by Louis Madarasz, published by C.W. Jones
    Lessons in Engraver's Script, C.W. Jones, editor, 1914
    Lessons in Ornamental Penmanship, C.P. Zaner, 1920
    Lessons in Ornamental Penmanship, P.Z. Bloser (Copies by E.A. Lupfer), 1948
    Lessons in Practical Penmanship , H.P. Behrensmeyer
    Madarasz Book, - The Secret of the Skill of Madarasz, Madarasz/Zanerian College, 1911, Copyright © by Zaner-Bloser, Inc.
    Metodo Palmer de Caligrafia Comercial, A.N. Palmer Company, 1949.  Donated by Mauricio Aguilar.  Please visit his website www.VintagePen.net
    Modern Business Penmanship, Edward C. Mills, 1903
    Muster Alphabete, circa 1885
    New Spencerian Compendium, Spencerian Authors, 1879
    New Standard Practical Penmanship, Spencer Brothers, 1881
    New Zanerian Alphabets, C.P. Zaner, 1900
    Ninety-five Lessons in Ornamental Penmanship, C.W. Jones, editor, 1914
    Noyes's Penmanship, Enoch Noyes, 1839
    Oberlin Business College - Compendium of Penmanship, C.A. Barnett, J.T. Henderson and J.N. Yocom, 1901
    Palmer Method of Business Writing, A.N. Palmer Company, 1935
    Palmer's Penmanship Budget, A.N. Palmer, 1919
    Penmanship Made Easy, George Comer & Oliver Linton, 1864. See also here.
    Penman's Leisure Hour, McDonald Business Academy, penwork by F.F. Wildish, 1894
    Portfolio of Ornate Penmanship, The A.N. Palmer Company
    Practical Penmanship Being A Development of the Carstairian System, Benjamin Franklin Foster, 1830
    Real Pen Work - Self Instructor in Penmanship, Knowles and Maxim, publisher, 1881
    Real Pen Work Compendium of Penmanship, Ivison, Blakeman, Taylor and Co., publisher, 1880
    Recueil Méthodique de Principes d' Ecriture "A Methodical Collection of Principles of Writing", P. Meyrat, circa 1920's
    Spencerian Script and Ornamental Penmanship, Volume I, Chapters 1,2 and 8, Michael R. Sull, 1989.  .
    Steel Pen Trade 1930-1980, A.A.S. Charles, 1983.  .
    Studies in Pen Art, W.E. Dennis, 1914
    Sykes's Manual of Penmanship, Sykes, circa 1885
    Theory of Spencerian Penmanship, Spencer Authors, 1874
    19th Century Swedish Copybook, dated December 9, 1858 and penned by Carl Damm, a tutor, this copybook contains 12 pages of handwritten forms of Copperplate/Engraver's Script. Contributed by Evan Lindquist.
    [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Idea mag

    Great Japanese design magazine, possibly the best design mag out there today, often featuring articles on typography. It published Typography Today, a book edited by Helmut Schmid that introduces selections from 88 designers. It traces the course of modern typography from Lissitzky, Tschichold, Zwart, Emil Ruder, Karl Gerstner, Herb Lubalin, to Wolfgang Weingart, Wim Crouwel and Kohei Sugiura. The new edition includes art by Neville Brody, April Greiman and Ahn Sang-Soo. See also IDEA NO. 305: Type Design Today (2004), which has articles by

    • Robin Kinross: "Some features of the font explosion"
    • Jean-François Porchez: "Type design that changed the outlook of Paris"
    • Fred Smeijers: "From punchcutting to digital type design"
    • Akira Kobayashi: "Originality and Redesign of Typeface"
    • André Baldinger: "Succeeding experimental typefaces"
    • LettError: "Twin Cities - Typeface represent a city"
    • François Rappo: "Didot Elder - Radical revival of Historical Typefaces"
    • Matthew Carter: "Yale University Typeface Project"
    [Google] [More]  ⦿

    ILAB--LILA

    Searchable sire of 2000 antique book sellers over the world. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Ilene Strivzer
    [The Type Studio]

    [More]  ⦿

    Ilene Strizver

    From Westport, CT, Ilene Strizver is the founder of The Type Studio. She consults on type, designs type and writes about typography and visual communication. She co-designer ITC Vintage (1996) with Holly Goldsmith. She was the Director of Typeface Development for International Typeface Corporation (ITC) where she developed more than 300 text and display typefaces with type designers such as Sumner Stone, Erik Spiekermann, Jill Bell, Jim Parkinson, Tim Donaldson, and Phill Grimshaw. Her essay on spacing and kerning. Essay on rags (ragged lines), orphans (short last lines) and widows. She published "Type Rules! The designer's guide to professional typography". [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Imprimerie H. Balzac
    [Honoré de Balzac]

    Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850), a famous author, got involved in printing in 1826 when he André Barbier (b. 1793), a typesetter, set up a printing and publishing business on the Rue de Marais-Saint-Germain in Paris. At one time, thirty workers were employed at Imprimerie H. Balzac which was funded with 70,000 Francs in borrowed money from Balzac's mother, as well as from his mistress, Laure De Berny. Link. The printing business thrived. In 1827, he bought Laurent's typesetting firm in order to extend his immediate control over all aspects of the printing business. In 1827, he published a specimen book with many Egyptian letter types. Another publication was Specimen des divers caracteres vignettes et ornemens typographiques de la Fonderie de Laurent et De Berny (now republished with a foreword by J. Dreyfus). Earlier that year, he had also bought the famous foundry of Joseph-Gaspard Gillé. See also here. Balzac spent most of his income to access the social circles of his mistress, Duchess d'Abrantès. Barbier left the business in 1828. The Imprimerie went bankrupt that same year. Luckily, Balzac's first mistress, Louise-Antoinette-Laure De Berny (1777-1836), forgave her loan and took over the print shop. As the wife of a high-ranking official in the French royal court and god-child of Queen Marie-Antoinette, Laure De Berny had sufficient financial resources. She entrusted the business to her 19 year-old son, Alexandre De Berny (1809-1881). Balzac left the type and printing business. Laurent&Deberny was born. References include Balzac: A Life (Graham Robb, 1994: New York: W. W. Norton& Company), and an article in Caractère in 1975 entitled Deberny et Peignot: La Belle Époque de la Typographie. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Ina Saltz

    Ina Saltz is an art director, author and professor (of Electronic Design and Multimedia at The City College of New York) whose areas of expertise are typography and magazine design. She is currently serving as the Chair of the Art Department at CCNY. For over 22 years, Ina was an editorial Design Director at Time Magazine's International Editions, Worth, Golf Magazine and others. Ina has authored several books: BODY TYPE: Intimate Messages Etched in Flesh, (Abrams, 2006), BODY TYPE 2: More Typographic Tattoos, (Abrams, 2010), TYPOGRAPHY ESSENTIALS: 100 Design Principles for Working With Type, (Rockport, 2009), and she is co-author of TYPOGRAPHY REFERENCED: A Comprehensive Visual Guide to the Language, History and Practice of Typography, (Rockport, 2012). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Index Book

    Book publisher in Barcelona, which has an active section on typography. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Indie Fonts

    Indie Fonts is a series of two books covering the work of many independent foundries. In 2003, it was followed by Indie2, which includes a number of free fonts. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Indra Kupferschmid

    German type personality (b. 1973, Fulda) who studied visual communication at the Bauhaus University in Weimar. She is involved in type at the Museum für Druckkunst Leipzig and in the DIN committee for type classification. Founder of Kupferschrift, a type expertise firm based in Weimar and Düsseldorf. Alternate URL. She is a professor of Kommunikationsdesign und Typografie and head of the department FB Design at the HBK (Hochschule der Bildenden Künste) Saar. She researches the classification of typefaces, the history of grotesks and legibility.

    She is co-author of Helvetica Forever (Lars Müller Publishers) and Buchstaben kommen selten allein, a typographic reference book.

    Speaker at ATypI 2011 in Reykjavik. Speaker at ATypI 2013 in Amsterdam. At the latter meeting she introduces Type Record, a data base on typefaces run by her and Nick Sherman. Speaker at ATypI 2016 in Warsaw. Speaker at ATypI 2017 Montreal. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Institut de l'Histoire du Livre

    At this French institute in Lyon which forms part of the Musée de l'imprimerie de Lyon, there are occasionally courses on typography. For example, in the Book History Workshop from 5-8 April 2004, James Mosley gave a course on Type, lettering and calligraphy 1450-1830. From 25-28 April 2005, he gave a course there on Typographie et calligraphie 1830-1980. We also find a list of books on typography and calligraphy, covering 1450-1830. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Institute of typography engineering research

    Institute in Cologne where this book was published: Typecosmic digital type collection serif (1994, 798 pages). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Internet Archive

    Free downloads of oldbooks. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Intertype
    [Gilbert Powderly Farrar]

    Defunct foundry. One of its typographic directors was Gilbert Powderly Farrar (1886-1957), who designed Bert Black. Intertype's typefaces include Monterey (1958, Rand Holub, its "version" of Murray Hill; available from Bitstream now), Imperial (designed by Ed Schaar; now a Bitstream font), Intertype Vogue (ca. 1930, see Am Sans by Volker Busse for a free digital version), Stuyvesant (1940, now available from Bitstreeam), and Nuptial Script (now an Adobe font).

    MyFonts writes: Harris inherited the Harris-Intertype library, made up of the typefaces cut by Intertype to compete with Mergenthaler from the First World War. A small group of original typefaces centers on newspaper typefaces and scripts. In the thirties C.H. Griffith at Mergenthaler believed the linecaster to be unsuitable for the development of scripts, which led Ed Schaar at Intertype to claim this market as their own. Intertype became Harris-Intertype ca. 1960, and Harris ca. 1975.

    Cyrillic typefaces in their library, ca. 1930. The firm still exists as Harris Corporations in Melbourne, FL, but is no longer producing fonts.

    Leonard Spencer, in his article Linotype / Intertype Linecasting Machines How They Differ writes: Intertype started as International Typesetting Machine Company in 1911. Many of first machines were rebuilt Linotype bases with improvements patented by the new company. When World War I broke out, International Typesetting Machine Company was reorganized as the Intertype Corporation, and by 1917 had three machines for sale: Model A one magazine, Model B two magazine, Model C three magazine. Intertype was first in cold type with its Fotosetter in 1950. This machine continued the circulating matrix principle but had film image instead of the punched character. Stuart Sandler adds this piece of information: The Harris-Intertype Fotosetter was the first photo typesetting machine invented. It marks the beginning of the Cold Type era and is the machine responsible for it . . . Incidentally this is the machine that inspired the creation of the Filmotype by its inventor Allan Friedman when he saw it unveiled to US audiences in 1948. Instead of lead slugs, the Intertype which was a Linotype machine had replaced them with small film negatives and proceeded to set type as you would imagine the bastardization of a lead type and photo type machine only could. There are many reasons Cold Type caught on and it became the standard some time after that period till digital typesetting machines like the Alphatype came into their own. It wasn't until the release of the first MacIntosh in 1984 when Cold Type was eclipsed by desktop publishing.

