Misplaced Pages

#14985

115-493: Akzidenz-Grotesk is a sans-serif typeface family originally released by the Berthold Type Foundry of Berlin . "Akzidenz" indicates its intended use as a typeface for commercial print runs such as publicity, tickets and forms, as opposed to fine printing , and "grotesque" was a standard name for sans-serif typefaces at the time. Originating during the late nineteenth century, Akzidenz-Grotesk belongs to

230-459: A J), but much more common in Germany. Each weight is available in two fonts featuring alternative designs. In 2008, OpenType Pro versions of the fonts were released. FontFont 's FF Schulbuch family is in a similar style. Akzidenz-Grotesk Old Face, designed by Lange and released in 1984, was intended to be more true to the metal type than previous phototypesetting versions and incorporate more of

345-413: A counterpunch, a type of punch used in the cutting of other punches, was often used to create the negative space in or around a glyph . A counterpunch could be used to create this negative space, not just where the space was completely enclosed by the letter, but in any concavity (e.g., above and below the midbar in uppercase "H"). Of course, the counterpunch had to be harder than the punch itself. This

460-402: A counterpunch, they could be nearly identical. Counterpunches were regularly used in this way to give typefaces a more consistent look. The counterpunch would be struck into the face of the punch. The outer form of the letter is then shaped using files. To test the punch, the punchcutter makes an imprint on a piece of paper after coating the punch with soot from an open flame. The soot left by

575-592: A design alleged to be a copy of one of his own original designs: "there are also people who say that the best Helvetica is my AG Book." Digital versions included Greek and Cyrillic characters, and the family includes a condensed, extended, rounded and stencil series. Akzidenz-Grotesk Schoolbook (German: Schulbuch ) is a 1983 variant of Akzidenz-Grotesk Buch also designed by Lange. It uses schoolbook characters , characters intended to be more distinct and closer to handwritten forms to be easier for children to recognise. Generally based on Akzidenz-Grotesk Book, it includes

690-417: A device for emphasis , due to their typically blacker type color . For the purposes of type classification, sans-serif designs are usually divided into three or four major groups, the fourth being the result of splitting the grotesque category into grotesque and neo-grotesque. This group features most of the early (19th century to early 20th) sans-serif designs. Influenced by Didone serif typefaces of

805-439: A letterform. This letterform could be in any metal, so engraving increasingly began to be done by cutting a letterform in soft typemetal. This allowed an explosion in variety of typefaces, especially display typefaces that did not need to be cast so often and for which only a few matrices were needed, and allowed the regeneration (or, often, piracy) of types for which no punches or matrices were available. Pantograph engraving

920-643: A lower-case 'L' with a curl or 'i' with serif under the dot. A particular subgenre of sans-serifs is those such as Rothbury, Britannic , Radiant , and National Trust with obvious variation in stroke width. These have been called 'modulated', 'stressed' or 'high-contrast' sans-serifs. They are nowadays often placed within the humanist genre, although they predate Johnston which started the modern humanist genre. These may take inspiration from sources outside printing such as brush lettering or calligraphy. Letters without serifs have been common in writing across history, for example in casual, non-monumental epigraphy of

1035-522: A more unified range of styles than on previous designs, allowing a wider range of text to be set artistically through setting headings and body text in a single family. The style of design using asymmetric layouts, Helvetica and a grid layout extensively has been called the Swiss or International Typographic Style . This gallery presents images of sans-serif lettering and type across different times and places from early to recent. Particular attention

1150-419: A project in the 1960s to build Akzidenz-Grotesk into a coherent series, to match the new families appearing in the same style; it was used by Berthold for its Diatype system in the late 60s under the name of "Gerstner-Programm" but according to Lange it was never fully released. A digitisation has been released by the digital type foundry Forgotten Shapes. H. Berthold AG of Germany declared bankruptcy in 1993 and

1265-575: A result, printing done in the Latin alphabet for the first three hundred and fifty years of printing was "serif" in style, whether in blackletter , roman type , italic or occasionally script . The earliest printing typefaces which omitted serifs were not intended to render contemporary texts, but to represent inscriptions in Ancient Greek and Etruscan . Thus, Thomas Dempster 's De Etruria regali libri VII (1723), used special types intended for

SECTION 10

#1732793239015

1380-529: A single-storey 'a', curled 'l', lower- and upper-case 'k' that are symmetrical, and 't', 'u' and 'y' without curls on the base. The 'J' has a top bar, the 'M' centre does not descend to the baseline and the 'G' and 'R' are simplified in the manner of Futura. A particularly striking feature is a blackletter-style default upper-case 'i' with a curl at the bottom: this is rarely encountered in the English-speaking world (it would more commonly be recognized as

1495-775: A spurred "G" and an "R" with a curled leg. Capitals tend to be of relatively uniform width. Cap height and ascender height are generally the same to produce a more regular effect in texts such as titles with many capital letters, and descenders are often short for tighter line spacing. They often avoid having a true italic in favor of a more restrained oblique or sloped design, although at least some sans-serif true italics were offered. Examples of grotesque typefaces include Akzidenz-Grotesk , Venus , News Gothic , Franklin Gothic , IBM Plex and Monotype Grotesque . Akzidenz Grotesk Old Face, Knockout, Grotesque No. 9 and Monotype Grotesque are examples of digital fonts that retain more of

1610-417: A strong impact internationally: Helvetica came to be the most used typeface for the following decades. Geometric sans-serif typefaces are based on geometric shapes, like near-perfect circles and squares. Common features are a nearly-circular capital 'O', sharp and pointed uppercase 'N' vertices, and a "single-storey" lowercase letter 'a'. The 'M' is often splayed and the capitals of varying width, following

