LinoLetter 2008/06

Versatile, extensive, customizable, & multi-lingual – Soho Gothic has it all

The Soho Gothic family is the latest chapter in Sebastian Lester’s Soho design project. With the same proportions as its comprehensive slab serif cousin Soho, this new addition to the family has 14 fonts and seven weights, each with italics, that range from a willowy Hairline to a brawny Ultra.
Soho Gothic’s meticulously crafted, ultra-modern design is packed with more than 800 glyphs per font as well as the regular assortment of numbers, small caps, and ligatures. But on top of that there are many more unique components, such as the semi-slab alternates for each character. So not only can you set text in most Central and Eastern European languages, but you also have greater design flexibility via the five different stylistic sets and alternates.
“I wanted the family as a whole to radiate effortless modernity,” recalls Lester, “to be a master communicator that works in all conditions and at all sizes.” The result is a type family that will perform equally well as the backbone of a global brand as it will in an edgy fashion magazine.

Linotype Syntax Serif – A ‘New Classic’ as a bonus

As the name implies, Syntax Serif is an addition to Hans Eduard Meier’s famous Syntax type family. The design of Syntax began in 1954, was released by D. Stempel AG in 1968, digitized in 1989, and then completely reworked and expanded in 2000 – becoming Linotype Syntax as a part of the Platinum Collection. During this update, Meier added a set of serif designs to complete the family. With six weights, all of which have italics and correspond perfectly to those in the sans serif family, Linotype Syntax Serif will fast become a modern classic, much like the original Syntax. In fact, to help show you how great this design is, we are offering you Syntax Serif’s regular weight for download to use and play with.

Three new foundries – Thousands of new fonts

Linotype is pleased to announce the arrival of three new font libraries to our offerings: Underware, T.26 and Berthold. From major classics to fresh and funky designs, these three companies bring with them almost 3000 new fonts to our online shop!
Underware is a (typo)graphic design studio based in Den Haag, Helsinki and Amsterdam. The company was founded in 1999 by Akiem Helmling, Bas Jacobs, and Sami Kortemäki. Check out their award winning designs Bello, Auto, and Sauna!
T.26 was founded by Carlos Segura in 1994 to explore and promote new and independent directions in typography. From cutting-edge to conservative, humanist to techno, script to bitmap, T.26 looks beyond stylistic categories to find the endless value in typographic variety. Get aquatinted with T.26 today and have a look at Aaux, Baker, and Collos for a start!
We also welcome Berthold. Founded in 1858 in Berlin, Berthold has developed many of the most highly regarded and widely used typefaces. Their impressive selection of typefaces includes the designs Formata®, Imago®, and Poppl-Residenz®.

Tips™ – Icons and pictograms for the occasion

Summer is here, and this means time for sports! The European Soccer Championships and baseball are in full swing, and the Olympics in Beijing are coming up in a few weeks. Allow us to present Tips, a collection of dingbat fonts that includes many great sport icons. Whether you are promoting your kid’s team, hosting a sports-themed party, or organizing a trip to a professional game, Tips Active probably has an icon for your activity. This font’s 67 glyphs include everything from basketball and golf to bowling and kayaking.
In addition to sports, the Tips family has several other themed fonts for subjects such as astrology, communications, travel, numbers, and arrows. There are images for escalators, WCs, copy machines, poison, medical help … you name it – it’s probably in there.

Special deals for special typefaces

Directly from the Linotype.com homepage you can always find the Font of the Week feature. These promotions showcase a wide variety of designs, including fun display faces, classics, or simply underexposed fonts. And the best part is that the Font of the Week is always 20% off, making it an affordable way to add new typefaces to your collection!
This week’s design is ITC Orbon™. Created by New York designer James Montalbano, it is a futuristic display face – but with historic roots. Inspired by old blackletter styles, Montalbano pared the shapes down to arrive at this simple and condensed design. He succeeded in making characters that appear to have, as he explains, “evolved over several hundred years to arrive at its post-modern incarnation.”

Frutiger’s Birthday

As you will remember from last month’s LinoLetter, Adrian Frutiger just celebrated his 80th birthday. During a small birthday celebration in Switzerland, Frank Wildenberg presented him with your many birthday messages. He is very flattered by all of your wonderful greetings and would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to everyone for the kind words.

Linotype’s educational discount

At Linotype, we are proud to support higher education. Students and teachers from around the world can receive a 30% discount on all of our products.