    Mac McGrew: Ideal (originally called Ideal News) was designed by Herman R. Freund for Intertype in 1926, for the New York Times. It has much the appearance of Century Schoolbook, but with shorter ascenders and squattier capitals. The italic is a little closer to Century Expanded Italic, providing more contrast with the roman. Sturdy serifs, substantial hairlines, and open loops make it a practical typeface for the demanding production requirements of high-speed newspaper use. Ideal Bold is heavier than the Century bold typefaces.

    View a few digital typefaces with roots in the Intertype collection.

    Another famous type is Cairo. Mac McGrew: Cairo is Intertype's adaptation of Memphis, originally designed by Rudolf Weiss for Stempel in Germany about 1929, and first imported into the United States as Girder. Except for Litho Antique, this was the first of the modern square-serif typefaces, which are revivals of older typefaces known as Egyptians. The Intertype typefaces appeared in 1933 to 1940. Lining Cairo features several sizes of caps on 6- and 12-point bodies in the manner of Copperplate Gothic. Compare Memphis, Stymie, Karnak.

    Farrar is also the author of The Typography of Advertisements That Pay (1917, D. Appleton and Co., New York). Local download. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Irene Korol Scala

    Irene Scala is a fellow typophile and graduate of The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, where she had the opportunity to study with educators such as Paul Rand, Lou Dorfsman, and Milton Glaser. After earning a B.F.A. from the Cooper Union, she went on to postgraduate study at The Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem. She now lives in New York City, where she is associated with Designing with Type: Designingwithtype.com is a web site devoted to the art and appreciation of typography. It offers a unique typographic resource for students, educators, and professionals, showcasing talent from around the world. Originally created by James Craig as a supplement to his popular textbook Designing with Type specifically for his Cooper Union students, it has grown to include contributions presented by fellow educators and designers to embrace a wider audience.

    In 2006, James Craig and Irene Korol Scala published the blockbuster book Designing with Type, 5th Edition: The Essential Guide to Typography (published by Watson-Guptill).

    Designer of a wonderful logotype entitled Cognac One (2012). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Irma Puskarevic

    Irma Puskarevic is a graphic designer and teaching assistant. She took her Master's and Doctoral degrees from the University of Novi Sad, Faculty of Technical Sciences, Department of Graphic Engineering and Design. She is currently a teaching assistant at the Department of Graphic Engineering and Design. Her academic research covers the effectiveness of typography and visual rhetoric in advertising images. She is a coauthor of Typeface and Typography Practicum. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Isabel Naegele

    Professor of Typography at the University of Mainz, Germany. Coauthor of Neue Schriften / New typefaces (2014, Niggli), which contains a type exhibition held in 2013 at the Gutenberg Museum in Mainz, Germany. It also has interviews with 25 type designers. In 2016, Petra Eisele, Annette Ludwig and Isabel Naegele published Futura: Die Schrift (in German). The English version Futura: The Typeface (Laurence King) followed in 2017. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Issuu

    A place where one can share publications. There is a subgroup on typography---no direct limk though. First click on design, then graphic arts, and then typography. The design and navigation is painful, as is the way books are shown. Downloads are nearly impossible. In short, the design of this design site gets an F. But there are some interesting publications there. Subgroups: Fonts (which has the FontFont 2009 catalog), Muestras tipograficas (which has about 60 specimen booklets), MICA (Comps of Form/Counterform and Type Specimen books for Tony Rutka's Typography 1 class at MICA, Spring 2010). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    italic 1.0
    [Silvia Sfligiotti]

    "Italic 1.0 Il disegno di caratteri contemporaneo in Italia Contemporary Type Design in Italy" is an English-Italian book edited by Paola Lenarduzzi, Mario Piazza and Silvia Sfligiotti and published by AIAP in 2002. It summarizes the state of typography in Italy in 2002. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Italic 2.0

    Italic 2.0 is an Italian blog and type project, very central to all that is happening on the type scene in Italy. There is also a book by the same title, dated 2008, edited by Marta Bernstein, Luciano Perondi, and Silvia Sfligiotti, with articles by Giovanni Lussu, James Clough, Antonio Cavedoni, Marta Bernstein, Luciano Perondi, Giangiorgio Fuga, and Silvia Sfligiotti. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Ivan Vartarian

    Author of Typo-Graphics: The Art and Science of Type Design in Context (2003, RotoVision). In this collective work, we find these typefaces: Surface, Bionic Systems, Lorem Ipsum, Offica Ludi, Fidel Castro/LOMO, Buro Destruct, Norm, Electrosmog, Emigre/Rudy VanderLans, Zuzana Licko, Test Pilot Collective, Kyle Cooper, Tycoon Graphics, Power Graphixx, Graph, Dainippon Type Organization, Cyclone Graphics, and Superlow/Function. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    J. Ben Lieberman

    Author of Type and Typefaces: A Treasury of Typography Book (New Rochelle: The Myriade Press, 1978), Types of Typefaces (New York Sterling Publishing Co, 1967) and Type and Typefaces and how to recognize them (New York Sterling Publishing Co, 1968). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    J. de Haan

    Dutch architect in Amsterdam who edited the lettering model book Alphabet: letters van allerlei vorm (1895-1898), which, according to Mathieu Lommen, is the prettiest and most ambitious model book ever published in The Netherlands. The text has lettering examples from many contributors, such as Jan Boerma, C.L. Stal, and J.B. Heukelom (1875-1965). Heukelom's contributions include Sierletters (Dutch art nouveau style) and Perspectiefletters.

    Reference: Nederlandse belettering negentiende-eeuwse modelboeken (2015, Mathieu Lommen, de Buitenkant, Amsterdam). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    J. Eric S. Thompson

    Author of A Catalog of Maya Hieroglyphs (1962, University of Oklahoma Press). It is a catalogue of most of the glyphs known up to the time of its publication. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jacek Mrowczyk

    Polish designer of Danova (2011). He wrote Niewielkiego slownika typograficznego, and edits the 2plus3d magazine. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jack Curry

    New York City-based type and brand designer, who has a BFA (2008-2011) from California State University at Long Beach, and used to work in Los Angeles. He studied typeface design at The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art in 2011.

    Author of articles Typodarium 2012 (Verlag Hermann Schmidt Mainz, August 2011), The 3D Type Book (Laurence King Publishing, June 2011), and Typography 31 / TDC 2010 Annual (Collins Design, Dec. 2010). He published Foundation: Process and Reflection (2011, The Cooper Union).

    His typefaces:

    • Foundation Grotesque (2011-2012). Developed at The Cooper Union, it is vaguely based on an early 20th century typeface by Linotype called Philadelphia Gothic.
    • Dash (2010). A free octagonal typeface.

    His blog. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jack W. Stauffacher

    Jack Stauffacher (b. 1920 or 1921, d. 2017, Tiburon) was a master printer who worked with metal and wood type and printed everything from business cards and tickets to fine art books and museum monographs. Jack was at Carnegie Tech (now Carnegie Mellon) during the early 1960's. He started the Laboratory Press and taught the creative possibilities of letterpress. He left there about 1964. Later he ran the Greenwood Press in San Francisco, and lived in Tiburon.

    Robert Harlan describes Jack Stauffacher's involvement in Sumner Stone's "Cycles" font.

    John Berry on Jack Stauffacher and his use of large wooden letters in illustrations. Jack wrote a lot about typography, e.g., Janson, a Definitive Collection (The Greenwood Press, 1954), Hunt Roman: the birth of a type, (1965), and Inscriptions at the Old Public Library of San Francisco (2003, edited by Jack).

    Hunt Roman is a type designed by Hermann Zapf in the early sixties in collaboration with Jack Stauffacher. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jacob I. Biegeleisen

    Instructor at the New York School of Industrial Art. Coauthor with Dan X. Solo of Classic Type Faces And How To Use Them: Including 91 Complete Fonts (reprinted in 1995 by Dover Press), a book which includes 91 typefaces. He also wrote The ABC of Lettering (5th edition in 1940; reprint, New York: Harper & Row, 1976). The book of 100 type typeface alphabets A guide to better lettering (1965, The Signs of the Times Publ. Co., Cincinnati, OH), Art Directors' Book of Type Faces (1973), and Poster Design (1945 or 1946, Greenberg Publisher, New York). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jacqueline Svaren

    Author of Written Letters 22 Alphabets for Calligraphers (1975, The Bond Wheelwright Company, Freeport, ME). Scans of some poages by Gordo. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jacques André
    [Bibliothèque virtuelle de livres de typographie]

    [More]  ⦿

    Jacques André

    French type professor (b. 1938) who designed some experimental fonts such as Delorme (1989). Jacques André has been working in the field of structured documents and digital typography since 1980. He was the leader of the European Didot Project concerned with the digitization of types. He is Research Director at INRIA (the French National Institute on Computer Science) in Rennes, and his work covers the digitization of ancient books and the encoding of their fonts and glyphes.

    Author of Histoire de l'écriture typographique: Le XIXe siècle français (2013, with Christian Laucou). From the blurb: Pour montrer toute la richesse de cette période, les auteurs ont choisi d'en raconter les aventures successives: les Anglais avec l'invention des caractères gras, des égyptiennes et des sans-sérifs; la fonderie GillÃé qui devient celle de Balzac puis de De Berny et qui rejoindra, à l'aube du XXe siècle, celle des Peignot; la saga des Didot, de la rigueur de Firmin à l'extravagance de Jules; l'Imprimerie royale, puis impériale ou nationale, ses caractères orientaux et ceux de labeur, qui perdureront tant qu'il y aura du plomb; Louis Perrin, qui réinvente les elzévirs; les grandes fonderies françaises, qui rivalisent d'invention et de copies, et, enfin, les évolutions techniques de tout le siècle. The book also contains chapters by Alan Marshall, Alice Savoie and Matthieu Cortat.

    Author of Caractères numériques: introduction, in: Cahiers GUTenberg, 1997, pp. 5-44. Author of Histoire de l'écriture typographique---Le XXe siècle, (Atelier Perrousseaux, Gap, France, 2016). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jacques André
    [BiViTy: Bibliothèque virtuelle de typographie]

    [More]  ⦿

    James Clough

    James Clough (b. 1947, London) studied typographic design at the London College of Printing. In 1971 he moved to Milan to work as a designer, typographer and calligrapher. Since 1990, he has been teaching the theory and history of typography and visual communication at various institutions including the Milan Polytechnic University (since 2002) and the ISIA of Urbino. He lectures on many aspects of calligraphy, type design and the history of typography in Italy, Britain and Switzerland. Recent essays of his research for English and Italian publications include a study of the various editions of the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili (first printed by Aldus Manutius in 1499), types used by the earliest printers in Milan and Venice, the 20th century revivals of Bodoni's types and a study of historical and contemporary script types. In 2005 he curated the Mondovì Museum of Printing. He is on the scientific board of Bibliologia, and wrote the introduction to volume 2 in 2007.

    James Clough co-founded the ACI (Associazione Calligrafica Italiana). He is a member of the Nebiolo History Project, and has been CAST's editor and adviser since its inception in 2013.

