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LUC DEVROYE

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The best commercial typefaces of 2016: Luc's selection

This is my own selection of the best commercial typefaces published in 2016, grouped by category. The list will grow until December 31, 2016.

Text typefaces: Scientia (Natalia Vasilyeva, Paratype). A neutral text typeface for scientific publications. Sole Serif (Luciano Perondi, for CAST). Designed for newspapers and books. Classica Pro (Bernd Moellenstadt and Volker Schnebel, URW). Bara (Nikola Djurek). Kopius (Sybille Hagmann). Pensum Pro (Nils Thomsen). PSFournier (Stéphane Elbaz, Typofonderie). A revival of Pierre Simon Fournier's French transitional typefaces. Talia (Robert Jarzec, Poland). William (Maria Doreuli, Typotheque). A clean and logical contemporary take on Caslon, in Text, Subhead and Display subfamilies. PF DIN Serif (Panos Vassiliou). Maybe not natively a text typeface, but the idea is of a serif companion of DIN is worth exploring. Logica (Dino dos Santos). Marbach (Dieter Hofrichter).

Sans typefaces: Apax (François Rappo). Monrad Grotesk (Jan-Christian Bruun). Aspen (Ludwig Uebele). Zeitung Pro (Underware). Perfectionism, optical sizes, macro and micro type in one, variable fonts, the works. Bw Modelica Expanded (Alberto Romanos). Soin Sans Neue (Stawix Ruecha). Retina and Retina MicroPlus (Tobias Frere-Jones). The Retina typeface goes back to 1999-2000 at Hoefler Frere Jones, but this 2016 edition is expanded. Alpinist (Jeremie Hornus and Alisa Nowak). Brother 1816 (Ignacio Corbo and Fernando Diaz, TipoType). Core Sans CR (Hyun-Seung Lee, Dae-Hoon Hahm and Dong-Kwan Kim). Enigma Grotesque (Mateusz Machalski). This was renamed Migrena Grotesque after a short time, probably under pressure from Jeremy Tankard's lawyers (as Tankard created a typeface called Enigma in 2004). Muller Narrow (Radomir Tinkov, Fontfabric). MTT Roma (Mattia Bonanomi). Alergia Grotesk (Mateusz Machalski). A take on the classical geometric grotesque in 60 styles/weights, for Latin, Greek and Cyrillic. Classic Grotesque (Rod McDonald, Monotype): 54 styles, eight years of work, inspired by Monotype Grotesque, Ideal Grotesk and Venus, and served in a crystal goblet. RNS Sanz (Yorlmar Campos). Conceived for wayfinding and information design. Noir (Milos Mitrovic). An early 20th century-style geometric sans family. Uni Grotesk (Peter Bilak, Nikola Djurek and Hrvoje Zivcic at Typotheque). A revival and extension of Universal Grotesk (1951, Grafotechna). Stratos (Yoann Minet and Emmanuel Labard at Production Type). Geometric grotesque with especially attractive heavier weights.

Rounded sans display typefaces: Gasket (Cyrus Highsmith). Yuzu (Elliott Amblard, Indian Type Foundry). Globa (Pedro Gonzalez Jorquera, Latinotype).

Type systems: Triplet (Yana Kutyina and Andrey Belonogov in cooperation with Valery Golyzhenkov) in Erste, Zweite and Dritte styles, for Latin and Cyrillic. Questa (Maarten Majoor and Jos Buivenga). This type system was started in 2010, and finished in 2014. With Regular, Slab, Sans and Grande subfamilies, this type system keeps on giving and growing through 2016. Tupper Serif (Mateusz Machalski and RR Donnelley). This superfamily covers Latin, Greek, Hebrew and Arabic. 90 Minutes (Tal Leming). A 37-style type system exclusively licensed to U.S. Soccer, consisting of Display, Kit and Text subfamilies, and largely influenced by Morris Fuller Benton.

