Week 27, 2024
Releases:
Azahar Display & Text
29LT
→ "29LT Azahar is a pleasant and reader-friendly typeface in the text style balanced with a sharp and graceful display version. Its name is rooted in the elegance and fragility of the orange tree blossom, also called Azahar in Spanish originally comes from the Arabic word الزَّهْرَة (az-zahra). Its mixed origin illustrates the fusion of different cultures and mirrors 29LT’s dedication to the creation of multi-script typefaces."
Icona Sans
Suitcase Type
→ Icona Sans is a neutral typeface with a high x-height, a wide range of weights with adequate italics, and an extensive character set covering Latin, Cyrillic, and Greek. Many alternative characters find use in changes of typesetting character.
Business Didot
Pizza Typefaces
→ Business Didot is a contemporary interpretation of the historical Didot model, packaged together in a tidy package of tow fonts: a regular weight and a matching italic. Business Didot is released as a companion to the foundry's experimental Business Blooming typeface, which is a fanciful script typeface with a similar contrast model. Pizza Typefaces calls Business Didot 'confident', and we have to agree! Be sure to dive into the details and small quirkier moments like the full bar ascender serifs and hockey stick descenders.
Columba
East of ROme
→ Columba is a typeface that was actually released through Colophon back in 2020, but since Colophon's sale to Monotype designer Lewis McGuffie got the type family back, added additional language support, and decided to re-release the refreshed family through his own foundry East of Rome. "Columba is an award winning type family made for long reads, tight columns, footnotes and references in print and retina screen editorial design. Inspired by old-style types and polytonic bibles Columba has five weights, two optical sizes, italics and covers three scripts – Latin, Cyrillic and Greek."
Subito
Luis Bandovas on Future Fonts
→ "Subito is a contemporary almost mono-linear geometric typeface inspired by the classics like Avant Garde and Century Gothic, but designed with more versatility in mind. Well-proportioned and balanced, it shares a generous x-height with these. Its narrower width makes it great for longer texts, not just titles. The lighter weights are good for big sizes, the medium ones for regular text, and the bolder version for impactful info and headlines."
Agna
DSType
→ Agna is a large editorial serif megafamily from DSType with 4 optical size subfamilies and a collection of assorted "poster" styles that make any level of contemporary editorial design accessible. "Drawing inspiration from the refined proportions of Pierre-Simon Fournier’s Petit-Canon, Agna pays homage to the storied tradition and meticulous craftsmanship of 18th-century French typography." Agna is also released with 'Pro' versions of each of the 4 optical size subfamilies which offer thorough global language support. Designed by Pedro Leal, Agna is an rather inspiring collection of fonts.
SubSans
Out of the dark
→ Sub Sans, a new structured humanist sans family of 8 weights with matching italics "emerged from research dedicated to exploring new shapes for a subtitling typeface tailored to the demands of the streaming services era, particularly for the fields of film and television. Quickly developing a fascination with the humanist sans-serif genre, the typeface is drawing inspiration in its construction from the timeless directional signage fonts of the 1960s and 1970s by Adrian Frutiger such as Concorde and Alphabet Roissy, as well as the display characteristics and memorability of Ernst Friz’s Friz Quadrata. Especially its dynamic contrast, curved stroke endings as well as short ascenders and descenders have proved to be an influence."
Tiny Grotesque
Optimo
→ Tiny Grotesque, as the name would imply, is a Grotesque sans family "inspired by the ingenious solutions of punchcutters who crafted typefaces for optimal legibility at minute sizes. With its inviting warmth and practical functionality, Tiny Grotesque boasts a high level of readability, harmonious forms, and playful features. From expressive to rational aesthetics, its stylistic sets offer a range of options which convey a variety of moods." Tiny Grotesque with it's featured ink traps lands as a simple family of 5 weights with roman and italic styles for a total of 10 fonts total.
2023 Annual Report — Out Now!
Packed with stats, insights, and analysis, the 2023 Annual Report is the most comprehensive look into the economics and storylines from the world of independent type.
Full Season of Typecraft is now Free!
All six episodes of the podcast miniseries focused on the stories behind Custom Typography are available now, for free, wherever you listen to podcasts.