    In 2015, James Clough and Chiara Scattolin coauthored Alphabets of Wood: Luigi Melchiori & the history of Italian wood type (Tipoteca Italiana, Cornuda, Italy). David Wolske writes: Alphabets of Wood is the most recent and arguably the most beautiful addition to the new wave of wood type scholarship. It is also important because it is the first publication to seriously examine the historical and cultural significance of Italian wood type manufacturers. In the first part of the book, James Clough calligrapher, writer provides a broad historical overview of wood block printing, from fourteenth- and fifteenth-century hand carved imagery and text through the nineteenth-century American origins of moveable wooden type. In Chapter 6 Clough introduces us to Luigi Melchiori, a skilled designer and manufacturer of wood type, active during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in the Veneto Region of Italy. Through beautifully paced layouts, sumptuous photography, and a richly textured typographic palette, Melchiori's life, work, and legacy are situated in the context of other Italian wood type manufacturers. In the second part of Alphabets of Wood, Chiara Scattolin digs deep into the archive of wood type fonts, specimen books, tools, and documents held by Tipoteca Italiana. Detailed testimonies from peers help to humanize "the Bodoni of wood type," making it easy for contemporary typographers, graphic designers, letterpress printers, and artists to recognize themselves in the pride and craftsmanship Melchiori brought to his work. Every chapter of the book is illustrated with stunningly handsome antique wood type specimens. Two eight-page letterpress inserts on a toothy, soft-white paper stock provide an arrestingly modern counterpoint. The Stamperia of Tipoteca Italiana printed all sixteen frame-worthy pages using original wood type from Tipoteca's Wood Type Archive. Typographically the book echoes the best of Italian design, finding a harmonious balance between industrial sharpness and sensuous fluidity.

    He also wrote Signs of Italy (2015, Lazy Dog Press). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    James Craig
    [Designing with Type]

    [More]  ⦿

    James Eckmann

    Type historian who wrote in Printing and Graphic Arts between 1957 and 1961 on "The Keystone Type Foundry, 1888-1917", "The Chicago Type Foundry of Marder, Luse&Company 1863-1892", "Chicago Type Foundry Specimen Books", "The Inland Type Foundry, 1894-1911" and "The Great Western Type Foundry of Barnhart Brothers&Spindler, 1869-1933". [Google] [More]  ⦿

    James Moran

    Author of Stanley Morison's biography: Stanley Morison. His typographic achievement (London, 1971). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    James Mosley

    James Mosley (born 1935) is a retired librarian and historian who specialized in the history of printing and type design. From 1958 until 1999, Mosley was librarian of St Bride Printing Library, London. He was lecturer and professor in the Department of Typography and Graphic Communication at the University of Reading, UK, 1964-present. He was a founding member of the Printing Historical Society and the first editor of its Journal. He is currently a faculty member in the Rare Book School, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, and in the Ecole de l'Institut d'histoire du livre, Lyon. He is a Senior Research Fellow in the Institute of English Studies, University of London. A specialist of type history from 1400 until today, he has written many articles, including "Les caractères de l'Imprimerie Royale" in "Le romain du roi: la typographie au service de l'état, 1702-2002" (2002, Lyon: Musée de l'Imprimerie). Among his recent writings are studies of the Italian 16th-century calligrapher Giovan Francesco Cresci, the origins in England of the modern sans serif letter, and notes to a facsimile edition of the Manuel typographique (1746) of Fournier le jeune. Speaker at ATypI 2007 in Brighton. He has a blog. At ATypI 2010 in Dublin, he spoke about the types of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    James Moyes

    London-based printer. Author of Specimens of the types commonly used in the Temple printing office, Bouverie Street; with Their Names and the Names of the Founders: Also, Specimens of Wood Engravings (1826, the Temple Printing Office, London, Bouverie Street). Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    James Ronaldson
    [Binny&Ronaldson]

    [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    James Shimada
    [The Font Wars]

    [More]  ⦿

    James T. Edmondson
    [Oh No Type]

    [More]  ⦿

    James Walker Puckett
    [Dunwich Type Founders]

    [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Jan Hendrik Scholte

    Dutch author, b. 1874, who edited Die Hochdeutschen Schriften aus dem 15ten bis zum 19ten Jahrhundert der Schriftgiesserei und Druckerei (1919, Enschedé en Zonen, Haarlem), a publication which has four articles:

    • Gustav Mori: Christian Egenolff, der erste ständige Buchdrucker in Frankfurt a/M
    • Christian Münden: Von den ersten Franckfurter Bruchdruckern
    • Gustav Mori: Geschichte und Entwicklung des Schriftgiesserei-Gewerbes in Frankfurt a/M
    • Charles Enschedé: Die Druckerei der Elsevier und ihre Bezichung zu der Lutherschen Schriftgiesserei
    This book is mainly about the development and history of blackletter types. Open Library link. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jan Hendrik Weber

    Hendrik Weber or Jan Hendrik Weber. Graduate of the University of Applied Sciences in Potsdam (in graphic design) and Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst in Leipzig (in type design).

    He designed commercial typefaces published at Our Type. Later he joined Monotype to advise clients on bespoke type and develop new markets in branding. In 2016, he became type director at Monotype Germany. After that, he joined Fred Smeijers' Type By. His typefaces:

    • The Lirico family at (2008, Ourtype, and later Type By). This text family is slightly organic, flirts with hairline connectors, and is characterized by triangular serifs. Lirico won an award at TDC2 2009.
    • Edward and Edward Plus (2008, Ourtype, and later Type By): Edward is named in honour of Edward Johnston, calligrapher, teacher, and author of Writing & Illuminating, & Lettering (1906). [...] The inspiration behind Edward will be immediately recognizable: the 'blockletter' Johnston designed for the London Underground in 1916, for use in their signs and posters.
    • The free typeface Northstream Wind (2016, Monotype).
    • Weber's custom design for Bentley Motors nailed him the Red Dot Award in 2014.
    • The crisp branding sans typeface family Unitext (2018, Monotype).
    • He was part of a team at Monotype that developed Helvetica Now in 2019 at Monotype, together with Charles Nix and others. Monotype writes: Every single glyph of Helvetica has been redrawn and redesigned for this expansive new edition which preserves the typeface's Swiss mantra of clarity, simplicity and neutrality, while updating it for the demands of contemporary design and branding. Helvetica Now comprises 48 fonts, consisting of three distinct optical sizes: Micro, Text and Display. In 2021, he took part in the development of Helvetica Now Variable (Monotype). Helvetica Now Variable was designed by Max Miedinger, Charles Nix, Monotype Studio, Friedrich Althausen, Malou Verlomme, Jan Hendrik Weber and Emilios Theofanous and published by Monotype. Monotype writes: Helvetica Now Variable gives you over a million new Helvetica styles in one state-of-the-art font file (over two-and-a-half million with italics!). Use it as an extension of the Helvetica Now family or make custom-blends from its weights (Hairline to ExtraBlack), optical sizes (four point to infinity), and new Compressed and Condensed widths. It contains 144 static styles.
    • Corporate typefaces developed as part of the team at brand agency KMS TEAM in Munich: Bentley Motors (this received a Red Dot award in 2014), Canyon Bikes.

    His thesis Kursiv has been published by Niggli Verlag in 2010. In 2020, Niggli published his English language book Italic.

    Klingspor link. Linotype link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Jan Middendorp

    Jan Middendorp, born in the Den Haag, Netherlands, lived in Leiden, Amsterdam and Gent (Belgium) before moving to Berlin in 2005. He died in December 2023. An independent writer, translator and consultant, he taught (taught) at Weissensee Art College in Berlin and the Plantin Institute of Typography in Antwerp. During the past twenty years Jan has edited, written and co-written a number of well-known books on graphic design and typography, including Hey, there goes one of mine! (2002), Dutch Type (2004), Shaping Text (2012), Hand to Type (2012), Type Navigator (2011, with TwoPoints. Net), Creative Characters (2010) and Made with FontFont (2006, with Erik Spiekermann). He had an ongoing collaboration with the Bibliothèque typographique of Ypsilon Editeur in Paris and with MyFonts, where he edited the popular interview newsletter Creative Characters.

    In 2017, he founded Fust & Friends.

    In 2023, received the TDC Medal.

    Dorp Dal link. Fust & Friends bio. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jan Pas

    Author of Mathematische of wiskundige behandeling der schryfkonst. Behelzende een manier om alle de gemeene letteren van het regt- en schuin romeins; curcyf; italiaansch; nederduitsch; en fractuur ... Opgesteld en geteekend (Amsterdam, 1737). This Dutch text contains some pages in French under the section title Demonstration mathematique de l'art d'écrire. The text shows many letter styles drawn entirely with compass and ruler, and is clearly influenced by the romain du roi. Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jan Tschichold

    Born in Leipzig (1902), died in Locarno, Switzerland (1974). Influential German type designer whose typefaces include these:

    • Sabon (1964-1967, for Stempel). The most famous digital version of Sabon is Linotype's Sabon Next. See also Sabon eText Pro (2013, Linotype) and Salieri (2020, a free font by Daniel Benjamin Miller).
    • Transit and Transito (1931). Transito has been remade by Nick Curtis in 2009 as Waddem Choo NF, and by Paulo Heitlinger in 2008 as Transito.
    • Zeus (1931). Pleks Zeus (2008) is a revival of Zeus by Hans Munk.
    • Saskia (1931, Schelter&Giesecke). Revived by Ralph M. Unger in 2016 as Saskia Pro.
    • Uher Standard Grotesque.
    • Between 1926 and 1929, he designed a "universal alphabet" to help with non-phonetic spellings in the German language. For example, he devised new characters to replace "ch" and "sch". Long vowels were indicated by a macron below them. The alphabet was presented in one typeface, which was sans-serif and without capital letters. Leicht und schnell konstruierbare Schrift (1930) is a Bauhaus-style geometric revived in 2008 by Sebastian Nagel as Iwan Reschniev. See also Architype Tschichold by The Foundry.
    Links about him: Textism site. Nicolas Fabian's page on him. Links to his work. Bio at Linotype. Wikipedia site. Publications include:
    • Die neue Typographie (Berlin, 1928). Quote from this book: Type production has gone mad, with its senseless outpouring of new types. Only in degenerate times can personality (opposed to the nameless masses) become the aim of human development,
    • Typographische Gestaltung (Basel 1935).
    • Geschichte der Schrift in Bildern (Basel 1941).
    • Schriftkunde, Schreibübungen und Skizzieren (Basel 1942, Berlin 1952).
    • Schatzkammern der Schreibkunst (Basel 1946).
    • Meisterbuch der Schrift (Ravensburg 1953).
    • Erfreuliche Drucksachen durch gute Typographie (Ravensburg 1960).
    • Willkürfreie Maßverhältnisse der Buchseite und des Satzspiegels (Basel 1962).
    • Ausgewählte Aufsätze über Fragen der Gestalt des Buches und der Typography (Basel 1975).
    • Jan Tschichold, Leben und Werk (Dresden 1977).
    • Jan Tschichold. Schriften 1925-1974 (Berlin 1991).
    • Recommended is this short essay entitled Consistent Correlation Between Book Page and Type Area.
    • The book jan Tschichold. Vormveranderingen van het &-teken. In een hedendaagse context (Amsterdam, De Buitenkant, 1993) has contributions by Petr van Blokland, Peter Borgman, Bram de Does, Dick Dooijes, Paul Groenendaal, Martin Majoor, Karina Meister, Gerrit Noordzij, Helmut Salden and Gerard Unger.
    [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Jan van Krimpen