Art deco typefaces: Cassannet Plus (Atipo). An expansion of Cassannet (2012), which is based on the art deco poster lettering used by Cassandre in the 1920s. Inbox (Alisa Nowak, Indian Type Foundry). Barbecue (Roman Shchyukin for Gaslight; the typeface was first called BarBQ). Eileen (Julie Soudanne, Indian Type Foundry).

Hipster typefaces: Bobo (Jean-Baptiste Morizot).

Script typefaces: Gerolinda (Antonio Vignali). Beautiful Friends (Darwin Huayan Harahap). Solantra (Stephen Rapp). Escafina (Riley Cran). Dambera Retro (Dusan Jelesijevic). Rosaline (Jeremie Hornus). Modigirl Script (Moriz Type). Vena Amoris (Kathryn Podorsky, Delve Fonts). A wedding invitation font. Mon Voir (Dathan Boardman). Shyntia Bella (Darwin Huayan Harahap). A 1300+ glyph calligraphic script with hundreds of swash characters. Sleeplesson Script (Siwox Smoke). Cheers (Callie Hegstrom). An extensive curly script. Wedding Font (Darwin Huayan Harahap, BedRoom Studio). A high-contrast calligraphic cutie loaded with opentype features. Berow (Katsia Jazwinska).

Brush typefaces: Jane Bugg (Klapaucius Co).

Sketched, Layered or Poster typefaces: Town (Jason Vandenberg). Black Pack (Juanjo Lopez). Organique (Jakob Fischer). Frontage Condensed (Juri Zaech). Thug and Thug Rough (Jeremie Hornus). Austral Slab (Antipixel). Okojo Slab Pro Stack (Ian Lynam). Posterama (Jim Ford). Mighty Slab (Ryoichi Tsunekawa). A layered slab. Basecoat (Jonathan Ball). A handcrafted geometric sans serif inspired by sign painting and modern gothics. Botanique (Pintassilgo Prints). A handcrafted revival of Lucian Bernhard's Schmalfette Bernhard Antiqua, I put it here mainly because Bernhard's typeface is the striking typeface I have been using for a decade as a titling typeface on my own web site. Let's say that I am biased. Novecento Carved (Synthview). Leutner (Aaron Sechrist). Prismatic layered system, wonderfully presented. Devinyl (Nico Inosanto). Expreso (John Vargas Beltran).

Blackletter typefaces: Wittingau (Frantisek Storm).

Dingbats and ornaments: Roijer Ornaments and Roijer Dingbats (Pedro Gonzalez Jorquera, aka Peggo). Ciao Bella (Charles Gibbons and Cindy Kinash at Oddsorts). These floral ornaments can be set in multicolors and stacked by making clever use of kerning. Kinfolk Pro (Hanneke Classen). Check out the useful set of hand-drawn arrows, and the way in which they correlate with the brushed mother font.

Garalde typefaces: Garalda (2016, Xavier Dupré at TypeTogether).

Display typefaces: Kaligari (Franziska Weitgruber). A German expressionist typeface family. Juline (Hajime Kawakami, URW). Becky (Magdalena Arasanz). Gothiks Compressed (Daniel Sabino). Gastromond (James Todd). Breul Grotesk (Chatnarong Jingsuphatada). A 32-style Bauhaus-inspired geometric typeface with sharp (A) and rounded (B) subfamilies. Amphibia (Frantisek Storm). Krana Fat (Schick Toikka). Title (Julie Soudanne and Jérémie Hornus). Designed for movie credits. Canilari (Patricio Truenos). Cortese (David Kerkhoff). A poster typefaces with many interlocking ligatures. Ciutadella Display (Eduardo Manso). Oposta (Pedro Leal). Chercan (2016, Francisco Galvez, Pampa Type). Schizotype Grotesk (Dave Rowland). Brim Combined (Jamie Clarke). Bumpo (Deepak Dogra). An exercise in plumpness. ATC Harris (Quan Ika, Avondale Type Company). A nifty monospaced programming font. Triade (Etienne Aubert Bonn). A heavy titling or display typeface with tons of personality.