1725-409: A study of Schelter & Giesecke specimens; Mosley describes this as "thoroughly discredited"; even in 1986 Walter Tracy described the claimed dates as "on stylistic grounds   ... about forty years too early". Sans-serif lettering and typefaces were popular due to their clarity and legibility at distance in advertising and display use, when printed very large or small. Because sans-serif type

1840-460: A tradition of general-purpose, unadorned sans-serif types that had become dominant in German printing during the nineteenth century. Relatively little-known for a half-century after its introduction, it achieved iconic status in the post-war period as the preferred typeface of many Swiss graphic designers in what became called the "International" or "Swiss" design style which became popular across

1955-613: A typeface expressly designed to be suitable for both display and body text. Some humanist designs may be more geometric, as in Gill Sans and Johnston (especially their capitals), which like Roman capitals are often based on perfect squares, half-squares and circles, with considerable variation in width. These somewhat architectural designs may feel too stiff for body text. Others such as Syntax , Goudy Sans and Sassoon Sans more resemble handwriting, serif typefaces or calligraphy. Frutiger , from 1976, has been particularly influential in

2070-406: A vertical spur. The capitals are wide and have relatively little variation in width, with letters like 'E' and 'F' quite wide. The 'M' is straight-sided with the diagonals meeting in the bottom centre of the letter. Capitals in several weights have very noticeably thicker strokes than the lower-case. On many but not all styles a straight leg on the 'R' and a 'Q' where the outstroke does not cut through

2185-486: Is a 'single-storey' design, like in many other German sans-serifs, but unlike the double-storey 'g' found in most serif faces and in many of the earliest sans-serifs that had a lower-case; sans-serif types first appeared in London, but became popular in Germany from the mid-nineteenth century onwards. Walter Tracy describes this style of 'g' as a common feature in German sans-serifs of the period and apparently influenced by

2300-444: Is a technology where a cutting machine is controlled by hand movements and allows type to be cut from large working drawings. It was initially introduced to printing to cut wood type used for posters and headlines. In the 1880s, the typefounder Linn Boyd Benton adapted the technology to cutting very small matrices and steel punches. This gave very precise results and transferred the place of individual creativity completely away from

2415-483: Is a variant designed by Lange between 1969 and 1973. Designed after Helvetica had become popular, it incorporates some of its features, such as strike-through tail in 'Q', a curved tail for the 'R', horizontal and vertical cut stroke terminators. As in some Helvetica versions, the cedilla is replaced with a comma. Former Berthold font designer Erik Spiekermann has called it Lange's "answer to Helvetica". Late in life Lange made no apology for it, commenting when asked about

SECTION 20

#1732793239015

2530-562: Is called Egyptian Characters ". Around 1816, the Ordnance Survey began to use 'Egyptian' lettering, monoline sans-serif capitals, to mark ancient Roman sites. This lettering was printed from copper plate engraving. Around 1816, William Caslon IV produced the first sans-serif printing type in England for the Latin alphabet, a capitals-only face under the title 'Two Lines English Egyptian' , where 'Two Lines English' referred to

2645-473: Is copyrighted, and the name is trademarked, the design of a typeface is in many countries not copyrightable , notably in the United States, allowing alternative interpretations under different names if they do not reuse digital data. Sans-serif In typography and lettering , a sans-serif , sans serif ( / ˈ s æ n ( z ) ˈ s ɛ r ɪ f / ), gothic , or simply sans letterform

2760-407: Is given to unusual uses and more obscure typefaces, meaning this gallery should not be considered a representative sampling. Punchcutting The initial design for type would be two-dimensional, but a punch has depth, and the three-dimensional shape of the punch, as well as factors such as the angle and depth to which it was driven into the matrix , would affect the appearance of the type on

2875-584: Is not a conventional feature on grotesque and neo-grotesque designs. Due to the diversity of sans-serif typefaces, many do not exactly fit into the above categories. For example, Neuzeit S has both neo-grotesque and geometric influences, as does Hermann Zapf 's URW Grotesk . Whitney blends humanist and grotesque influences, while Klavika is a geometric design not based on the circle. Sans-serif typefaces intended for signage, such as Transport and Tern (both used on road signs), may have unusual features to enhance legibility and differentiate characters, such as

2990-498: Is one that does not have extending features called " serifs " at the end of strokes. Sans-serif typefaces tend to have less stroke width variation than serif typefaces. They are often used to convey simplicity and modernity or minimalism . For the purposes of type classification, sans-serif designs are usually divided into these major groups: § Grotesque , § Neo-grotesque , § Geometric , § Humanist , and § Other or mixed . Sans-serif typefaces have become

3105-418: Is similar to that used in other precision metalworking professions such as cutting dies to make coins, and many punchcutters entered the trade from these fields: for instance sixteenth-century theologian Jean de Gagny when commissioning types for his private press in the 1540s, hired Charles Chiffin, known to have previously practiced as a goldsmith. Among the most famous punchcutters, Robert Granjon began as

3220-402: Is that it expands as it cools ( water , silicon and bismuth are other substances that expand on freezing), keeping the accurate dimensions of letters. This characteristic is shared by the bronze used to cast sculptures , but copper-based alloys generally have melting points that are too high to be convenient for typesetting. Punched matrices were not easy to create for large fonts since it

3335-448: Is that sans-serifs are based on either " fat face typefaces " or slab-serifs with the serifs removed. It is now known that the inspiration was more classical antiquity, and sans-serifs appeared before the first dated appearance of slab-serif letterforms in 1810. The Schelter & Giesecke foundry also claimed during the 1920s to have been offering a sans-serif with lower-case by 1825. Wolfgang Homola dated it in 2004 to 1882 based on