    Major Dutch typographer and type designer, b. Gouda, 1892, d. Haarlem, 1958. He studied at the Koninklijke Academie van Beeldende Kunsten in Den Haag (1908-1912) and joined Enschedé in 1925. He had a considerable influence on the next generation of type designers. His typefaces include:

    • Cancellaresca Bastarda (1934-1935, Enschedé). 100 Types writes: Cancellaresca Bastarda is a graceful narrow italic with long descenders and ascenders, and a large array of character variations and swashes. The uppercase and lowercase alone ran to 167 characters including ligatures, anticipating large-family calligraphic fonts such as Poetica Chancery by at least 50 years. Jan van Krimpen's types have been called 'austerely beautiful' but are little known outside of his native Holland. The Enschedé Foundry for whom he worked in the mid 20th century still rigidly controls his types, and none of these have been cross licensed, redistributed or pirated. As a result, Cancellaresca Bastarda is one of the rarest typefaces.
    • Haarlemmer (1938). Berry, Johnson and Jaspert write: Designed by Jan van Krimpen, and commissioned in 1938 by the Vereeniging voor Druk- en Boekkunst. This originally private type was intended for an edition of the Staten Bijbel to be printed in small folio format. The type has the qualities of an old face. The serifs on the capitals are thin; on the lower case they are stronger and not quite horizontal. The capitals are wide, especially the M. The g has a large bowl. The italic is slightly inclined and has angular beginning strokes; the g has a calligraphic tail; v and w have cursive forms. Two styles of figures are provided. Now digitized as DTL Haarlemmer and DTL Haarlemmer Sans (1994). Frank E. Blokland published it at Monotype in 1998, and later at his own type foundry, Dutch Type Library. This is a prototype example of a design that is totally destroyed by one glyph, the lower case g in the italics.
    • Lutetia (Enschedé, 1924). Berry, Johnson and Jaspert write: The type shares some of the qualities which we have found in a number of contemporary types, small serifs and unobtrusive capitals. The capitals are wide, note especially E and F. U has the lower-case design. In the lower case the e has an oblique stroke to the eye, the g a large bowl, and the t is very short. The figures are old style. In the italic there is a swash series of capitals with prolonged strokes in A, K, M, N and R. The lower case, very slightly inclined, resembles Blado in the angularity of the begininng strokes, but the serifs on ascenders are flat. The g has a calligraphic form. It is an italic which, again like Blado, will stand on its own. The roman alphabet shown here is the first Lutetia of 1925 designed 1923-1924. With the co-operation of Jan van Krimpen an American printer, Porter Garnett, had it revised in 1928. The present Enschedé Lutetia is of the first form with the exception of the horizontal bar to the e. Monotype Lutetia was adapted by the designer to the Mono-unit system. Lutetia Open was cut about 1930 on the model of handtooled capitals which the designer had been using occasionally. Lutetia was digitally revived as Lutetia Nova Book in 2014 by Ralph M. Unger, and as Lutetia Open by ARTypes in 2007. For her type revival project at KABK, Barbara Bigosinska picked Lutetia (2013) and writes: Lutetia was designed as a commission from Enschedé by Jan van Krimpen. The drawings of the typeface were ready in the middle of 1924 and first cut and cast in 16 point size in the Enschedé Type Foundry. For the first time the typeface was used in the book dedicated to the exhibition that took place in Paris in 1925. Therefore the name Lutetia refers to the Roman name of Paris. Essay by Doyald Young on Van Krimpen and his Lutetia.
    • Open Roman Capitals (or: Open Kapitalen, revived in 2006 by Ari Rafaeli; see also Open Capitals by ARTypes, 2007).
    • Romanée (Enschedé, 1928). For a digital revival, interpretation and extension, we refer to Holger Koenigsdoerfer's Romanée (2017, unpublished).
    • Romulus (Enschedé, 1931 for the Capitals and 1936 for the Open version). Romulus Kapitalen and Romulus Open were revived in 2006 by Ari Rafaeli. See also Romulus Capitals and Romulus Open in 2007 by ARTypes. Now digitized as DTL Romulus (2002).
    • Curwen Initials, done in 1925 for The Curwen Press at Plaistow, London. Digitized by ARTypes as Curwen Initials (2008, Ari Rafaeli).
    • Spectrum (Monotype, 1952--a very beautiful modern type family, legible, and flexible in all situations; part of the Linotype library). MyFonts writes: Spectrum is based on a design by Jan van Krimpen, who worked on his typeface from 1941 to 1943 for use in a Bible of the Spectrum publishing house in Utrecht. The bible project was later cancelled but the typeface was so beautifully formed and universal that the Monotype Corporation in London completed it.
    • Van Dijck.

    Van Krimpen had a difficult character. Lines&Splines wrote this: Alastair Johnston, from an issue of Ampersand, once posed the question, "Do you have to be an asshole to be a good type designer?" Gerard Unger replied to the effect that even to this day, people will look over their shoulders before discussing Van Krimpen. One can almost imagine Van Krimpen waving one of his sharp serifs over his head like a stick, flailing against the difficulties of his everyday relations, his nostrils flared as they were in every portrait taken of him. MyFonts page. CV at Linotype. FontShop link. Some of his work and correspondence can be found at the University of Amsterdam.

    Klingspor link.

    A list of typefaces based on Jan Van Krimpen's work:

    A

    Author of On Designing and Devising Type (1957, New York: the Typophiles, & Heemstede). [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Jan Visser

    Lithographer in Groningen, The Netherlands, who studied at Academie Minerva in Amsterdam. Born in 1856, he taught at two schools, the Quellinusschool and the Teekenschool, and died in 1938. He published the lettering model book Lettervormen voor school en werkplaats, ca. 1885, published the lettering model book Lettervormen voor school en werkplaats, ca. 1885.

    Reference: Nederlandse belettering negentiende-eeuwse modelboeken (2015, Mathieu Lommen, de Buitenkant, Amsterdam). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Janon Co

    Authors of Fine Hand Embroidery (1914, New York). This book contains many embroidered alphabets and monograms. Janon Co had offices in Paris and New York.

    Digital typefaces based on their work include Antoinette Monogrammes (2013, Ryoichi Tsunekawa). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jaro Springer

    Jaro Springer (1856-1915) of the International Chalcographical Society authored the specimen book Gothic Alphabets (1897, printed by the Reichsdruckerei, Berlin), which was also published the same year in German as Gothische Alphabete. This book showcases three ancient anthropomorphic alphabets: a pen-drawn figurine alphabet from ca. 1400 consisting of cowled figures and fabulous beasts and dragons; a figurine alphabet from 1464 engraved on wood in the Netherlands by Master of the Banderoles; and an architectonic alphabet engraved on copper. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jaroslav Andel

    Czech art historian and author of Avant-Garde Page Design 1900-1950 (Delano Greenidge Editions, 2002). This book presents a comprehensive visual lexicon of early 20th-century page design. Illustrations include designs by Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Wassily Kandinsky, Marcel Duchamp, Aleksandr Rodchenko, Lázló Moholy-Nagy, El Lissitzky, and Jan Tschichold. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jason Dewinetz

    Author of Alphabetum Romanum (Greenboathouse Press, Vernon, BC, 2010). This book has an alphabet of Felice feliciano, ca. 1460, asc redrawn by Dewinetz. There is a forword by Paul F. Gehl of Chicago's Newberry Library. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jason Pamental

    Jason Pamental (Rumford, RI) is Senior Director of Design and Technical Strategy at Isovera, where he heads the design and development team, leads workshops, and works with clients establishing their digital strategy. Jason specializes in typography for the web.

    Author of Responsive Typography (O'Reilly). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    J.C. van Lunteren

    Dutch penman and teacher in Den Haag, d. 1848. According to Mathieu Lommen, he was probably the first one to publish a lettering model book in The Netherlands, Alphabet-album: collection de différentes feuilles d'alphabets historiés et fleuronnés (ca. 1846).

    Reference: Nederlandse belettering negentiende-eeuwse modelboeken (2015, Mathieu Lommen, de Buitenkant, Amsterdam). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jérôme Knebusch
    [Poem Editions (or: Atelier Jerome Knebusch)]

    [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Jean de Beauchesne

    Influential French master penman, 1538-1620. Jean de Beauchesne and John Baildon published the first writing manual in England: A Booke containing divers sortes of hands, as well the English as French secrataries with the italic, roman, chancelry&court hands (1570-1571, London: Thomas Vautrollier). In 1580, he published Le Tresor d'escriture, auquel est contenu tout ce qui est requis&necessaire à tous amateurs dudict art. His third book was La Clef de l'escriture laquelle ouvre le chemin à la jeunesse, pour bien apprendre à excrire la vraye lettre françoyse&italique (1595, London: G. Boulengier). He also published Specimens manuscrits anglais dédiés à Mme Elizabeth fille unique du roi de Grande Bretaigne (1610, England).

    Sample of his batarde angloise (1570). Digital typefaces based on his examples include Piacevole (2008, Marc H. Smith). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jean Joseph Marcel

    At one point director of the imprimerie de la république. Author of Alphabet irlandais, précédé d'une notice historique, littéraire, et typographique (Paris, Imprimerie de la République, nivôse an XII [1804]). This book explains the Irish alphabet, but has little in terms of typographic information. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jean Joveneaux

    Author of La lettre dans la peinture et la publicité (1957, Editions Charles Massin, Paris: see also here and here). His Futura Stencil-like Le Pochoir (plate 40) was digitally remade by Toto as Le Pochoir (2011), and also by Jan Gerner as Pochoir (2006). Author also of La lettre dans le décor. An art deco typeface from that book was digitally revived by Toto and Dick Pape in 2011 under the name La lettre dans le décor. Free download here.

    The alphabets of La lettre dans la peinture et la publicité (1957) include many styles, from art deco to blackletter, Victorian and retro. Joveneaux gave them names, so I will list them in alphabetical order: 1erEmpire, AnDeGrace1320, Antiquites, Aquarium, ArtsGraphiques, BalDeNuit, Bar, BeauxArts, Cafe, CompositionDecorative, Constellation, CoursDeStenotypie, DerniereHeure, EclairageFluorescent, Editorial, ElectroStatique, EnExclusivite, Exposition, Illustration, InitiationSportive, JeuDeDominos, LaGrandeParade, LePochoir, LettresOrnees, Massif, Meubles, ModeDEte1950, Motos, Nouvelle, Ordonnance, OrpheeAuxEnfers, PrestigeDeLaSoie, Promotion52, RealisationsGraphiques, RobesDEte, SalonMai1953, Samedi23Mai1953, TissusTousColoris, TouteUneGammeDeLaines, ZoneInterdite. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jean Larcher

    French type designer and calligrapher (b. 1947, Rennes, d. 2015) who worked mostly in Cergy-Pontoise. From 1962-1965, he studied typographic art in a school under the Paris Chamber of Commerce. From 1973 until 1985, Jean Larcher, who had studied calligraphy as well, worked as a freelance calligrapher in and around Paris. From 1985, he taught calligraphy both inside and outside France. He wrote several books, including Character Traits (2014). While calligraphy was his passion, Jean was also fascinated by op-art and geometric patterns. His fonts are all phototypes except for the metal font Latina.

