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Ivo’s Best Fonts of 2013–2014
The best typefaces of the previous two years, according to yours truly (as published on Fontwerk.com).
Since 2007, I’m writing about my favorite new type releases of each year on my private blog. After I’ve missed my traditional best-of list in 2013, this year’s list includes my favorite typefaces from the last two years. Listed are those typefaces, that are available on FontShop. Find further information, more fonts as well as individual showings on Fontwerk.com.
The Handel Gothic™ typeface has been a mainstay of graphic communication for over 40 years - all the while looking as current as... Read More
It was the first FontFont that was designed after we’ve identified a gap in the library. The project climaxed in the release of both FF Mark and a microsite that set new standards for the way fonts are presented online. Both the final result and the typeface’s success eventually exceeded expectations of everybody involved.
FF Mark is one of the most iconic geometric sans serif typefaces of our time. Created by German type designers Hannes von Döhren,... Read More
The typeface that lives in the lonely land between Antiquarico and Slabserifistan, has everything that typographers need to be happy: individuality, personality, durability, an extensive glyph set … and maybe even a sans serif counterpart (someday).
Under the guidance of Albert-Jan Pool and Professor André Heers, Jakob Runge started designing the typeface that would ultimately become... Read More
What a beautiful ink festival made of uppercase characters and catch words Ulrike Rausch celebrates with her LiebeDoris! Flamboyant yet reserved. American yet European. A family of four yet with individual characters. Reduced to the essential yet with many OpenType gimmicks. You can still see the brush flying over the paper.
Inspired by a workshop with iconic American sign painter Mike Meyer, Ulrike of LiebeFonts set out to create a versatile, lovely typeface... Read More
FF Bauer Grotesk is an outstanding example of an attempt to safe an old design that hasn’t been available in digital form into the 21. century. Still close to the original, Thomas Ackermann and Felix Bonge totally reached their goal to come up with a versatile contemporary typeface.
FF Bauer Grotesk breathes new digital life into the metal type “Friedrich Bauer Grotesk”, a 1933 release by the Trennert & Sohn type... Read More
Antithesis illustrates the concept of tension between three unequal poles. Each of the three members of the display family relate to each other in a very high visual contrast. The Regular is a rather blocky Serif, the Italic a connected Script and the Bold a heavy Sans. Each is designed to accompany any of the two others to produce compositions with high visual tension. In creating an... Read More
It took Hannes von Döhren and Livius Dietzel two years to develop and complete the Brix Sans family – the companion of the well-known Brix Slab. The approach was to design an independent type family following the rules of the Sans Serif genre, harmonizing with its older sister Brix Slab from the Slab Serif genre. The result is a family of 6 weights with matching italics, which works perfectly... Read More
Originally designed during her Type and Media masters course at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, FF Dora was drawn by editorial and book designer Slávka Pauliková. It is a strong-willed type system consisting of five styles: Regular, Italic, Bold, Bold Italic, and Display. FF Dora’s construction principles – especially in the italic and display styles – are based on a careful study of... Read More
Originally designed during her Type and Media masters course at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, FF Dora was drawn by editorial and book designer Slávka Pauliková. It is a strong-willed type system consisting of five styles: Regular, Italic, Bold, Bold Italic, and Display. FF Dora’s construction principles – especially in the italic and display styles – are based on a careful study of... Read More
Though created from the sans, FF Kievit Slab is not FF Kievit with slabs tacked on. The family is the fruit of a four year collaboration between friends – Mike Abbink and Paul van der Laan – to make the perfect companion to the FF Kievit family. Each glyph was painstakingly adjusted and to achieve the proper density, contrast, and balance across the typeface, and additionally when used in... Read More
FF Marselis mixes geometric and humanistic models, creating a freshly dynamic sans serif family. All of the apertures in the typeface are wide open; this aids readers’ eyes quickly flow across lines of text, without experiencing hang-ups. Certain superfluous strokes have been eliminated – b and q are spurless, for instance. The letterforms’ diagonals all bow outwards slightly, adding flavor to... Read More
FF Milo Slab is not just the sans with slabs attached. It has undergone a wide range of careful adjustments from increased contrast, longer ascenders and descenders and modified glyphs in the heavier weights. All these changes amount a typeface that feels enough like Milo but also can stand on its own as a new and fresh typeface. The slab also has a more horizontal feel since the terminals... Read More
Frank Grießhammer started FF Quixo out as graduation project while studying in the Type and Media program at KABK Den Haag. Learning pointed-pen calligraphy, he explored a more casual dimension by interpreting the model with different-sized brushes. In the typeface presented at graduation each of the weights is based on a different writing tool. Afterward, the concept was re-evaluated and... Read More
Details like the splay of the upper and lowercase W, alternate cursive constructions of a, g, & y, and its crimped spurs distinguish Texta from other popular faces that mix humanist sans, geometric, and American gothic models. The face comes in a mirrored set of regular and alternate forms, filling out a full eight weights.
It was the first ITC that was designed after we’ve identified a gap in the library. The project climaxed in the release of both ITC Handel Gothic and a microsite that set new standards for the way fonts are presented online. Both the final result and the typeface’s success eventually exceeded expectations of everybody involved.