3450-715: Is unclear but it appears on several record album covers as early as 1957." In 1957, three notable competitors of Akzidenz-Grotesk appeared intended to compete with its growing popularity: Helvetica from the Haas foundry , with a very high x-height and tight letterspacing, Univers from Deberny & Peignot , with a large range of weights and widths, and Folio from Bauer. Shaw suggests that Helvetica "began to muscle out" Akzidenz-Grotesk in New York from around summer 1965, when Amsterdam Continental's marketing stopped pushing Standard strongly and began to focus on Helvetica instead. By

3565-406: Is variation between weights: Karl Gerstner notes that even comparing one size (20pt), the medium and bold weights have different x-height , cap height and descender length to the light and regular weights. This is common with nineteenth-century sans-serifs, which were not designed with the intention of forming an extended family that would match together. (Berthold literature from the 1900s marketed

Akzidenz-Grotesk - Misplaced Pages Continue

3680-507: The Western world in the 1950s and 1960s. Its simple, neutral design has also influenced many later typefaces. It has sometimes been sold as Standard in English-speaking countries, and a variety of digital versions have been released by Berthold and other companies. Akzidenz-Grotesk is often translated into English as "jobbing sans-serif", "jobbing" in the sense of "used for jobs". Both words were everyday, descriptive terms for typefaces of

3795-459: The classical model . The geometric sans originated in Germany in the 1920s. Two early efforts in designing geometric types were made by Herbert Bayer and Jakob Erbar , who worked respectively on Universal Typeface (unreleased at the time but revived digitally as Architype Bayer ) and Erbar ( c.  1925 ). In 1927 Futura , by Paul Renner , was released to great acclaim and popularity. Geometric sans-serif typefaces were popular from

3910-505: The "astonishing" effect the unusual style had on the public. The lettering style apparently became referred to as "old Roman" or "Egyptian" characters, referencing the classical past and a contemporary interest in Ancient Egypt and its blocky, geometric architecture. Mosley writes that "in 1805 Egyptian letters were happening in the streets of London, being plastered over shops and on walls by signwriters, and they were astonishing

4025-408: The "primitive" feel of sans-serifs, or their roots in archaic Greek and Roman inscriptions, and by the late nineteenth century was commonly used to mean "sans-serif", without negative implication. Like most sans-serifs , Akzidenz-Grotesk is 'monoline' in structure, with all strokes of the letter of similar width. This gives a sense of simplicity and an absence of the adornment and flourishes seen in

4140-777: The (generally wider) slab serif and "fat faces" of the period. It also added a lower-case. The term "grotesque" comes from the Italian word for cave , and was often used to describe Roman decorative styles found by excavation, but had long become applied in the modern sense for objects that appeared "malformed or monstrous". The term "grotesque" became commonly used to describe sans-serifs. Similar condensed sans-serif display typefaces, often capitals-only, became very successful. Sans-serif printing types began to appear thereafter in France and Germany. A few theories about early sans-serifs now known to be incorrect may be mentioned here. One

4255-430: The 1920s and 1930s due to their clean, modern design, and many new geometric designs and revivals have been developed since. Notable geometric types of the period include Kabel , Semplicità , Bernhard Gothic , Nobel and Metro ; more recent designs in the style include ITC Avant Garde , Brandon Grotesque , Gotham , Avenir , Product Sans , HarmonyOS Sans and Century Gothic . Many geometric sans-serif alphabets of

4370-622: The 1950s; Reynolds comments that the original Akzidenz-Grotesk has limitations in extended text: "the capital letters are slightly too dark." Max Miedinger at the Haas Foundry used it as a model for the typeface Neue Haas-Grotesk, released in 1957 and renamed Helvetica in 1961. Miedinger sought to refine the typeface making it more even and unified, with a higher x-height, tighter spacing and generally horizontal terminals. Two other releases from 1957, Adrian Frutiger's Univers and Bauer's Folio, take inspiration from Akzidenz-Grotesk; Frutiger's goal

4485-481: The 1960s, Berthold could claim in its type specimens that Akzidenz-Grotesk was: a type series which has proved itself in practice for more than 70 years and has held its ground to the present day against all comers...wherever one sees graphics and advertising of an international standard...starting a revival in Switzerland in recent years, Akzidenz-Grotesk has progressed all over the world and impressed its image in

4600-566: The 28th in Berlin by Berthold, and Reynolds found that Berthold's records indicate that the design originated in Stuttgart. Some early adverts that present Akzidenz-Grotesk are co-signed by both brands. Early references to Akzidenz-Grotesk at Berthold often use the alternative spelling 'Accidenz-Grotesk'; Reynolds has suggested that the name may have been intended as a brand extension following on from an "Accidenz-Gothisch" blackletter face sold by

4715-479: The Bauer & Co. foundry. In general, Reynolds comments that the style of Schattierte Grotesk and Akzidenz-Grotesk "seem to me to be more of a synthesis of then-current ideas of sans serif letterform design, rather than copies of any specific products from other firms." The light weight of Akzidenz-Grotesk was for many years branded separately as 'Royal-Grotesk'. It apparently was cut by Berthold around 1902-3, when it

Akzidenz-Grotesk - Misplaced Pages Continue

4830-493: The Bauer u. Cie Type Foundry of Stuttgart (not to be confused with the much better-known Bauer Type Foundry of Frankfurt ). The Bauer foundry had recently released a sans-serif with a drop shadow effect (German: Schattierte Grotesk ). Akzidenz-Grotesk was based on this design, but with the drop shadow removed. Two design patents on Akzidenz-Grotesk were filed in April 1898, first on the 14th in Stuttgart by Bauer and then on

4945-457: The Egyptians had no letters, you will doubtless conceive must be curious. They are simply the common characters, deprived of all beauty and all proportion by having all the strokes of equal thickness, so that those which should be thin look as if they had the elephantiasis." Similarly, the painter Joseph Farington wrote in his diary on 13 September 1805 of seeing a memorial engraved "in what