    His typefaces: Abécédaire à Renayures (1991, for Collector magazine), Beauté (1966, for Magazine Votre Beauté), Castillejo-Bauhaus (1980, Rapitype Madrid), Catich (1998), Digitale (1974, Hollenstein Phototypo), Gautier (1992, Agence J.-P. Gautier&Associés), Guapo (1973-75, Hollenstein Phototypo), Hollywood Script (1989), Honolulu (1974, Hollenstein Phototypo), Incise Volume (1981, for Cergy Magazine), Jamaica Experience (1978, for Rock Hebdo Magazine), Lancöme (1981, Rapitype, for Lancöme), Larcher (1974, Hollenstein Phototypo), Latina (1987, Mécanorma), Liberté Égalité Fraternité (1985, for the Ministère de l'Éducation Nationale), Logement (1980, Rapitype, for Cergy Magazine), Menhir (1973-75, Hollenstein Phototypo), New Crayon (1980, Rapitype, for Cergy Magazine), Optical (1974, Hollenstein Phototypo), Plouf (1970-74, Hollenstein Phototypo), Rasgueo (1979, for U&lc Magazine), Revival (1979, for 20 ans Magazine), Soleil (1973-75, Hollenstein Phototypo), Super Crayon (1976, Titrage CCT), Tornade (1974, Hollenstein Phototypo), Veloz (1987, Mécanorma), Vibrator (1976, Titrage CCT).

    3D Alphabet (by Character) is inspired by an alphabet coloring book designed by Jean Larcher, 1978.

    Web site. MyFonts link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Jean Méron

    Author of "Orthotypographie : recherches bibliographiques", Convention typographique, 2002. A 416 page opus on the history of the book, printing, writing, and typography. A great handwritten preface by Fernand Baudin. See also here. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jean Paillard

    French type historian. Author of Claude Garamont: graveur et fondeur de lettres: étude historique (1914, imp. Maurice Ollière et Cie, Paris). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jean-Antoine Alessandrini

    Type designer, graphic designer and illustrator, born in Marseille in 1942. Allessandrini (sometimes spelled Alessandrini in various publications) used to work at Paris Match, Lui and Elle. His typefaces: Akénaton 1969 (Hollenstein Phototypo) (1975, VGC??), Alias 1977 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Allessandrini 7 1972 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Anarchiste (Mécanorma), Andronique 1984 (Mécanorma), Astronef 1976 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Circus World, (Mécanorma), Cléopatre 1984 (Mécanorma), Combinat 1976 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Éclipso 1982 (Mécanorma), Electric-Type 1977 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Futuriste 1977 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Germain 1969 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Grand Dadais 1977 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Grand Large 1977 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Graphic Man 1973 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Grossium 1977 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Gyptis 1977 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Hypnos 1969 (Hollenstein Phototypo: a psychedelic face), Legitur, Mikado 1977 (Mécanorma: oriental simulation), Mirago 1970 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Priam 1976 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Showbiz 1969 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Sigle (Mécanorma), Technos 1984 (Mécanorma), Trombinoscope 1964, Vampire 1969 (Hollenstein Phototypo), Wotan, (Mécanorma).

    Inventor of the classification system Codex 1980 that provoked heated responses from luminaries such as Vox, baudin, Blanchard and Mendoza.

    Author of Typomanie / Jean Alessandrini; préface de Massin (Paris: La Noria, DL, 1977).

    In 2013, David Rault wrote the monograph Jean Alessandrini Le poète de la lettre.

    Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Jean-François Porchez
    [Typofonderie (was: Porchez Typofonderie)]

    [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Jean-Luc Dusong

    Coauthor with Fabienne Siegwart of "Typographie, du plomb au numérique" (Dessain et Tolra, 2003). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jean-Luc Froissart

    Grandson of Georges Peignot, b. 1926. Author of L'or, l'âme et les cendres du plomb: L'épopée des Peignot, 1815-1983 (2004). It paints the history of the Peignot family of typefounders from 1815 until 1983. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jean-Michel Papillon

    French wood engaver, b. 1698, Paris, d. 1776, Paris. Son of Jean Papillon, the famous manufacturer of fine wallpapers. He was for a long time employed by the Imprimerie Royale as wood engraver. There, he created numerous ornaments. Author of Traité historique et pratique de la gravure en bois (1766, Paris). Chapters cover cutting of the block, inking and printing, monograms, xylography and block books, cutter's tools, and chiaroscuro prints.

    Digital typefaces that are based on his work include

    • Papillon 1760 (2007, Dick Pape). A free font. First shown in Paris in 1760, and reprinted by Clarence P. Hornung in Dover Pictorial Archive Series: Early Advertising Alphabets, Initials and Typographic Ornaments (1956, Dover Publications). Hornung's images inspired Pape's typeface.
    • Papillon Woodcuts (2013, Jose Jimenez). A commercial font based on the same sample from 1760.
    [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jean-Pierre Fournier

    French author of Inventaire de la fonderie Le Bé, 1738, Archives nationales, Minutier Central des Notaires, étude LXV L. 324. In 1957, Stanley Morison re-edited this text as Inventaire de la fonderie Le Bé selon la transcription de Jean-Pierre Fournier (André Jammes). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jean-Pierre Lacroux

    Jean-Pierre Lacroux (1947-2002) had a wonderfully informative site with tons of useful links, many to French sources, and many concerned weith orthotypography. Subpages: Bibliography on pens, paper and writing. Bibliography on ancient and modern typography. Sadly, on November 12, 2002, Lacroux passed away. His pages remain on the web, a testimony to the many hearts he touched with his kindness. A tribute entitled Typographique tombeau de Jean-Pierre Lacroux (148 pages, 2003, PDF file) was published under the editorship of Thierry Bouche and Éric Angelini. Look for Lacroux's principle: the minimal typographic quality of a text is inversely proportional to its literary value. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jef Tombeur

    Typographic aficionado who contributes links to the St. Bride Printing Library in London. This page has links to the main type sites on the web.

    I can't resist this wonderful short autobiography of Jef, and I do not want to translate it, because it would lose its punch: Jef Tombeur, ex-vagabond professionnel&auto-stoppeur en Europe, au Moyen-Orient et en Amérique du Nord depuis l'âge de 15 ans, s'est rapidement tourné vers le journalisme par désoeuvrement. Vendre à la criée The International Times et The Black Dwarf à Londres, puis Le Monde à Strasbourg, l'y incita. Laissant tomber facs et école de journalisme, il contribua à rédiger, composer, gérer l'hebdomadaire franco-alsacien Uss'm Follik (Issu du Peuple), ce que facilitèrent ses origines bretonnes. Repéré ensuite à Belfort, Niort, Reims, devenant progressivement grand reporter et de moins en moins pigiste pour Libération et d'autres. Chef de desk à l'Agence Centrale de Presse, il en diffusa la dernière dépêche puis retourna à la rue et aux facultés. Ayant traduit divers auteurs anglophones au passage, tel Tom Coraghessan Boyle (cf. www.tcboyle.net), il s'est de nouveau passionné pour la typographie, en devenant le seul journaliste spécialisé français (notamment pour Création Numérique ou Pixelcreation.fr). Envisage de devenir chômeur en fins de droits et propagandiste plénipotentiaire pour Phil Martin en Afrique avant d'avoir atteint, prochainement, si possible, 55 ans. Localisé fréquemment chez Ali (bar La Gitane, près de Strasbourg-Saint-Denis, Paris) ces temps derniers.

    Author in 2004 of Femmes&métiers du Livre, Women in the Printing Trades, which appeared with Talus in Belgium. It describes women typographers and printers throughout history. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jeff Level

    Worked at Autologic under Sumner Stone. Then moved to Monotype where he art director many fonts. Author, with Bruce Newman and Brenda Newman, of The Precision Type Font Reference (1995, Precision Type Inc). Rumoured to be working on version 6 of that book. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jennifer Bass

    Daughter of Saul Bass. Author with Pat Kirkham of Saul Bass: A Life in Film&Design (2011). The book's blurb: This is the first book to be published on one of the greatest American designers of the 20th Century, who was as famous for his work in film as for his corporate identity and graphic work. With more than 1,400 illustrations, many of them never published before and written by the leading design historian Pat Kirkham, this is the definitive study that design and film enthusiasts have been eagerly anticipating. Saul Bass (1920-1996) created some of the most compelling images of American post-war visual culture. Having extended the remit of graphic design to include film titles, he went on to transform the genre. His best known works include a series of unforgettable posters and title sequences for films such as Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo and Otto Preminger's The Man With The Golden Arm and Anatomy of a Murder. He also created some of the most famous logos and corporate identity campaigns of the century, including those for major companies such as AT&T, Quaker Oats, United Airlines and Minolta. His wife and collaborator, Elaine, joined the Bass office in the late 1950s. Together they created an impressive series of award-winning short films, including the Oscar-winning Why Man Creates, as well as an equally impressive series of film titles, ranging from Stanley Kubrick s Spartacus in the early 1960s to Martin Scorsese s Cape Fear and Casino in the 1990s. Designed by Jennifer Bass, Saul Bass's daughter and written by distinguished design historian Pat Kirkham who knew Saul Bass personally, this book is full of images from the Bass archive, providing an in depth account of one of the leading graphic artists of the 20th century. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jerry Kelly

    Jerry Kelly is a book designer, calligrapher, type designer, and typographer. Since the late 1970s he has designed hundreds of books for numerous clients, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Pierpont Morgan Library, The American Federation of the Arts, The American Academy of Arts and Letters, The Grolier Club, Cambridge University Press, David R. Godine Publisher, International Typeface Corporation (ITC), and others. Hs book design career started first with the Press of A. Colish in Mount Vernon, New York (1981-1991), and then with the Stinehour of Press of Lunenberg Vermont, where he rose to the position of Vice President (1991-1999). After The Stinehour Press was sold he went out on his own, designing and producing books as proprietor of Jerry Kelly LLC. His work has received numerous awards, including more than thirty selections in the American Institute of Graphic Arts's prestigious Fifty Books of the Year awards for excellence in book design. Since 1978 he has been a partner at the Kelly-Winterton Press and at the Nonpareil Type foundry, an independent type design firm.

