Typographic Reference

In the late 1970s, Ed Benguiat was working at Herb Lubalin’s design studio, and was asked by a friend to design a logo for a new store. Benguiat went through hundreds of trail designs, and although one was eventually approved, he became enamored with the character shapes of one of the rejected designs.

ITC Bookman was an instant success when it was first released in 1976. The design was an interpretation of the original Bookman typeface that dates back to the late 1800s. This earliest Bookman was very popular in the early part of the 20th century.

Under license from ATF, in 1978 ITC commissioned designer Victor Caruso to re-draw the Clearface family to current standards. Caruso’s work adapts Bentons’ original design into a consistent family that is suitable for both text and display settings. Slightly condensed, ITC Clearface is ideal when space is at a premium. It features small (almost slab) serifs, a large x-height and minor contrast in stroke weight.

The story of ITC Cheltenham Since the family’s release in the early 1900s, “Chelt” (as the old-timers call it) has drawn criticism for being ungainly. But someone – in fact, lots of someones – got hooked on using it, making it one of the most successful typefaces of its day.

ITC Fenice is a neoclassical design in the tradition of Didot and Bodoni. Its 18th century predecessors exhibit a highly sophisticated design philosophy, and represented the ultimate refinement of the typographic letter at that time. Improving on the Bodoni style has been a challenge to type designers for the past two hundred years.

The ITC Galliard story begins with Robert Granjon, a Parisian-born type designer who lived roughly a generation after Claude Garamond. In the 1560s, Granjon labored in Antwerp. Four hundred years later, the punches and matrices he left behind would become the beginnings of Galliard.

Aldo Novarese originally designed this typeface for Switzerland's Haas foundry. International Typeface Corporation licensed shortly after its first release and issued the design as ITC Novarese in December of 1979. Novarese is a blend of old and new.

Perpetua was to be the first original typeface in Stanley Morison’s plan for building the Monotype type library. (All the earlier designs were revivals based on historical models.) He knew that he wanted the design patterned after epigraphic rather than calligraphic letters, and that Eric Gill was the man for the job.

The story of Mentor begins in the early 1970s. It was then that Michael Harvey drew a serif and sans serif alphabet to use for illustrations in his book “Lettering Design.” They were intended to be typical twentieth-century letterforms with no fancy affectations or idiosyncratic details.

Robert Hunter Middleton’s drew the original design of Stellar for the Ludlow Typograph Company in Chicago. Work began in the late 1920s, when Middleton was asked to create a sans serif type family to compete with European imports of Futura and Kabel.