5060-477: The Futura, Erbar and Kabel tradition include Bank Gothic , DIN 1451 , Eurostile and Handel Gothic , along with many of the typefaces designed by Ray Larabie . Humanist sans-serif typefaces take inspiration from traditional letterforms, such as Roman square capitals , traditional serif typefaces and calligraphy. Many have true italics rather than an oblique , ligatures and even swashes in italic. One of

5175-464: The Netherlands to print a Hungarian bible. There was apparently a drop in the number of engravers active in seventeenth-century France compared to the sixteenth, probably due to economic reasons and a saturation of the market with high-quality typefaces cut in the previous century; Pierre-Simon Fournier commented that knowledge of the technique in France degenerated after the sixteenth century to

5290-531: The Theater as the Highest Symbol of a Culture), by Peter Behrens , in 1900. Throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries sans-serif types were viewed with suspicion by many printers, especially those of fine book printing , as being fit only for advertisements (if that), and to this day most books remain printed in serif typefaces as body text. This impression would not have been helped by

5405-439: The apprentice to a jeweller, although Claude Garamond wrote of cutting type since his childhood. Also Christoffel van Dijck was trained as a goldsmith. In the eighteenth century, William Caslon took up the craft from engraving ornamental designs on firearms and bookbinders' tools. A less common background was that of Miklós Tótfalusi Kis , who began his career as a schoolmaster before paying to learn punchcutting while in

5520-476: The best typeface ever designed...it doesn't overdominate when used, allowing the designer more freedom and versatility". Kris Sowersby has written that he found the semi-bold and bold weights most satisfying. Lange commented that the light weight "was my favourite font from the beginning. I used it on my first Berthold business card and my letterhead. It's a delicate, slender piece of engraving." A particular criticism of Akzidenz-Grotesk however, has often been that

5635-450: The business in 1885. Kupferschmid and Reynolds speculate that he was misled by Akzidenz-Grotesk appearing in a Theinhardt foundry specimen after Berthold had taken the company over. Reynolds additionally points out that Theinhardt sold his foundry to Oskar Mammen and Robert and Emil Mosig in 1885, a decade before Akzidenz-Grotesk was released, and there is no evidence that he cut any further fonts for them after this year. As Lange commented, it

5750-549: The classical period. However, Roman square capitals , the inspiration for much Latin-alphabet lettering throughout history, had prominent serifs. While simple sans-serif letters have always been common in "uncultured" writing and sometimes even in epigraphy, such as basic handwriting, most artistically-authored letters in the Latin alphabet, both sculpted and printed, since the Middle Ages have been inspired by fine calligraphy, blackletter writing and Roman square capitals . As

5865-668: The condensed forms of the contemporary sans cuttings of the last thirty years." Leading type designer Adrian Frutiger wrote in 1961 on designing a new face, Univers , on the nineteenth-century model: "Some of these old sans-serifs have had a real renaissance within the last twenty years, once the reaction of the 'New Objectivity' had been overcome. A purely geometrical form of type is unsustainable." Of this period in Britain, Mosley has commented that in 1960 "orders unexpectedly revived" for Monotype's eccentric Monotype Grotesque design: "[it] represents, even more evocatively than Univers,

SECTION 50

#1732793239015

5980-481: The design was "cruder but much larger" than its predecessor, making it a success. Thereafter sans-serif capitals rapidly began to be issued from London typefounders. Much imitated was the Thorowgood "grotesque" face of the early 1830s. This was arrestingly bold and highly condensed, quite unlike the classical proportions of Caslon's design, but very suitable for poster typography and similar in aesthetic effect to

6095-920: The development of the modern humanist sans genre, especially designs intended to be particularly legible above all other design considerations. The category expanded greatly during the 1980s and 1990s, partly as a reaction against the overwhelming popularity of Helvetica and Univers and also due to the need for legible computer fonts on low-resolution computer displays. Designs from this period intended for print use include FF Meta , Myriad , Thesis , Charlotte Sans , Bliss , Skia and Scala Sans , while designs developed for computer use include Microsoft's Tahoma , Trebuchet , Verdana , Calibri and Corbel , as well as Lucida Grande , Fira Sans and Droid Sans . Humanist sans-serif designs can (if appropriately proportioned and spaced) be particularly suitable for use on screen or at distance, since their designs can be given wide apertures or separation between strokes, which

6210-603: The earliest humanist designs was Edward Johnston 's Johnston typeface from 1916, and, a decade later, Gill Sans ( Eric Gill , 1928). Edward Johnston, a calligrapher by profession, was inspired by classic letter forms, especially the capital letters on the Column of Trajan . Humanist designs vary more than gothic or geometric designs. Some humanist designs have stroke modulation (strokes that clearly vary in width along their line) or alternating thick and thin strokes. These include most popularly Hermann Zapf 's Optima (1958),

6325-462: The early twentieth century, an increase in popularity of sans-serif typefaces took place as more artistic sans-serif designs were released. While he disliked sans-serif typefaces in general, the American printer J. L. Frazier wrote of Copperplate Gothic in 1925 that "a certain dignity of effect accompanies   ... due to the absence of anything in the way of frills", making it a popular choice for

6440-409: The eccentricities of some of the early sans-serif types. According to Monotype, the term "grotesque" originates from Italian : grottesco , meaning "belonging to the cave" due to their simple geometric appearance. The term arose because of adverse comparisons that were drawn with the more ornate Modern Serif and Roman typefaces that were the norm at the time. Neo-grotesque designs appeared in

6555-700: The engraving stage towards a drawing office. Some punchcutters did continue to hold prestige for their artisanal work into the early or mid-twentieth century. These included Edward Prince , who cut many types for Arts and Crafts movement fine printers, Charles Malin in Paris, Otto Erler in Leipzig and P. H. Rädisch at Joh. Enschedé in Haarlem, who cut the types of Jan van Krimpen . Type designer Matthew Carter , who learned punchcutting from Rädisch while at an internship at Enschedé, has added commentary to

