The Rotis family was the final typeface family from designer Otl Aicher. Named after a converted mill site southwest of Munich, where Aicher and a small design group worked several years developing the typeface, the Rotis font was one of the first typeface families to employ matching subfamilies: Sans Serif, Semisans, Semi Serif, and Serif. Proportionally, all the Rotis faces are somewhat condensed. Aicher, however, took special care to ensure that counters and serifs were constructed open and full. The result is a design that is economical with space and still remarkably legible.
The Rotis font uses a numbering system to identify weight and width variations. In this system, light weights are numbered in the 40s (45 roman, 46 italic), regular in the 50s, bold in the 60s and extrabold in he 70s.
The broad coverage that the Rotis font provides by providing subfamilies that share weights, heights, and proportions, has earned this typeface a respected position among font Super Families.