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We The People

We The People

by K-Type
Individual Styles from $20.00
Complete family of 3 fonts: $20.00
We The People Font Family was designed by Keith Bates and published by K-Type. We The People contains 3 styles and family package options.

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About We The People Font Family


This typeface is extrapolated from the ‘We the People’ calligraphy of the handwritten US Constitution Preamble which employed a style based on German Text and Square Text exemplars from George Bickham’s penmanship copy-books, the most celebrated being The Universal Penman published in 1743.


The original Constitution document was transcribed onto parchment by Jacob Shallus, a Pennsylvania Assistant Clerk, over a weekend in 1787. Shallus’s biographer, Arthur Plotnik (The Man Behind the Quill, 1987), notes that he was paid $30, a modest monthly wage at the time. He also suggests that the calligraphic headings, ‘We the People’ and ‘Article’, may have been inserted by Shallus’s 14 year old trainee son, Francis,


“The manner in which the ‘Article’ headings are squeezed into the space Shallus allowed for them suggests a second hand—and perhaps not a very experienced one.”


The unconventional backslant of the headings would seem to support this contention, and at the end of the document there is perhaps a novice’s inconsistency in the structure of the letter n between that used for ‘done’ and those used for ‘In Witness’. However, one has to admire the elegant swagger of the wavy t, h and l which the K-Type font extends to the b, f and k. Also, the simpler, Schwabacher-style W, an enlarged version of the lowercase w, is a little less flamboyant than the capital W from the German and Square texts in Bickham’s manuals.


For designers using OpenType-aware applications, the typeface includes some Alternates, including a Bickham-style W, the letters t, h and n with added flourishes, two simpler forms of the A, and a few roman numerals for numbering articles. Also some ornamental flourishes and a round middle dot/decimal point. Punctuation marks are drawn in square, calligraphic style, but an alternative round period/full stop, for use with currency and numerals, is available at the period centered position (though placed on the baseline), accessed by Shift Option 9 on a Mac, or Alt 0183 on Windows. The full phrase, ‘We the People’, has been placed at the trademark keystroke and can be accessed by Option 2 (or Shift Option 2) on a Mac, or Alt 0153 on Windows.


For designers who find the backslant awkward or unpleasant, the licensed typeface also includes two additional fonts which have a vertical aspect that may be more conducive to graphic design layouts. ‘We The People Upright’ and ‘We The People Upright Bold’ both retain the distinctive style, and the heavier weight is only slightly emboldened, just enough to add some punch.

Designers: Keith Bates

Publisher: K-Type

Foundry: K-Type

Design Owner: K-Type

MyFonts debut: Feb 1, 2021

We The People

About K-Type

K-Type is a small, independent type foundry based in Manchester England, offering a unique range of high quality fonts which are modestly and simply priced for designers, small businesses and large organisations.In addition to creating new typefaces resulting from formal experimentation, many K-Type fonts show the influence of inspirational artists and designers, many exploring the mix of insular and eclectic that has forged the typographical landscape of Britain and America.K-Type is also keen to make affordable fonts from styles which possess cultural currency or an existing social presence, generally redrawn to include comprehensive character sets containing a full complement of Latin Extended-A glyphs. New, previously unavailable weights and italics are often designed and added.

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