Search Results: Lucas Young Alphabeta 2013

Her name does not rhyme with “bike”, but is pronounced “Ool-ree-kah” — a common girls’ name in her native Germany. Born and raised in Berlin, she studied at the University of Applied Sciences in nearby Potsdam, with a short but game-changing intermezzo in Florence, Italy. Four years ago she came to MyFonts with a collection of witty picture fonts; but it was an alphabetic typeface that gave her foundry LiebeFonts (“sweet fonts”) its first hit — LiebeErika was one of our Top Fonts of 2010. Ulrike’s skills are equal parts handicraft and digital savvy, and her fonts are as technically sophisticated as they are charming. Meet the talented Ulrike Wilhelm, in love with letterforms.

Type designers (mostly the male ones) have often compared the curves of a well-drawn font to the female silhouette. Oh well, you may say, boys will be boys, and a little sensual fantasy will probably help reconcile designers to the fact that what they’re staring at for hundreds of hours are actually sterile pixels on a monitor representing unfeeling Bézier curves… But no, you’re wrong. Type designers are imaginative and sensitive people, and their relationship with those shapes on the screen can be something just as heart-felt as a painter’s love affairs with canvases, brushes and colors. Watch as the energetic, luscious and rounded shapes of this month’s Stars unfold.

Sorry, purists among you. This newsletter has turned out a little exuberant. It must have been something in the air, or perhaps it was the sheer quantity of sunlight that shone on so many of us over the past few months — the font-loving public seems to have been lusting for flourish. Most of the stars of the moment bathe in ornament and swashes. What’s true for hip-hop probably goes for typography too; you either love the bling, or you hate it. Should the latter be the case, please scroll down to our impressively serious Text Font section. We also have some great MyFonts news for screen typography addicts. Enjoy!

If the Best Seller lists on MyFonts are something of a barometer of trends in typography, then there are two main currents — and they are diametrically opposed. One: the minimalism of cool, clean slab and sans-serif fonts. Two: the delight in exuberance, ornament, cheerful irregularity and all that looks handmade. This month, with summer in the air for many of us, the scale has most definitely tipped towards the latter. It’s May, and our Rising Stars — even the Text Fonts of the month — are bursting with joie de vivre. Enjoy!

Many of you must have marveled at the number of typefaces offered at astonishing introductory discounts these days. A large, well-equipped font family at the price of a single font — that would have sounded like commercial suicide three years ago. It has now proved to be an effective way of promoting fonts, at least for some. MyFonts, your humble distributor, doesn’t decide about promotions. It’s our partners, the foundries, that come up with these ideas. But one thing we’re certainly pleased about is that so many people buy complete font families now. To have many weights to play with, from Thin to Black, can be so much more rewarding than making do with a couple of weights, just because you can’t afford more... And as this newsletter shows, there are still fonts that become popular simply on the strength of a great design.

Each typefoundry is unique, but some are more unique than others. Initiated by David Březina from Brno in the Czech Republic, the Rosetta foundry specializes in fonts for writing systems other than the Latin script (the one you’re reading now). Contributing to its growing library of beyond-Latin typefaces is a group of young designers from eight different countries, several of whom have acquired an MA in Type Design at the University of Reading (pronounced “redding” — a town not far from London). We managed to capture three of them at their alma mater, as shown above; they agreed to answer our questions about designing type for the world.

He is not one of those type designers who produces a new font family every two or three months. Each of his typefaces has taken considerable time to mature, and it shows: they are thoughtful, original and well-wrought. Rather than responding to passing trends, his Emtype Foundry publishes fonts that are aimed at having a long shelf-life, and his Geogrotesque has been a bestseller ever since it came out five years ago. He is also prepared to pull his weight when it comes to nourishing international typographic culture — he’ll be co-organizer of next year’s ATypI conference, the world’s major annual get-together of type designers. Meet Eduardo Manso, an Argentinian who has made Barcelona his home.

He is one of those type designers who taught himself the craft by making experimental geometric fonts, then traveled a steep learning curve by continually challenging himself. Within years he was designing highly original, beautifully drawn typefaces, and winning awards. Several of his most striking faces were published by Fountain in Sweden. He still releases work with them, but some years ago launched his own one-man label, operating from Lisbon, Portugal. Among his side projects is a series of splendid videos he designed and directed to accompany his typeface releases. Meet the multi-talented Rui Abreu.