Slab serif typefaces: Bombarda (Alexander Lubovenko, Paratype). An ultra-black slab for Latin and Cyrillic. Humble (Aylin Karaman). Sagona (René Bieder). Gimlet (David Jonathan Ross). Inspired by Georg Trump's Schadow (1938) and turned into a 112-style Opentype family. Davis (Patrick Griffin, Canada Type). Knile (Maria Ramos, Atipo).

Copperplate: Bluebell (Emil Bertell, Fenotype). Spencerio (Jérémie Hornus and Julie Soudanne, Indian Type Foundry). Not quite copperplate, but this Spencerian calligraphic script comes close.

Wood type revivals: MFC Rodizio (Brian J. Bonislawsky and Jim Lyles). Gothiks (Daniel Sabino, Blackletra). Not exactly a wood type revival, but these condensed variable width typefaces were influenced are undeniably linked to the early gothic wood types in style.

Letterpress emulation: Noyh A Bistro and Cafe Press (Chatnarong Jingsuphatada, Typesketchbook).

Didone typefaces: Fino, Fino Sans and Fino Stencil by Ermin Mededovic at Type Together. A tall and stately caps-only didone family. Ambroise Pro (2016, Jean-François Porchez). A revision and extension of the 2001 version. Pergamon (Coen Hofmann, URW++). A revival of Alfons Scheider's Pergamon Antiqua (1937, at Ludwig Wagner). Trianon Normande (Loic Sander, with the aid of Sandra Carrera, Roxane Gataud and Yoann Minet at Production Type). Leducation (David Engelby). Haboro (Jeremy Dooley). A large didone family with wedge serifs and without ball terminals.

Fashion mag typefaces: Didonesque (Paulo Goode). Favela (Mateusz Machalski). Le Jeune (2016, Greg Gazdowicz, Christian Schwartz and Paul Barnes). Done for a revamp of Vanity Fair. FS Siena (Krista Radoeva and Jason Smith). Camila (Paula Nazal Selaive, Latinotype). Didone fashion magic. Prangs (Alejandro Paul, Sudtipos). A swashy perfectly rendered italic fashion didone.

Revivals: Baroque Pearl (Ralph M. Unger). A revival of Peter A. Demeter's Fournier Geperlt (1922, Schriftguss). Schmalfette CP (Jason Walcott and Rob King). A revival of Walter Haettenschweiler's original from 1954. Irena (David Kerkhoff). A tribute to Vojtech Preissig's cubist / expressionist style. Monument Grotesk (Robin Mientjes). This stone carving typeface revives architectural lettering by Piet Zwart. LTC Village (Paul D. Hunt, P22). Developed in 2005 and released in 2016, it is based on Goudy's warm Venetian typeface, Village.

Stencil typefaces: Acherus Militant (Horizon Type). Armatura (Sergey Godovalov). Paradise Sans Stencil (Teo Tuominen). Milka. By Ani Petrova, Botio Nikoltchev, Adam Twardoch and Andreas Eigendorf, based on a 1979 original by Milka Peikova. Popsky (Igor Petrovic). A popart font described as constructivism wearing sunglasses. Clerk (Kasper Pyndt).

Multilingual typefaces: GT Eesti (Reto Moser, Grillitype). GT Eesti (Latin & Cyrillic) is a free-spirited interpretation of the Soviet geometric sans serif Zhurnalnaya Roublennaya, first released in 1947 and designed by Anatoly Shchukin. Bustani (Kamal Mansour and Patrick Giasson, Monotype). A Naskh style adaptive font for Arabic, Farsi and Urdu.

Wonderful, adorable, refreshing typefaces: Beatrix Antiqua (2016). By Francesco Canovaro, Cosimo Lorenzo Pancini and Andrea Tartarelli for Zetafonts. Regina Black (Charles & Thorn). Digerati Mono (Kyle Jones).

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Best typefaces of 2016 ⦿ Articles on type design written by Luc Devroye ⦿