6670-441: The flame acts like ink to create an image on the paper (a smoke proof). Once the punches are ready a mold could then be created from the punch by using the punch on a softer metal (such as copper ) to create a matrix . Then, type metal , an alloy of lead , antimony , and tin , flows into the matrix to produce a single piece of type, ready for typesetting. One characteristic of type metal that makes it valuable for this use

6785-548: The following styles. English names are taken from Berthold's Type Specimen (German: Schriftprobe ) No. 473 except where stated otherwise: Reynolds prefers 'Bold Condensed' to describe the Schmalhalbfett and 'Condensed Heavy' for the Schmalfett. Other weights were added by the time of the phototypesetting and digital versions, such as the ultra-bold 'Akzidenz-Grotesk Super'. Akzidenz-Grotesk Book (German: Buch )

6900-405: The fresh revolutionary breeze that began to blow through typography in the early sixties" and "its rather clumsy design seems to have been one of the chief attractions to iconoclastic designers tired of the   ... prettiness of Gill Sans". By the 1960s, neo-grotesque typefaces such as Univers and Helvetica had become popular through reviving the nineteenth-century grotesques while offering

7015-666: The holder of the Berthold rights from 1993 to 2022 was Berthold Types of Chicago . Berthold Types released Akzidenz-Grotesk in OpenType format in 2006, under the name Akzidenz-Grotesk Pro, and added matching Cyrillic and Greek characters the next year. Berthold Types' co-owner Harvey Hunt died in 2022, and the rights to its typeface library were acquired by Monotype later that year. As described above, many influential graphic designers have used Akzidenz-Grotesk. In 2013, Pentagram partner Domenic Lippa rated Akzidenz-Grotesk as "probably

SECTION 60

#1732793239015

7130-678: The late nineteenth century, which had a large number of small local type foundries offering different versions. H. Berthold was founded in Berlin in 1858 initially to make machined brass printer's rule, moving into casting metal type particularly after 1893. Berthold publications from the 1920s onwards dated the design to 1898, when the firm registered two design patents on the family. Recent research by Eckehart Schumacher-Gebler , Indra Kupferschmid and Dan Reynolds has clarified many aspects of Akzidenz-Grotesk's history. The source of Akzidenz-Grotesk appears to be Berthold's 1897 purchase of

7245-537: The leading expert on early revival of sans-serif letters, has found that architect John Soane commonly used sans-serif letters on his drawings and architectural designs. Soane's inspiration was apparently the inscriptions dedicating the Temple of Vesta in Tivoli, Italy , with minimal serifs. These were then copied by other artists, and in London sans-serif capitals became popular for advertising, apparently because of

7360-437: The letter. number: A top serif on the 1 and in some styles a downward-pointing serif on the top left of the 7. It is important to note, however, that as the weights and sizes of Akzidenz-Grotesk were cut separately not all these features will appear on all styles. For instance, the 't' of the Schmalhalbfett weight only has no base, as it was designed separately and not by Berthold. Akzidenz-Grotesk did not have italics until

7475-472: The light and regular weights as being compatible, light at the time called 'Royal-Grotesk'.) The differences in proportions between different sizes and weights of Akzidenz-Grotesk has led to a range of contemporary adaptations, reviving or modifying different aspects of the original design, discussed below. Akzidenz-Grotesk's design descends from a school of general-purpose sans-serifs cut in the nineteenth century. Sans-serifs had become very popular in Germany by

7590-464: The limited demand for it; and the peculiar style of each of these punch cutters is perfectly well known to persons conversant with letter founding." He estimated that a punchcutter could cut two punches of this size a day although more work would be needed to "get type from the punches". Punchcutters did not necessarily conceive the designs they worked on. Indeed, G. Willem Ovink, a Dutch printing executive and historian of printing, noted in 1973 that he

7705-530: The main system for printing general-purpose body text , and for machine composition Akzidenz-Grotesk was unavailable until around 1958, when it was first sold on Linotype and then in 1960 on Intertype systems. Much printing around this time of body text accordingly used Monotype Grotesque as a lookalike. In the United States, Akzidenz-Grotesk was imported by Amsterdam Continental Types under the name 'Standard', and became quite popular. According to Paul Shaw , "exactly when Amsterdam Continental began importing Standard

7820-491: The mid-twentieth century as an evolution of grotesque types. They are relatively straightforward in appearance with limited stroke width variation. Similar to grotesque typefaces, neo-grotesques often feature capitals of uniform width and a quite 'folded-up' design, in which strokes (for example on the 'c') are curved all the way round to end on a perfect horizontal or vertical. Helvetica is an example of this. Unlike earlier grotesque designs, many were issued in large families from

7935-729: The more decorative sans-serifs of the late nineteenth century influenced by the Art Nouveau style. Modern type designer Martin Majoor has described the general design of Akzidenz-Grotesk and its ancestors as similar in letterforms to the Didone serif fonts that were standard printing types in the nineteenth century, such as Didot , Walbaum and their followers. This is most visible in the quite folded-up apertures of letters such as 'a' and 'c'. The capitals of Akzidenz-Grotesk are wide and relatively uniform in width. The 'g' of Akzidenz-Grotesk

8050-532: The most prevalent for display of text on computer screens. On lower-resolution digital displays, fine details like serifs may disappear or appear too large. The term comes from the French word sans , meaning "without" and "serif" of uncertain origin, possibly from the Dutch word schreef meaning "line" or pen-stroke. In printed media, they are more commonly used for display use and less for body text . Before

8165-399: The nineteenth century. Its comments would prove influential in later graphic design: Among all the types that are available, the so-called "Grotesque"...is the only one in spiritual accordance with our time. To proclaim sans-serif as the typeface of our time is not a question of being fashionable, it really does express the same tendencies to be seen in our architecture…there is no doubt that