    Author of various books on typography and type design. In 2011, he wrote About More Alphabets: The Types of Hermann Zapf (New York, The Typophiles). In 2007, he published Spend your alphabets lavishly! The work of Hermann & Gudrun Zapf (The Typophiles and RIT Cary Graphic Arts Press). The latter book is a catalogue of an exhibition at the Melbert B. Cary, Jr. Graphic Arts Collection of the Rochester Institute of Technology, and presents a survey of work by Hermann and Gudrun Zapf. On the same topic, he wrote Manuale Zapficum (Rochester: Cary Graphic Arts Press, 2009, 24 pages, limited edition). Manuale Zapficum commemorates the ninetieth birthdays of typographers Hermann Zapf and Gudrun Zapf von Hesse through typeface specimens set in homage to the classic design of Hermann Zapf's 1968 Manuale Typographicum. The twenty specimen designs in the book are based upon quotes about the couple's oeuvre, each typeset in Zapf faces and letterpress printed by several of the Zapfs' colleagues. The contributors include Jill Bell (of Brandlettering Design), Rick Cusik (of Hallmark Cards), Jerry Kelly (of the Kelly-Winterton Press and Nonpareil Type), Nancy Leo Kelly (a designer at The Dial Press), David Pankow (curator of the Cary Graphic Arts Collection) and Doyald Young.

    In 2014, Jerry Kelly and Misha Beletsky coauthored The Noblest Roman: A History of the Centaur Types of Bruce Rogers (RIT Cary Graphic Ars Press). The blurb: The history of the Centaur type, likely the most important American typefeace ever designed, has been recounted untold times in very general terms, following the official version of events, purported by its designer in several publications. Yet, as the new research by Jerry Kelly and Misha Beletsky shows, there is a number of gray areas to the story. The new data, culled from archival documents, some unpublished, as well as from a variety of published sources presents this important design and its history in a new light. That book was issued in a 300-sample limited edition by the The Book Club of California in 2016.

  • Hermann Zapf and the World He Designed: A Biography (2019, The Grolier Club, New York).

    Jerry Kelly designed these typefaces:

    • Rilke (Nonpareil Type). A transitional typeface family.
    • A digital version of Bruce Rogers's original Centaur, used in his 2016 book.
    [Google] [More]  ⦿

  • Jerry Kelly and Alice Koeth

    Editors of "Artist&Alphabet : 20th Century Calligraphy&Letter Art in America", a nice book on calligraphy. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jesse Noel

    Freelance designer in Culpeper, VA. Author of Just Your Type (2014, Jackson Publishing, Syracuse, NY). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    J.F. Coakley

    J. F. Coakley is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, and on the staff of Houghton Library, at Harvard University. His private press, the Jericho Press, occasionally makes use of Syriac and other exotic types. In 2006, he wrote The Typography of Syriac: a Historical Catalogue of Printing Types, 1537-1958 (Oak Knoll Press, New Castle, DE). Oak Knoll writes: Syriac, a dialect of the ancient Aramaic language, has a remarkable Christian literature spanning a thousand years from the fourth to the thirteenth century, including important versions of the Bible. It remains the liturgical language of several churches in the Middle East, India, and the West, and 'Modern Syriac' is a vernacular still in use today. It is no wonder that this language has a long and rich printing history. The challenge of conveying the beautiful cursive Syriac script, in one or another of its three varieties, was taken up by many well-known type-designers in the letterpress era, from Robert Granjon in the sixteenth century to the Monotype and Linotype corporations in the twentieth, as well as by many lesser-known ones. This study records and abundantly illustrates no fewer than 129 different Syriac types, using archival documents, type-specimens, and the often scattered evidence of the print itself. The Typography of Syriac will be of interest not only to scholars of Middle Eastern languages and scripts but also to all historians of type and printing. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    J.G. Bissell

    Author of Instructions on Modern Show Writing (1921). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    J.H. Furst Company

    Publisher of A Specimen Book of Type Styles (Baltimore, MD). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jim Byrne

    Author of Accessible Web Typography. The web page corresponds to the book. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jim Felici

    Jim Felici discusses extreme letter spacing. He is the author of The Complete Manual of Typography (Peachpit Press, 2003). This book is reviewed by John Berry. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    J.J. Augustin

    Author of Schriftproben: Orientalischer Typen wie auch Phonetische Akzente (1933, Glückstadt and Hamburg). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    J.N. Halsted

    Author of Modern Ornament & Design (1927, 1985). J.N. Halsted shows illustrations, ornaments and graphic design elements. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jo de Baerdemaeker
    [Studio Type (or: Typojo)]

    [More]  ⦿

    Joannes Weenink

    Dutch penman and lettering artist (1797-1879), who published the lettering model book Alphabeth in onderscheiden soorten van oude, nieuwe en ornament letteren, ca. 1843. Some of his work is close to earlier model book work of Jean Midolle in Switzerland.

    Reference: Nederlandse belettering negentiende-eeuwse modelboeken (2015, Mathieu Lommen, de Buitenkant, Amsterdam). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Joao Henrique Lopes

    Ananindeua, Brazil-based creator (b. 1986, Brazil) of FontForum Giureska (2012), a blackletter / uncial family published by URW, and of Styla Pro (2013), a flared typeface also published by URW, and advertized as a romantic sans influened by Bodoni.

    Lucca (2013) is a flared humanist sans typeface that was inspired by Italian Renaissance fonts like Poliphilus, Blado, Centaur and Arrighi.

    Typefaces from 2015: Pleiad (seven interchangeable scripts published by URW++: Pleiad Alcyone, Pleiad Celeno, Pleiad Electra, Pleiad Maia, Pleiad Merope, Pleiad Sterope, Pleiad Taygete).

    Typefaces from 2017 at URW++: Meyling (emulating painted letters, or perhaps an oriental brush).

    Typefaces from 2020: Slazer (futuristic, sci-fi).

    Author of Elements of Manga Style. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Joaquim Carneiro da Silva

    Portuguese author of Breve tratado theorico das letras typograficas (1803, Lisboa: Regia officina typografica), which can be downloaded here. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jodocus Hondius

    Penman. Author of Theatrvm Artis scribendi, Varia Svmmorvm Nostri Seculi, Artificum exemplaria complectens (1594), a book with many European script specimens. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Joep Pohlen
    [Letterfountain: Bibliography]

    [More]  ⦿

    Joep Pohlen
    [Polka Design / Letterfontein]

    [More]  ⦿

    Joh. A. Moesman

    Lithographer and calligrapher in Utrecht, The Netherlands, 1859-1937. He published an untitled lettering model book in 1877. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Johan Kroeger

    German type expert who wrote a short survey paper in 1985 entitled Deutsche Schrägschriften. In it, he deals with cursive typefaces made between 1900 and 1935 in Germany. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Johann Friedrich Unger

    German type designer, b. 1750, Berlin, d. 1804, Berlin. He had a press in Berlin, which he founded in 1780. His foundry started in 1791. His typefaces:

    • Unger-Fraktur (1793-1794). Revived by the following foundries: D. Stempel (1919), Julius Klinkhardt (Berthold) (1907), Otto Weisert (1927), Norddeutsche Schriftgiesserei, Schiftguss (1928), Delbanco (as DS-Unger-Fraktur), SoftMaker (2002: see J790 Blackletter on the SoftMaker MegaFont XXL CD), Berthold (as Unger Fraktur BQ), and Ralph M. Unger (Unger Fraktur (2010); includes fett and mager).
    • The metal font Kabinett-Fraktur (1938-1939, Johannes Wagner) is identical to Unger Fraktur. Peter Wiegel did a digital revival in 2015 called Kabinett Fraktur. Dieter Steffmann also revived Kabinett Fraktur.

    He became a professor of woodcutting at the Akademie der Künste in 1800. Brief bio by Harald rösler, 1999.

    Unger's publications: Etwas über den Buchhandel, Buchdruckerey und den Druck außerhalb Landes (1787), Etwas über die Holz- und Formschneidekunst, und ihren Nutzen für den Buchdrucker (1788), Einige Gedanken über das Censur-Edikt vom 29. December 1788 (1789), Vorschlag, wie Landkarten auf eine sehr wohlfeile Art können gemeinnütziger gemacht werden (1791), Probe einer neuen Art deutscher Lettern (1793), Die neue Cecilia. Letzte Blätter von Karl Philipp Moritz. Zweite Probe neu veränderter deutscher Druckschrift (1794).

    Heinrich Heeger wrote in 1973 about the story of Unger Fraktur and Kabinett Fraktur. Konrad F. Bauer penned Zur Geschichte der Unger-Fraktur (1929, Bauersche Giesserei).

    Klingspor link. MyFonts page. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Johann Heinrich Gottfried Ernesti

    Author of Die Wol-eingerichtete Buchdruckerey, mit hundert und achtzehen Teutsch- Lateinisch- Griechisch- und Hebrä'ischen Schrifften, vieler fremden Sprachen Alphabeten, musicalischen Roten, Calender-Zeichen, und Medicinischen Characteren, Ingleichen allen üblichen Formaten bestellet, und mit accurater Abbildung der Erfinder derlöblichen Kunst, nebst einer summarischen Nachricht von den Buchdruckern in Nürnberg, ausgeziere, publ. Nürnberg: Johann Andred Endters seel. Sohn und Erben, 1721. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Johann Jacob Losenawer

    Author of Vorschrift Deutsch-Lateinisch und Franczösischer Schriften Geschrieben (Stuttgart, 1719, later edition in 1739). It has several calligraphic alphabets, and many elaborate initial caps: Sample, another sample, ample, and one more, and still more, and a final one for the road. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Johann Neudörffer

    German writing master, 1497-1563, aka Johann Neudörffer The Elder, who founded his writing school in Nürnberg, and printed his first plates ca. 1519. His first publication was Fundament in 1519. These prints eventually became the foundation for a new kind of writing education throughout Europe. His writing manual and teachings helped further the development of blackletter. Author of Anweijsung einer gemeiner hanndschrift. Durch Johann Neudoerffer, Burger vnd Rechenmeister zu Nurmberg geordnet und gemacht (Nürnberg, 1538). Some of his methods are still alive in contemporary type design.

    Oliver Linke, an expert on Neudörffer, and Christine Sauer published Zierlich schreiben Der Schreibmeister Johann Neudörffer der Ältere und seine Nachfolger in Nürnberg (2007, Beiträge zur Geschichte und Kultur der Stadt Nürnberg 25, Typographische Gesellschaft München / Stadtbibliothek Nürnberg).

    Several blackletter type families are named after him, such as Helmutt G. Bomm's Neudoerffer Fraktur (2009, Linotype), Manfred Klein's Neudoerffer (2003; the note in the font says that these codex-style initials are the unaltered original Neudoerffer Initialen from 1660, but this information could be in error) and Neudoerffer Scribble Quality (2003), and Klaus-Peter Schäffel's 1519 Neudoerffer Fraktur (2012). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Johanna Balusikova

    Johanna Balusikova (b. 1974, Slovakia), now Johanna Bilak, studied typography at Atelier National de Création Typographique in Paris and at the Bratislava Art Academy in her native Slovakia, as well as at the Jan van Eyck Akademie in the Netherlands. She now works as a freelance graphic designer in The Hague, where she has lived since 1999. She designed Jigsaw (1999-2000) at Typotheque: this was originally intended as a Multiple Master font that varies from roman to stencil.

