TYPE DESIGN INFORMATION PAGE last updated on Fri Dec 13 00:53:22 EST 2024

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LUC DEVROYE


ABOUT







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.

EXTERNAL LINKS
Alfred John Fairbank
 [Designer info]
Monotype link
Klingspor Museum page
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INTERNAL LINKS
School fonts ⦿ Type design in the United Kingdom ⦿ Type designers ⦿ Type designers ⦿ Chancery hand, cancellaresca ⦿ Penmanship ⦿ Bembo ⦿ Books on type design ⦿








file name: Alfred Fairbank Dryad Writing 1932


file name: Robin Nicholas Fairbank M T 2003


file name: Robin Nicholas Fairbank M T Chancery 2003


file name: Robin Nicholas Fairbank Pro 2003


file name: Robin Nicholas Fairbank Pro 2003b







Luc Devroye ⦿ School of Computer Science ⦿ McGill University Montreal, Canada H3A 2K6 ⦿ lucdevroye@gmail.com ⦿ https://luc.devroye.org ⦿ https://luc.devroye.org/fonts.html