8280-474: The original type's inconsistencies of dimensions such as x-height. It also incorporates a comma-style cedilla in the medium and bold weights, inward hook in regular-weighted ß , and a shortened horizontal serif on the regular-weighted 1 . Regular, medium, bold, outline, bold outline and shaded styles were made for the family, but no obliques. Berthold promoted the series with a brochure designed by Karl Duschek and Stankowski. In December 2006, Berthold announced

8395-405: The page. The angle of the side of the punch was particularly significant. The punchcutter begins by transferring the outline of a letter design to one end of a steel bar. The outer shape of the punch could be cut directly, but the internal curves of a small punch were particularly difficult as it was necessary to cut deep enough and straight into the metal. While this can be done with cutting tools,

8510-607: The period and sign painting traditions, these were often quite solid, bold designs suitable for headlines and advertisements. The early sans-serif typefaces often did not feature a lower case or italics , since they were not needed for such uses. They were sometimes released by width, with a range of widths from extended to normal to condensed, with each style different, meaning to modern eyes they can look quite irregular and eccentric. Grotesque typefaces have limited variation of stroke width (often none perceptible in capitals). The terminals of curves are usually horizontal, and many have

8625-613: The period, such as those authored by the Bauhaus art school (1919–1933) and modernist poster artists, were hand-lettered and not cut into metal type at the time. A separate inspiration for many types described "geometric" in design has been the simplified shapes of letters engraved or stenciled on metal and plastic in industrial use, which often follow a simplified structure and are sometimes known as "rectilinear" for their use of straight vertical and horizontal lines. Designs which have been called geometric in principles but not descended from

8740-508: The point that "a man could hardly be found to cut the JJ consonants and UU vowels when the use of them was introduced into France". The process of punchcutting was apparently sometimes treated as a trade secret due to its difficulty and sometimes passed on from father to son. William Caslon was an example of this, according to Nichols teaching his son his methods privately while locked in a room where nobody could watch them. Manual punchcutting

8855-411: The post-war period. Its slanted form is an oblique rather than a true italic . This means that the letters are slanted without using handwriting forms. During the metal type period, when italics for Akzidenz-Grotesk were not available, Amsterdam Continental marketed those of an unrelated typeface, Mercator, as companions instead. Berthold's Akzidenz-Grotesk family by the late metal type period included

8970-473: The public, who had never seen letters like them and were not sure they wanted to". A depiction of the style, as an engraving, rather than printed from type, was shown in the European Magazine of 1805, described as "old Roman" characters. However, the style did not become used in printing for some more years. (Early sans-serif signage was not printed from type but hand-painted or carved, since at

9085-507: The regular weight has capitals that look unbalanced relative to the lower-case, as shown on the cover of Designing Programmes , which is problematic in extended text. Adrian Frutiger commented that Akzidenz-Grotesk forms "patches in print"; Reynolds that in a digital version "the capital letters are slightly too dark, and slightly too close to the lowercase letters that follow them in a word" and Wolfgang Homola that in Helvetica "the weight of

9200-472: The release of Akzidenz-Grotesk Next. Designed by Bernd Möllenstädt and Dieter Hofrichter, this typeface family features readjusted x-heights and weights throughout the family, giving a more consistent design. Original release of the family consists of 14 variants with 7 weights in roman and italic, in a single width. Extended and Condensed widths were added later, expanded the family to 42 fonts. Several type designers modelled typefaces on this popular typeface in

9315-662: The representation of Etruscan epigraphy , and in c.  1745 , the Caslon foundry made Etruscan types for pamphlets written by Etruscan scholar John Swinton . Another niche used of a printed sans-serif letterform from 1786 onwards was a rounded sans-serif script typeface developed by Valentin Haüy for the use of the blind to read with their fingers. Towards the end of the eighteenth century neoclassicism led to architects increasingly incorporating ancient Greek and Roman designs in contemporary structures. Historian James Mosley ,

9430-811: The rest of the "art" faces. As bread-and-butter faces they are less good than the old sans faces...I find the best face in use today is the so-called ordinary jobbing sanserif, which is quiet and easy to read. In the post-war period and particularly in Switzerland a revival in Akzidenz-Grotesk's popularity took hold, in what became known as the "Swiss International Style" of graphic design. This style often contrasted Akzidenz-Grotesk with photographic art, and did not use all caps as much as many older posters. Graphic designers of this style such as Gerstner, Josef Müller-Brockmann and Armin Hofmann all used Akzidenz-Grotesk heavily. Like Tschichold, Gerstner argued that

9545-406: The rigid schemes of conventional typography. He became a leading advocate of Modernist design: first with an influential 1925 magazine supplement; then a 1927 personal exhibition; then with his most noted work Die neue Typographie in 1927. This book was a manifesto of modern design, in which he condemned all typefaces but Grotesk and praised the aesthetic qualities of the "anonymous" sans-serifs of

9660-433: The sans-serif types available today are not yet wholly satisfactory as all-purpose faces. The essential characteristics of this type have not been fully worked out: the lower-case letters especially are still too like their "humanistic" counterparts. Most of them, in particular the newest designs such as Erbar and Kabel, are inferior to the old anonymous sans-serifs, and have modifications which place them basically in line with

9775-488: The sans-serifs of the nineteenth century were more "matter-of-fact" (German: Selbstverständlichkeit ) than the more "personal" recent sans-serifs of the previous decades. Art historian Stephen Eskilson wrote that they "conveyed the functionalist ethos without appearing too stylised...in the manner of the more geometrically pure types." Berthold suggested in the 1980s that the originator of this use of Akzidenz-Grotesk in Zürich

