Hello, and welcome to the REN FONT foundry!
REN FONT has steadily built its reputation by repeatedly earning accolades in the Typeface category of the “Yearbook,” an exhibition organized by the Japan Typography Association (NPO). Founded in 2001 with the aim of bringing a fresh breeze to the font industry, REN FONT continues to create distinctive typefaces that stand out.
The hand-drawn-style fonts crafted by REN FONT’s type designer, Kazuo Kanai, have received high praise from professional designers and typographers for their exceptional quality.
A Message from Kazuo Kanai
With the exception of our comprehensive typeface Waon, our company has been particularly dedicated to producing kana fonts in the traditional Mincho and Gothic styles. Most of these fonts have been developed as multi-weight families — and there’s a good reason for that.
In Japanese text, kana characters account for roughly 70% of the total. Even so, kana fonts have little significance on their own; it is only when combined with kanji that they take on “meaning” and come to life.
Most vendors offer font weights in seven to nine variations, from “Light” to “Ultra,” but there are no universal standards for these weight categories — each vendor defines them differently. As a result, a “Light” weight from one vendor may differ subtly in thickness from another. For kana fonts to pair harmoniously with such variations and truly come alive, a finer gradation of weights is essential.
This is why our kana fonts feature such detailed weight variations.
Simply changing the kana can greatly enrich the expression of a typeface.
We hope you will make the most of our kana fonts, blending them freely with other typefaces to create combinations that perfectly suit your taste.
A Focus on Readability
Shizuka Mincho Large Kana 5-Weight Font Family
A straightforward form ideal for novels and long text.
While 靜明朝大かな (Shizumi Mincho Large Kana) resembles traditional typefaces, it is not a revival. Instead, it is a well-balanced design that blends a modern sensibility into a classical form. Mincho kana often carry distinctive quirks, but Shizuka Mincho minimizes those idiosyncrasies to achieve a clean, straightforward impression. The typeface comes in two versions: Large Kana and Small Kana. This font is the Large Kana version, optimized for horizontal typesetting, offering a clear and highly readable form well-suited to contemporary literature.
Based on the everyday handwriting of our type designer Kazuo Kanai, Shizuka Mincho combines the formal structure of traditional Mincho with a touch of modern refinement. The family includes five weights—Light (L), Regular (R), Medium (M), Demi-Bold (DB), and Bold (B). While it preserves an old-style atmosphere, its large kana design is not constrained by convention, giving it the versatility to adapt to modern composition needs.
Why It Excels in Horizontal Typesetting
Today, horizontal text has become the standard, with most documents laid out this way due to functionality and the increased mixing of Japanese with English. Yet kana were originally designed for vertical writing, and setting them horizontally often causes issues. Many kana characters are naturally narrow, which creates awkward spacing when used in justified horizontal text, reducing readability. In fact, we are accustomed to reading text that is less legible than it could be simply out of habit.
Shizuka Mincho Large Kana addresses this by slightly widening the narrow kana and enlarging the overall proportions. This reduces irregular spacing, resulting in smoother flow and greater legibility for horizontal text layouts.
