Vicenza
Italic
Add type sampleCredits
Background
Stanley Morison enlisted Fredric Warde to design a modernized version of the Arrighi chancery cursive. Warde designed three, which differ mainly in the upper serifs of the ascenders. The second version, Vicenza, extend to the left and angle sharply.
Warde worked with fine printers in Europe from 1925 to 1927. His most important collaboration there was with Giovanni Mardersteig, printer of the Officina Bodoni, who printed two books with the first two of Warde’s Arrighi types, one book in each of the versions. The first book to use the second variation was called Crito: A Socratic Dialogue by Plato and the colophon called the face Vicenza.
One of the rarest typefaces in the world, the only casting still in existence owned by Peter Koch Printers in Berkeley, California. Current location of punches and matrices is unknown.
Background Source
- Morison, Stanley. Early Italian Writing Books. Boston: Godine, 1980
- Lawson, Alexander. Anatomy of a Typeface. Boston: Godine, 1990
- Robert Dickover, Stalwart Sloth Press
- Peter Koch, Peter Koch Printers
Caturrita