    At ATypI 2004 in Prague, she spoke about "Experiment and typography". Co-editor with Alan Zaruba of We Want You To Love Type (2004, e-a-t). Since 2003 she is a partner in Peter Bilak's Typotheque. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Johanna Drucker

    Author of "The Alphabetic Labyrinth : The Letters in History and Imagination". See also here. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Johannes Bergerhausen

    Johannes Bergerhausen (b. 1965, Bonn, Germany), studied Visual Communication at the University of Applied Sciences in Düsseldorf. From 1993 to 2000, he lived and worked in Paris. First he collaborated with the Founders of Grapus, Gérard Paris-Clavel and Pierre Bernard, then he founded his own office. He returned to Germany in 2000, where he is Professor of Typography at the University of Applied Sciences in Mainz (since 2002). In 2003, together with Paris-Clavel, he published the font "LeBuro" at ACME Fonts, London. At ATypI 2004 in Prague, he spoke about Decoding Unicode. He describes his Unicode character collection project at Typotechnica 2005.

    In 2012, he was awarded with the Designpreis in Gold of the Federal Republic of Germany. He is currently working on a digital cuneiform font.

    Author, with Siri Poarangan, of decodeunicode: Die Schriftzeichen der Welt (2011, Verlag Hermann Schmidt Mainz). This text shows all 109.242 typographic symbols in the Unicode standard at the time of its publication. Speaker at ATypI 2018 in Antwerp, during which (jointly with Morgane Pierson) he published a silkscreen poster with 292 glyphs, representing all 292 known writing systems of the world, together with their names, regions, and timeframes. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Johannes Missillie

    Painter in Sluis, The Netherlands (1830-1857) [at least, this is the educated guess of type historian Mathieu Lommen], who published the lettering model book Verzameling van letteren ten gebruike voor schilders en teekenaars (ca. 1855).

    Reference: Nederlandse belettering negentiende-eeuwse modelboeken (2015, Mathieu Lommen, de Buitenkant, Amsterdam). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John A. Lane

    John A. Lane (b. 1955) is a type and printing historian. He was born and raised in the United States and has lived in Leiden (Holland) since 1990. He who often writes on typography:

    • One of his crowning achievements is the book Letterproeven van Nederlandse gieterijen (1998), which shows Dutch typefounders' specimens from the Library of the KVB and other collections in the Amsterdam University Library with histories of the firms represented. It is coauthored with Mathieu Lommen, a noted type librarian and historian. Discussion of the text.
    • Coauthor with Mathieu Lommen in 2003 of "Bram de Does Boektypograaf&Letterontwerper" (Amsterdam, 2003).
    • Author of Early Type Specimens in the Plantin-Moretus Museum (New Castle and London: Oak Knoll Press and the British Library, 2004).
    • Author of The Diaspora of Armenian Printing 1512-2012 (2012, Amsterdam: Special Collections of the University of Amsterdam). From the book's blurb: In 1512, in the city of Venice, Hakob Meghapart printed the first book in Armenian type. [...] For technical and political reasons, all Armenian books were printed outside Armenia until 1771. The art of Armenian printing developed in major centres like Venice, Constantinople and Amsterdam, but also in many others around the world. Its history moves along highways and byways reflecting the ups and downs of the Armenian people. The book describes the diaspora of Armenian printing, highlighting the role of Amsterdam.
    [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John Albert Cavanagh

    Author of Lettering (1946). Designer of fonts such as Cavanagh No. 17 (1939, Ludlow). At Photo Lettering Inc, he designed Appalacia, Beacon Shaded, Billboard, Bingo, Bruce (+Italic), Calliope (Western), Chandelier, Dahlia, Dock Stencil, Eighteen Ninety (Western), Fournier, Hamilton, Hansa (blackletter), Initials 1 and 2, Jason, Kaleidoscope, Lenox Gothic Italic, Ogden, Parliament (blackletter), Pony Express (Western), Royal (roundhand), Shaded, Tiffany, Versailles, Yonalassi (script), and Zinnia. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    John B. Wiggins

    Author of Designs for Letters and Monograms (1893). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John D. Berry

    Ex-developer of U&lc, the well-known type magazine at ITC in New York. After ITC's demise, he moved to San Francisco, and is best known nowadays for his excellent articles on typography at CreativePro.com. He is the author and designer of Dot-font: Talking About Fonts and Dot-font: Talking About Design (Mark Batty Publisher, 2006), and the editor of Language Culture Type (ATypI/Graphis, 2002), Contemporary Newspaper Design, and U&lc: influencing design&typography. He also wrote Now Read This (Microsoft, 2004), a book about Microsoft's ClearType project.

    He writes and consults extensively on typography, and he has won numerous awards for his book designs. He lives in Seattle with the writer Eileen Gunn.

    John Berry was on the board of the Type Directors Club from 1999 to 2003, and was President of ATypI from 2007 until 2013. In 2008, he joined Microsoft as a Program Manager in the typography team. He is the founder and director of Scripta Typography Institute.

    At ATypI in Rome in 2002, he spoke about the Bukvaraz type competition. At ATypI 2004 in Prague, he spoke about newspaper type. John was the closing plenary speaker at ATypI 2007 in Brighton. Speaker at ATypI 2013 in Amsterdam and at ATypI 2019 in Tokyo. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    John D. Boardley
    [I Love Typography]

    [More]  ⦿

    John G. Cooley

    American wood type designer/manufacturer from the 19th century, whose company started out in 1852 by taking over Edwin Allen in South Windham, CT. In 1864, he partners with Robert Lindsay, sells the South Windham factory, and moves to New York City as John B. Cooley and Co. In 1866, he enters into a partnership with Samuel T. Dauchy to become Cooley&Dauchy. In 1869, however, that company was bought by William Page, who ironically, had been Cooley's employee in 1855-1856. He published Specimens of Wood Type.

    Examples of their wood types: Antique Tuscan No. 1 (1859).

    Digital revivals: Jeff Levine's Winnetka JNL (2009) was inspired by Cooley Antique Tuscan Condensed from 1859. Compressed Wood JNL (2020, Jeff Levine) is extrapolated from J.G. Cooley's Roman Triple Extra Condensed Fifty Line. Finally, AWT Cooley Ant Tuscan XX Cond (2013) and AWT Cooley Grecian XX Condensed were released by Dick Pape. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John G. Ohnimus

    Denver-based artist. Author of Henderson's Sign Painter (1906, R.H. Henderson, Newark, NJ). R. Henderson published the related text Henderson's Sign Designs and Alphabets (1905).

    His own alphabets in this text include Church Text (Lombardic), Modern Egyptian, Architectural, Initial Letters, and Heavy Sign Script. Local download of the former text [692MB].

    Digital revivals:

    [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John Gustave Dreyfus

    Born in London in 1918, died in London in December 2002. Assistant University Printer, Cambridge University Press 1949-56 Cofounder of ATypI with Charles Peignot in 1957. He was the typographic advisor to The Monotype Corporation (now Agfa Monotype) from 1955-1982, having taken over from Stanley Morison. President, Association Typographique Internationale 1968-1973. Sandars Reader in Bibliography, Cambridge University 1979-1980. He was a great writer about typographic matters. Author of Aspects of French Eighteenth Century Typography (The Roxburghe Club, Cambdridge, 1982). Obituary and biography by Nicolas Barker. Winner of the Gutenberg Prize in 1996. Reflections on his life by various typographers. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    John H. Bowman

    Programme Director for Library and Information Studies at University College, London. At the meeting in Thessaloniki in June 2002, he spoke about The fine printing of Greek in Britain and its types. Author of Greek printing types in Britain, from the late eighteenth to the early twentieth century (Thessaloniki : Typophilia, 1998). That book is based on the author's thesis completed in 1988 for the Department of Typography and Graphic Communication at the University of Reading, England. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John Haddon & Co (or: Haddon-Caxton Type Foundry)
    [Phil May]

    London-based foundry with a sense of humour, because all their type names start with the letter H. Examples of art nouveau typefaces: Harlech, Harquil, Harrington, Hawarden Italic, Huntsman (late Victorian, pre-art-nouveau style).

    Most of their typefaces were designed by Phil May [information unverified].

    For digital revivals, see Huntsman (2005, Dan X. Solo).

    John Haddon published Haddon-Caxton List of Poster Wood-Letters Ornaments and Rules at the Fleet Street location of the Haddon-Caxton Type Foundry in London in 1923. Free local PDF. That book shows these exclusive wood types: Haddon, Hawarden, Highland, Herald, and Hamlin. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John J. Palmer
    [Palmer and Rey]

    [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    John Jackson

    Author of The theory and practice of handwriting (1894, New York: William Beverley Harison). Google] [More]  ⦿

    John Johnson

    Author of Typographia, Or the Printers' Instructor: Including an Account of the Origin of Printing, with Biographical Notices of the Printers of England, from Caxton to the Close of the Sixteenth Century: a Series of Ancient and Modern Alphabets, and Domesday Characters: Together with an Elucidation of Every Subject Connected with the Art, Volume 2 (1824, London). Local download. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John Lewis

    Author of the 203-page book A Handbook of Type and Illustration. With notes on certain graphic processes and the production of illustrated books (London, 1956). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John M. Bergling

    Great American calligrapher and engraver. He wrote several books, including Engraving Designing Etching (1914), Heraldic Designs & Engravings (1913), Heraldic Designs for Artists and Craftspeople, Ornamental Designs and Illustrations">, Art Monograms and Lettering (1912, 1916) and Art Alphabets and Lettering (1914, 1918, 1923). He was Master Engraver with the renowned C.D. Peacock jewelers in Chicago around 1900. Creator of many art alphabets, Bergling is also noted for state seals of the United States and many seal crests of foreign countries. His great-grandchildren set up Bergling Publishing and are selling directly or through Amazon most of his oeuvre.

