Type News: Unhelvetican
If it feels like this past week flew by, it did for us too. Shall we?
Type among us
Bogglingly prolific letterer Laura Worthington has released her second font family in just under a month. The airy Mandevilla provides three semi-serif’d weights worth of open forms, “tendril-like” swashes, and subtle lachrymal terminalia. As with most of Worthington’s typefaces, alternates and typographic options are both plentiful and playfully deployed.
Perhaps better known for some of his weathered reproductions and experimental type, Poland’s Mateusz Machalski also proves he can sweat the geometric details. His Aneba consists of five squarish, low contrast weights in sans serif form. Details include a set of suitable obliques, slightly curved diagonals, and restrained “ink traps.”
Rui Abreu refers to Azo Sans as a “humanized geometric grotesque”. That particular description covers an awful lot of taxonomic ground, but it’s an accurate assessment. Throughout the six weights — from thin to black — the family maintains a aesthetic balance. Constructivist-inspired forms and the golden section come into play, but are softened with several design “nuances” — slight variations in the diagonals, optically adjusted counters, and modulated bowls.
Brisko Sans is a deceptively simple, five weight family from Dušan Jelesijević. Generous letterspacing, a quirky binocular g, and smattering of jaunty endings make for an interestingly modern sans — straddling both text and display. Feel like taking Brisko for a brisk walk? The bold and bold italic styles are available as free downloads from the Tour de Fonts site.
Adding to the mix, Jelesijević also released Brisko Display — an alternate cut of Brisko’s black weight — featuring a handful of tweaked characters, redrawn with attitude.
Look & read
Oh, my! Here are 21 links that teach and delight (and distract, thank goodness):
- Kris Sowersby shares some of his favorite typefaces in “Playing Favourites” (and continues in part 2 and part 3).
- Dan Rhatigan commemorates the centennial of the commissioning of Edward Johnston’s London Underground typeface.
- F— yeah, typeface design.
- Jon Tan writes about saccades, fixations, scan paths, and typesetting.
- James Young believes that “the responsive web will be 99.9% typography.”
- Iskra Johnson plays with art, lettering, and design at Alphabet Roadtrip.
- Find out what’s being read at Typofonderie.
- Shelley Gruendler shares her fascination with the language of feminine hygiene disposal bags.
- Book people unite!
- Sean Mitchell shows off 38 of his favorite recent typeface releases.
- Grain Edit features the work of Chris Rushing.
- A dress made from typewriters? Not quite.
- Gareth Hague writes about “Sindecut and Cut and Paste.”
- Ben Schott shares some lovely old coin envelopes.
- NBC Universal made a 3.5 million dollar font licensing lawsuit go away.
- Check out “The Reconstructionists.”
- We need reminding every now & then, so Joseph Alessio explains the difference between type and lettering.
- American Airlines has said goodbye to Helvetica and its iconic logo.
- Andrea Stinga and Federico Gonzalez bring us “The ABC of Architects.”
Some things happening
There’s plenty going on. Here are a few key dates:
- The Hamilton Wood Type & Printing Museum has until January 31 to raise $250,000 to fund a move to a new facility. Help them reach their goal!
- Nikki Villagomez discusses Type & Culture on January 31 in San Antonio.
- Then head to Crafting Type Boston, February 2–4, at the MIT Media Lab.
- Thomas Phinney’s “Font Detective” is a part of WebVisions New York, which runs February 27 – March 1.
- Celebrate significant whitespace with Ben Kiel — and learn Basic Python Programming for Typeface Design at the Cooper Union, April 6–7.
Auf Wiedersehen
TTFN and all that. Have a great week!
Thanks, Grant Hutchinson, for five fine faces to add to our collection!
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