9890-744: The spirit of modernity, using the German slogan " die Schrift unserer Zeit " ("the typeface of our time") and in English "the typeface of today and tomorrow" ; many typefaces were released under its influence as direct clones, or at least offered with alternate characters allowing them to imitate it if desired. In the post-war period, an increase of interest took place in "grotesque" sans-serifs. Writing in The Typography of Press Advertisement (1956), printer Kenneth Day commented that Stephenson Blake's eccentric Grotesque series had returned to popularity for having "a personality sometimes lacking in

10005-450: The standard of common sans-serif types of the period, many of which now seem somewhat lumpy and eccentrically-shaped. In 1922, master printer Daniel Berkeley Updike described sans-serif typefaces as having "no place in any artistically respectable composing-room." In 1937 he stated that he saw no need to change this opinion in general, though he felt that Gill Sans and Futura were the best choices if sans-serifs had to be used. Through

10120-533: The stationery of professionals such as lawyers and doctors. As Updike's comments suggest, the new, more constructed humanist and geometric sans-serif designs were viewed as increasingly respectable, and were shrewdly marketed in Europe and America as embodying classic proportions (with influences of Roman capitals) while presenting a spare, modern image. Futura in particular was extensively marketed by Bauer and its American distribution arm by brochure as capturing

10235-435: The stems of the capitals and the lower case is better balanced". Characteristics of this typeface are: lower case: A 'folded-up' structure with narrow apertures and strokes curled up towards the vertical, most obvious on letters such as c, e, s and a. Stroke endings, though, are less consistently horizontal or vertical than in Helvetica. A square dot over the letter i, double-storey a. Single-storey g. upper case: G with

10350-482: The term "sans-serif" became standard in English typography, a number of other terms had been used. One of these terms for sans-serif was "grotesque", often used in Europe, and " gothic ", which is still used in East Asian typography and sometimes seen in typeface names like News Gothic , Highway Gothic , Franklin Gothic or Trade Gothic . Sans-serif typefaces are sometimes, especially in older documents, used as

10465-486: The time in the German language . Akzidenz means some occasion or event (in the sense of "something that happens", not in the sense of a high-class social event or occasion) and was therefore used as a term for trade printing; Akzidenzschrift was by the 1870s a generic term meaning typefaces intended for these uses. A modern German-language dictionary describes it as work such as advertisements and forms. The origin of

10580-570: The time it was not possible to print in large sizes. This makes tracing the descent of sans-serif styles hard, since a trend can arrive in the dated, printed record from a signpainting tradition which has left less of a record or at least no dates.) The inappropriateness of the name was not lost on the poet Robert Southey , in his satirical Letters from England written in the character of a Spanish aristocrat. It commented: "The very shopboards must be   ... painted in Egyptian letters, which, as

10695-492: The time of release. Neo-grotesque type began in the 1950s with the emergence of the International Typographic Style , or Swiss style. Its members looked at the clear lines of Akzidenz-Grotesk (1898) as an inspiration for designs with a neutral appearance and an even colour on the page. In 1957 the release of Helvetica , Univers , and Folio , the first typefaces categorized as neo-grotesque, had

10810-406: The trade from metalworking and would therefore have had the skills to cut their own types: Johannes Gutenberg came from a metalworking background, as did Nicolas Jenson . As the sale of type evolved into a major, separate trade, punchcutting became a craft principally practiced by the owners or employees of type foundries, or sometimes specialised itinerant craftsmen. The technique of punchcutting

10925-445: The tradition of blackletter , still very popular for printing extended texts in Germany in the late nineteenth century, which uses a single-storey 'g' in upright composition. The metal type of Akzidenz-Grotesk shows variation between sizes , with adaptation of letter-spacing and proportions such as looser spacing at smaller text sizes, something that was normal practice in the design and engraving of metal type. In addition, there

11040-447: The typeface's body size, which equals to about 28 points. Although it is known from its appearances in the firm's specimen books, no uses of it from the period have been found; Mosley speculates that it may have been commissioned by a specific client. A second hiatus in interest in sans-serif appears to have lasted for about twelve years, until Vincent Figgins ' foundry of London issued a new sans-serif in 1828. David Ryan felt that

11155-638: The typography of our time. Metal type declined in use from the 1950s onwards, and Akzidenz-Grotesk was rereleased in versions for the new phototypesetting technology, including Berthold's own Diatype , and then digital technologies. Contemporary versions of Akzidenz-Grotesk descend from a late-1950s project, directed by Lange at Berthold, to enlarge the typeface family. This added new styles including AG Extra (1958), AG Extra Bold (1966) and AG Super (1968), AG Super Italic (2001) and Extra Bold italic (2001). Berthold ceased to cast type in 1978. Separately, Gerstner and other designers at his company GGK Basel launched

11270-433: The very popular Venus-Grotesk of the Bauer foundry of Frankfurt, very similar to Akzidenz-Grotesk but with high-waisted capitals, and Koralle by Schelter & Giesecke , which has a single-storey 'a'. ( Monotype Grotesque 215 also is based on German typefaces of this period.) Seeman's 1926 Handbook of Typefaces (German: Handbuch der Schriftarten ), a handbook of all the metal typefaces available in Germany, illustrates

11385-465: The wide range of sans-serif typefaces on sale in Germany by the time of its publication. By around 1911, Berthold had begun to market Akzidenz-Grotesk as a complete family. While apparently not unpopular, Akzidenz-Grotesk was not among the most intensively-marketed typefaces of the period, and was not even particularly aggressively marketed by Berthold. A 1921 Berthold specimen and company history described it almost apologetically: "In 1898 Accidenz-Grotesk

11500-437: The word is Latin accidentia , defined by Lewis and Short as "that which happens, a casual event, a chance". Grotesque (German: Grotesk ) was a standard term that had become popular in the first half of the nineteenth century for sans-serifs. It was introduced by the London type-founder William Thorowgood as the name for sans-serifs in the specimen books of his Fann Street Foundry around 1830. The name may have reflected