He’s arguably the most widely read type designer in the world. Verdana, Georgia, Tahoma, Skia: all ubiquitous, all his. Miller, one of North America’s most popular news faces — his initiative. Bell Centennial, drawn for AT&T, has been used in millions of phone books. His typefaces are all across the stylistic spectrum, from elegant renaissance oldstyles via meticulous scripts to indestructible sans-serifs. Having started as an apprentice at age 19, he has been in the business for the best part of six decades and is still passionately interested in the latest technological developments. He revels in working with demanding technicians and challenging projects. Here is our long-awaited interview with Matthew Carter.

"Sibylle Hagmann interview, April 2013"

His typefaces are as varied as the places he’s lived in. Is that the reason why his foundry is called Schizotype? No, he says, the name was pure serendipity — as was the way in which his love affair with lettering and type began. He came to MyFonts as a hobbyist type designer offering a bunch of carefree and less-than-perfect fun fonts, but quickly honed his skills. He began putting out ever more sophisticated and increasingly successful typefaces, from luscious scripts to idiosyncratic yet usable text types. Meet Dave Rowland, calling from Koh Samui, Thailand.

This month’s interviewee was an international free-font hero while still in his teens, before attending design college, dropping out, and becoming a well-known graphic designer and illustrator. Having made stunning illustrations and typographic posters for clients in the cultural and editorial sectors, he eventually specialized in energetic script and display fonts. His foundry Fenotype has been at MyFonts for a mere three years, but it feels as if it’s been longer. His fonts were featured in our Fonts-of-the-Year lists of 2011 and 2012, making him the most successful type designer from the Nordic countries currently on MyFonts. Meet Emil Bertell, our man in Turku, Finland.

They are four designers from Barcelona: Laura Meseguer, José Manuel (aka Josema) Urós, Joan Barjau and Enric Jardí. They’re a loosely-knit collective of independent individuals, each with their own activities as graphic designers, writers and teachers. They have been making and publishing fonts since the early days of desktop type design, and pioneered digital techniques that are now commonplace. Their fonts represent an approach that is, perhaps, typically Catalan: simultaneously adventurous and serious, witty and well-conceived. They recently released a string of new typefaces by Laura and Josema alongside some by other brilliant Barcelona designers. Meet the delegates of Type-Ø-Tones, a foundry that deserves respect.

He is one of those lettering artists who learned the craft right at the time when it was becoming obsolete. While passionate about calligraphy and sign painting, he loves working with digital design tools. He has drawn custom logos and titles for prestigious companies. He has produced a string of successful font families, of which the most recent — Desire — took him an estimated 7,000 working hours. He was a mentor to fellow lettering artists Laura Worthington and Debi Sementelli, both of whom he helped to perfect their digital skills. Meet Charles Borges de Oliveira from Borges Lettering, building bridges between hand crafts and digital savvy.

Based in Concepción and Santiago, Chile, Latinotype’s founders say, “Our goal is to design new typefaces remixing diverse influences related to our South American identity with high quality products for the contemporary design industry.” And the trio have been doing just that since their foundry’s creation in 2007.

Nils Types is the result of one talented young designer putting a business behind his life-long passion for lettering and graffiti. In 2013 Nils Thomsen decided to focus on his love of drawing letters and conceptualizing font families and start his own foundry.

Located in Concepción, Chile, Los Andes was established in 2011 by Daniel Hernandez, Miguel Hernandez and Luciano Vergara as a spin-off of LatinoType. Their goal was simple: to make typefaces that would simplify the job of the designers who used them. The young foundry published its first typeface, Pantano, that same year and the rest, as they say, is history.

He is one of those lettering artists who learned the craft right at the time when it was becoming obsolete. While passionate about calligraphy and sign painting, he loves working with digital design tools. He has drawn custom logos and titles for prestigious companies. He has produced a string of successful font families, of which the most recent — Desire — took him an estimated 7,000 working hours. He was a mentor to fellow lettering artists Laura Worthington and Debi Sementelli, both of whom he helped to perfect their digital skills. Meet Charles Borges de Oliveira from Borges Lettering, building bridges between hand crafts and digital savvy.

He is one of those lettering artists who learned the craft right at the time when it was becoming obsolete. While passionate about calligraphy and sign painting, he loves working with digital design tools. He has drawn custom logos and titles for prestigious companies. He has produced a string of successful font families, of which the most recent — Desire — took him an estimated 7,000 working hours. He was a mentor to fellow lettering artists Laura Worthington and Debi Sementelli, both of whom he helped to perfect their digital skills. Meet Charles Borges de Oliveira from Borges Lettering, building bridges between hand crafts and digital savvy.