    Digital fonts based on Bergling's work:

    • One Good Urn NF (2005, Nick Curtis) is based on his art nouveau lettering from 1914.
    • Morocco (1914) provided the caps of Funky Tut NF (2005, Nick Curtis), and Keramic Text (1914) provided the lower cases characters of the latter font.
    • Chantilly Lace NF (2005, Nick Curtis) uses uppercase letters by Bergling and lowercase letters by Roland W. Paul.
    • His Nibs NF is a digital font by Nick Curtis (2007) based on the calligraphy of Bergling, ca. 1914.
    • Carson Monogram (2009, Brian J. Bonislawsky) is based on Bergling's New Antique 53 from the book Art Monogram and Lettering.
    • Bergling (2010, Scriptorium) is a floriate script based on Bergling's work. Other (art nouveau style) Scriptorium fonts based on Bergling include Boetia, Belgravia, Bosphoros and Beaumains (2011).
    • LHF Bergling Panels (2012, John Davis) is based on Bergling's work.
    • Initials Bergling (2012, Alter Littera) is a comprehensive set of initials (usually referred to as Uncials, Lombardic Initials, or Lombards) of the French variety, adapted from Bergling's book Art Alphabets and Lettering (Second Edition) (1918, Chicago: Blakely-Oswald Printing Company).
    • In 2011, J.M. Bergling's work inspired John Studden's monogram fonts LHF Monogram Circle, LHF Monogram Diamond, and LHF Monogram Oval.
    • MFC Ambeau Monogram (2019, Monogram Fonts Co). Based on the decorative art nouveau alphabet called American Beauty in Art Alphabets and Lettering).
    • MFC Decatur Monogram (2020, Monogram Fonts Co). Based on an alphabet seen in J.M. Bergling's book Monograms and Engraving Alphabets (1914).
    • Bergling Nouveau Display (2020, Steve Harrison).
    • Skaliwag Display (2020, Steve Harrison).
    • Allotropic (2022, The Flying Type). An art nouveau font that loosely draws inspiration from an untitled alphabet drawn in 1914 by J.M. Bergling.
    [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    John M. Clark

    Author of Alphabets in two volumes, published in 1906 and 1907, respectively. PDF of the 1906 book. PDF of the 1907 book. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John M. Clark

    Author of two alphabet books in 1906 and 1907, simply called John M. Clark's Alphabets Book 1 and Book 2, respectively. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John Neal Booksellers

    This bookseller from Greensboro, NC, specializes in calligraphy. "We supply calligraphers, lettering artists, illuminators, bookbinders and papercraft enthusiasts with books, tools and supplies including fine papers. Our selection of calligraphy books and supplies is unequaled in the world." [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John R. Biggs

    Author of An Approach to Type (1949, Blandford Press). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John Ryder

    Prolific British author (b. 1917), who published, e.g., A suite of fleurons : or a preliminary enquiry into the history&combinable natures of certain printers' flowers (London : Phoenix House, 1956). Pictures, including cover page. The typeface Fleurons A (developed by S. G. Moye, 1991-1993) is based on A Suite of Fleurons by John Ryder. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    John S. Fass

    American typographer. In 1954, he wrote Hammer Creek. The Hammer Creek Press Type Specimen Book (NY). [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    Johnny Bekaert

    Freelance graphic artist in Gent, Belgium, who won many awards for his design of posters and poster typefaces. He specializes in book cover, poster and cartoon types, and excels in all. Many of his fonts have a Kafkaesque slightly threatening look, while others are satirical and delightfully funny. His magnificent posters showcase the Belgian humor that is undoubtedly inherited from growing up during the golden era of Belgian cartoon and comic strip design that included Tintin / Kuifje, Lucky Luke and Robbedoes / Spirou.

    Author of Font Design (2018, Huis van het Beeld, Brussels).

    Johnny Bekaert designed these fonts: Oneline (1971), Urbas (1976), Scrittostyle (1985), Fridabrush (1986), Plowboys (1988), Hibblesibble (1990, deco style), Xorkaz (1991), Thingydingy (1992), Bruxell (1996, a redesign of a font by Jacques Richez, 1957), Zuzulma (1997, angular and expressionist), Razor Dina (1998, dada style), Cakewalk (1999), Theo & Phil (2000), Gasbangers (2002), Blind Liddy (2003), Archie Teck (2003), Fridadida (2005), Bettsie-X (2008), Tweedledum (2010), Roswellian (2013, a UFO font), Struktura (2013-2014), Blacknoir (2014), Blackblanc (2014), Enozeno (2015, a compass-and-ruler typeface), Kublar (2015), Zapristie (2014-2015), Delphis (1993), Quodic (2015), Oscura (2016). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Johnson Ball

    Author of "Wiliam Caslon 1693-1766" (Kineton: The Roundwood Press, 1973), a 494-page magnum opus on Caslon's life. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Johnston's Underground Type
    [Edward Johnston]

    Greg Fleming, upon the publication of his open source version Railway Sans (2012) of Edward Johnston's Railway Type of 1916, recalls the history of the typeface, and adds valuable references. The text below is his.

    The typeface was commissioned between 1913 and 1915 by Frank Pick (1878-1941), Commercial Manager of the Underground Electric Railways Company of London, UERL, also known as The Underground Group, as part of his plan to strengthen the company's corporate identity. Frustrated at the diversity and seemingly endless variations of poor or unsuitable type- typefaces that were, at that time, in use across the system, one of his first key actions was to introduce a standardised approach to advertising and lettering. Pick's brief to Johnston was essentially that a typeface was needed that would ensure that the Underground Group's posters would not be mistaken for advertisements; it should have the bold simplicity of the authentic lettering of the finest periods and yet belong unmistakably to the twentieth century. Johnston's New Sans typeface first appeared in a poster of July 1916. Inspired by the proportions of classical Roman lettering, based on square and circular forms, it is a vehicle of bold clarity and a perfect example of typography as a powerful, authoritative information tool. It has been used, almost unchanged in essence, continuously and timelessly in signage, posters and publicity for nearly a century.

    In 1933, The Underground Group was absorbed by the London Passenger Transport Board and the typeface was adopted as part of the London Transport brand. The typeface was originally called Underground. It became known as Johnston's Railway Type, and later, simply, Johnston or New Johnston Sans. Today, Transport for London uses updated versions in many weights of the original face, known as New Johnston Sans. This is not commercially available, except under strict TfL license. Railway is not based on or derived from the official New Johnston Sans in current use by Transport for London. Instead, it predates New Johnston by sixty-three years.

    The references:

    • Justin Howes: Johnston's Underground Type. Harrow Weald: Capital Transport. 2000.
    • Oliver Green and Jeremny Rewse-Davies: Designed for London: 150 years of transport design. London: Laurence King. Pages 81-82. 1995.
    • Christian Barman: The Man Who Built London Transport: A Biography of Frank Pick. David & Charles. Page 43. 1979.
    • Colin Banks: London's Handwriting: The development of Edward Johnston's Underground railway block-letter. London Transport Museum. 1994.
    • Eiichi Kono: Pen to Printer --- New Johnston Sans. University of Brighton, Arts Faculty Staff member page.
    [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jordan Davies Books

    New antiquarian type book seller. They offer, for example, a nearly complete collection of works by Eric Gill. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    Jorge de Buen Unna

    Jorge de Buen (b. 1956, Mexico City) studied Graphic Design in Mexico City. In 1994 he moved to Tijuana to work in marketing and communication projects for the Agua Caliente race and sports books. He has conducted several workshops and conferences at many important Latin American institutions. The second edition of his book Manual de diseno editorial (Santillana, 2000) is published in 2003, and the third edition in 2009. He spoke at ATypI 2003 in Vancouver on a new approach to typometry, and at ATypI 2009 in Mexico City on quotation marks (las comillas), where he pointed out that the <<...>> used in Spanish were just a natural evolution of the standard quotation marks (66...99).

    He designed Unna Romana (2003), Unna (2004, serif family, done at Imprimatur) and Bardahlkia (1994). He often shows up in LA for type activities.

    He moved to Querétaro in 2009 and is graphic designer there---his studio is called Imprimatvr. The first typeface published at Imprimatvr is Caliente (2012).

    In 2011, he placed Unna up for free download at the Google Font Directory, and started cooperating with Hector Gatti and Pablo Cosgaya at Omnibus Type.

    At Tipos Latinos 2012, Jorge won an award in the text category for Unna regular.

    Klingspor link. [Google] [MyFonts] [More]  ⦿

    José Cruzado

    Spanish author of Muestraio de los caracteres de la imprenta / José Cruzado (Madrid, 1990, 147 pages). [Google] [More]  ⦿

    José Gestoso Pérez

    Author of Documentos para la historia de la primitiva tipografia mexicana, La Andalucía Moderna, 1908. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    José Luis Martín Montesinos

    Author of Ricard Girald Miracle. El diálogo entre la tipografía y el diseño gráfico. [Google] [More]  ⦿

    José Scaglione

    José Scaglione (b. Rosario, Argentina, 1974) is a graduate of the MA program of the University of Reading, 2005. He was co-founder and art director of Vision Media Design Studio in Argentina and Multiplicity Advertising in USA; and he was a part-time lecturer for four years at the Visual Comunications Institute of Rosario, teaching design for the internet. He lectured on typography at post-graduate level at the National University of Rosario and presently teaches at the at the University of Buenos Aires. He runs his own design studio, specializing in editorial design and branding. In 2006, he started Type Together with Veronika Burian. In 2013, he became President of ATypI.

    His books include Cómo crear tipografías. Del boceto a la pantalla, and Introducción al estudio de la tipografía (in collaboration with Jorge de Buen Unna). His fonts:

    • Abril (2010) is a didone font family engineered mainly for newspapers and magazines that features friendly and elegant styles for headlines and robust and economic styles for text. It won an award at Tipos Latinos 2012. Abril Fatface is free at Google Font Directory. Abril Titling was published in 2013.
    • Fabula (2005), about which he writes: Based on a series of drawings by Sue Walker and originally digitized by Vinnie Connaire, Fabula is the new display typeface for the cover of Collins Children Dictionaries. Its basic monolinear structure and stroke economy are the foundation for this typeface.
    • OUP Math&Pi: This Math and Pi font was designed to match the typefaces used by Paul Luna and Nadja Guggi in the new design of the Oxford University Press Dictionaries: Argo and Swift, designed by Gerard Unger.
    • With Veronika Burian, he designed the text typeface TT Carmina (2006). This morphed into Karmina Serif (2007), a complete text family, and later Karmina Sans (released in 2009, 12 styles). Karmina was selected in the text typography category at the Letras Latinas exhibition 2006 and won a merit in the European-wide ED-Awards competition 2007, and at Tipos Latinos 2010. Karmina, Bree and Ronnia were selected as part of the travelling exhibition Tipos Latinos 2008.
    • Athelas (2006), an outgrowth of his studies at Reading. It now ships with Apple's Mavericks OS.
    • Ronnia (2007), designed with Veronika Burian at Type Together: a humanist sans family.
    • Bree (2008, with Veronika Burian): a 5-style display sans with a cursive a and e.
    • Adelle (2009, with Veronika Burian): a 12-style slab serif engineered for intensive editorial use. Adelle Mono was added in 2020.
    • The Google web font Jockey One (2011, with Veronika Burian).
    • Tablet Gothic (2012). A joint design of Veronika Burian and José Scaglione, it is a grotesque meant for titling.
    • In 2015, Veronika Burian and José Scaglione finally published the 18-style editorial sans typeface family Ebony.
    • In 2016, Veronika Burian and José Scaglione co-designed Portada, a sturdy serif typeface family for use on screen and small devices. It comes with an extensive free set of icons. Winner at Tipos Latinos 2018 of a type design award for Portdada.
    • Protipo (2018) is a large information design sans family designed by Veronika Burian and José Scaglione.
    • In 2019, Type Together released Catalpa (Veronkia Burian, Jose Scaglione, Azza Alameddine) and wrote: Primed for headlines, Catalpa is designed to give words bulk and width and gravity itself. The Catalpa font family is José Scaglione and Veronika Burian's wood type inspired design for an overwhelming headline presence.
    • In 2021, Veronik