11615-416: Was German-born designer Anton Stankowski . Akzidenz-Grotesk was popular in this period although other typefaces such as Monotype Grotesque were used also: a problem with use of Akzidenz-Grotesk up to the late 1950s was that it was only available in individual units of metal type for manual composition . While this was acceptable for posters, by the 1950s hot metal typesetting machines had long since become

11730-514: Was a slow process that required expertise. It has been estimated that the work rate of experienced punchcutters was about one letter per day. Some testimony to the London Society of Arts in May 1818, which was given as part of an inquiry into developing new banknote anti-forgery precautions, illustrates this. Punchcutter Anthony Bessemer gave testimony by letter that his work rate for punches

11845-452: Was about 12 weeks (72 days not counting Sundays) to cut a complete set of 61 punches around or less than 1 punch per day, for 4pt "diamond"-size type. His employer, Henry II Caslon of the Caslon type foundry elaborated that a font of this size "could scarcely be completed in 7 or 8 months; at present there are only 4 or 5 persons in England who can execute diamond [4pt] type, owing no doubt to

11960-399: Was accomplished by annealing (softening) the punch blank, and hardening and tempering the counterpunch. Such a tool solved two issues, one technical and one aesthetic , that arose in punchcutting. Often the same counterpunch could be used for several letters in a typeface . For example, the negative space inside an uppercase " P " and " R " is usually very similar, and with the use of

12075-533: Was announced in a trade periodical as "a new, quite usable typeface" and advertised as having matching dimensions allowing it to be combined with the regular weight of Akzidenz-Grotesk. Reynolds and Florian Hardwig have documented the Schmalhalbfett weight (semi-bold, or medium, condensed) to be a family sold by many German type-foundries, which probably originated from a New York type foundry. Günter Gerhard Lange , Berthold's post-war artistic director, who

12190-529: Was claimed in the post-war period that Royal-Grotesk's name referred to it being commissioned by the Prussian Academy of Sciences , but Kupferschmid was not able to find it used in its publications. Many other grotesques in a similar style to Akzidenz-Grotesk were sold in Germany during this period. Around the beginning of the twentieth century, these increasingly began to be branded as larger families of multiple matched styles. Its competitors included

12305-495: Was considered effectively the curator of the Akzidenz-Grotesk design, said in a 2003 interview Akzidenz-Grotesk came from the Ferdinand Theinhardt type foundry, and this claim has been widely copied elsewhere. This had been established by businessman and punchcutter Ferdinand Theinhardt, who was otherwise particularly famous for his scholarly endeavours in the field of hieroglyph and Syriac typefaces; he had sold

12420-409: Was created, which has earned a laurel wreath of fame for itself. This old typeface, which these days one would perhaps make in a more modern style, has a peculiar life in its own way which would probably be lost if it were to be altered. All the many imitations of Accidenz-Grotesk have not matched its character." An unusual user of Berthold's Akzidenz-Grotesk in the period soon after its release, however,

12535-427: Was hard to drive large punches evenly. Alternative methods such as casting type or matrices in sand, plaster or lead were used for these. From the nineteenth century, several new technologies began to appear that displaced manual punchcutting. During the early years of printing, during which the craft and tastes were rapidly evolving, printers often cut or commissioned their own punches. Many early printers entered

12650-510: Was increasing interest in using sans-serifs as capturing the spirit of the time, most famously captured in the writings of German typographer Jan Tschichold . In 1923 Tschichold converted to Modernist design principles after visiting the first Weimar Bauhaus exhibition at the Haus am Horn , where he was introduced to important artists such as László Moholy-Nagy , El Lissitzky , Kurt Schwitters and others carrying out radical experiments to break

12765-517: Was made by the Haas Type Foundry of Switzerland. Also named "Accidenz-Grotesk" and "Normal-Grotesk", it had a more condensed, "boxy" design. Kupferschmid describes it as a "reworking of "Neue Moderne Grotesk", originally ca. 1909 by Wagner & Schmidt, Leipzig". The Haas Foundry created Helvetica in response to its decline in popularity in competition with Berthold's design. Although the digital data of Berthold releases of Akzidenz-Grotesk

12880-543: Was often used for headings and commercial printing, many early sans-serif designs did not feature lower-case letters. Simple sans-serif capitals, without use of lower-case, became very common in uses such as tombstones of the Victorian period in Britain. The first use of sans-serif as a running text has been proposed to be the short booklet Feste des Lebens und der Kunst: eine Betrachtung des Theaters als höchsten Kultursymbols (Celebration of Life and Art: A Consideration of

12995-453: Was struck by "the absolute lack of creative talent in all the most skilled punchcutters of this century" with regard to creating their own designs, although presumably many punchcutters of the past designed and conceived the work they engraved. New technologies displaced manual punchcutting from the mid-nineteenth century. Electrotyping from the 1840s is a technology used to form matrices of copper by electrodeposition around engravings of

13110-462: Was the poet Stefan George . He commissioned some custom uncial-style alternate characters to print his poetry. The use of Akzidenz-Grotesk and similar "grotesque" typefaces dipped from the late 1920s due to the arrival of fashionable new "geometric" sans-serifs such as Erbar , Futura and Kabel , based on the proportions of the circle and square. Berthold released its own family in this style, Berthold-Grotesk. However, during this period there

13225-512: Was to eliminate what he saw as unnecessary details, removing the dropped spur at bottom right of the G and converting the '1' and the '7' into two straight lines. Much more loosely, Transport , the typeface used on British road signs, was designed by Jock Kinneir and Margaret Calvert influenced by Akzidenz-Grotesk. However, many adaptations and letters influenced by other typefaces were incorporated to increase legibility and make characters more distinct. A completely different "Akzidenz-Grotesk"

#14985