He is one of those lettering artists who learned the craft right at the time when it was becoming obsolete. While passionate about calligraphy and sign painting, he loves working with digital design tools. He has drawn custom logos and titles for prestigious companies. He has produced a string of successful font families, of which the most recent — Desire — took him an estimated 7,000 working hours. He was a mentor to fellow lettering artists Laura Worthington and Debi Sementelli, both of whom he helped to perfect their digital skills. Meet Charles Borges de Oliveira from Borges Lettering, building bridges between hand crafts and digital savvy.

Trends in type come and go the way they do in fashion and music (anybody remember grunge?) but sometimes here at MyFonts we are surprised by the things that catch on. Take the current craze in chromatic fonts. That’s the specialist term for display alphabets in a range of variations that can be layered to decorative and dazzling multi-colored effect. We figured that layering text frames would be a bit too laborious for this technique to become a massive success, but guess what? Thousands are buying these fonts, and several recent families in this genre have become hits. We are getting curious to see what people make with them; scroll down to the news section for details on how to share your work with us.

Based in Santiago, Chile, Latinotype has been one of the most successful foundries on MyFonts in recent years. Their type library is a rapidly growing collection of typefaces in a wide array of genres. They specialize in colorful display and script faces, but have recently focused on sophisticated text faces as well. The foundry is owned and managed by a trio of type designers, two of whom have the same family name but are unrelated: Miguel Hernández, Luciano Vergara and Daniel Hernández. Yet Latinotype has worked with about a dozen talented, young designers and hopes to welcome more. Meet three of the most productive type designers in Latin America.

"Melle Diete interview, December 2011"

With Spring comes a staggering number of new releases to the MyFonts catalog. While the first few months of the year are often a time for accelerated releases from many of our established foundries, the last few months have brought us not only several dozen notable new releases from MyFonts staples, but over a dozen new designers as well, all of whom we are very excited to welcome.

Belated best wishes for 2013 from the MyFonts team! The time for our Fonts-of-the-Year list has finally come. Perhaps you wonder how it was put together. We’ll be brief. Basically, this is a list that you, as our users, have voted for — with your wallet. It is based on sales (revenue, not number of copies sold) of fonts that have first appeared on MyFonts since December 1st, 2011. It’s not simply the total sales volume across the year, because that would give an unfair advantage to those that have been on sale longest. So we’ve looked at average sales, correcting for what we might call the Introduction Sales Peak (ISP), kept the number of font families from the same foundry down to a maximum of two, and made sure popular genres are fairly represented. There you go: a type hit parade like no other. Thanks for helping us put it together.

This month’s interviewee left Buenos Aires almost a decade ago to study type design in the Netherlands. He put down roots in Amsterdam and set up ReType, one of the country’s most productive and versatile type foundries. An avid reader of books on type history, he is equally inspired by ancient calligraphy, Dutch modernism and vernacular lettering. He has roamed the streets of Amsterdam to research letterforms that few Dutch designers ever paid serious attention to, and digitized some of them into beautifully made and wonderfully usable fonts. Meet Ramiro Espinoza, an Argentinian designer in the land of windmills.

Best wishes for the brand new year from the MyFonts team — all twelve of us. From our respective locations in Massachusetts, Berlin, Sacramento, Bristol, and Siem Reap, we wish you a splendid, happy and successful 2012 wherever you are.

He is probably Finland’s most prolific type designer, and his foundry is simply named Suomi — which, of course, is what the Finns call their country. While working with us on this interview, he realized with a slight shock that he’s been in the font game for two decades. Yet his letterforms are as youthful and fresh as ever. His most recent offerings, such as the smart handwriting face Suomi Script and the spirited Suomi Sans, show a convincing mixture of attitude and maturity. Meet Tomi Haaparanta, our man in Helsinki.

"In Your Face Autumn 2006 "

Welcome to another jam-packed issue of In Your Face! This quarter, we have more new type than ever, both from new foundries as well as from designers who are already established with MyFonts. Highlights abound — from full-featured multi-weight/width sans-serif families to some of the most original display type in the world — and we are certain that you'll find plenty of useful bits and pieces to add to your type library.

When Toronto’s Canada Type font foundry made their first appearance in 2004, they could have been just another microfoundry producing nicely made display and script fonts. Over the years, it became clear that they were much more. Although they’re just two people — Rebecca Alaccari and Patrick Griffin — their output has been phenomenal, and of consistently high quality. When they do a revival, they go for the “more is more” approach, investing old letterforms with unseen possibilities. When they design a new typeface, the result can be as luxurious as Memoriam or as modestly practical as Informa. We already interviewed Rebecca in pre-Creative Characters times, so this month it’s the other half of the company that does the talking. Meet Patrick Griffin, the passionate font guy in the leather hat.