In 1968, Adrian Frutiger was commissioned to develop a signage system suited to the architecture of the new Charles de Gaulle Airport outside Paris; he designed a simple, clean, robust sans serif type that is highly legible. In 1976, Frutiger completed the family for the Stempel foundry.

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Avenir was designed by Adrian Frutiger and released by Linotype-Hell AG in 1988. The design is based on two earlier sans serif typefaces, Erbar and Futura. Avenir is unusual in that it has weights that are similar, but each is designed for a different purpose.

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As a student in Zurich, Adrian Frutiger began work on Univers, which would eventually be released in 1957 by the Deberny & Peignot foundry in Paris. The design is a neo-grotesque, similar to its contemporary, Helvetica.

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The typeface family known as Didot was designed by Firmin Didot in Paris in 1783. The Didot types defined the characteristics of the modern (or Didone) roman type style, with their substantial stems flowing into extremely thin hairlines; the serifs are straight across with virtually no bracketing. Because of the very fine hairlines that are characteristic of modern romans, their use was somewhat restricted in metal types.

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Linotype commissioned Adrian Frutiger to design a special face in celebration of its 100th anniversary in 1986. The resulting serif design is slightly compact, the weight is sturdy with fairly high contrast between thicks and thins. With its clean, unobtrusive appearance, Linotype Centennial is an excellent choice for book and periodical texts, newspapers, magazines, newsletters, and books.

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Designed in 1956 by Adrian Frutiger, this slab serif, or Egyptian, typeface was the first text typeface created expressly for photocomposition and printing by offset lithography.

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Developed by Adrian Frutiger for Bauer in 1966, Serifa is a slabserif based on the principles that led to the success of Frutiger’s 1956 sanserif, Univers. Glypha, designed by Frutiger for Stempel in 1979, is a version of Serifa with a moderately larger x-height; Stempel has paid royalties on Glypha to Neufville since 1984.

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Serifa was designed by Adrian Frutiger for the Bauer foundry in 1967. The letterforms are based on those of Frutiger’s earlier sans serif design, Univers. Square, unbracketed serifs have been added, making this a slab serif (or Egyptian) typeface.

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Vectora is a contemporary sans serif designed by Adrian Frutiger for Linotype-Hell in 1991.

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Apollo was designed in 1964 by Adrian Frutiger for the Monotype Corporation and was the first typeface created specifically for the new Monophoto technology. Originally designed for printing on smooth papers by photolithography, Apollo displays an overall lightness that is useful for shorter text settings.

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Designed by Adrian Frutiger in 1977 for Linotype, Glypha is a square-serif type that works well in both text and display applications. It is unusual for a slab serif in that the stroke weights vary slightly.

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Named for Pompeii’s sister city, Herculanum was designed by Adrian Frutiger in 1990 for Linotype’s Type before Gutenberg series. The typeface is based on first-century Roman letterforms cursive that were quickly written in clay using a stylus.

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Released by the French type foundry Deberny & Peignot in 1954, this bold, upright script was an early design of Adrian Frutiger and the only script face he ever created.

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Designed by Adrian Frutiger in 1957 for the French foundry Deberny & Peignot, Meridien is a typeface with slightly flared stems, and Latinesque spiky serifs.

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Adrian Frutiger’s distinguished and successful 1966 design for the European Computer Manufacturers’ Association improving readability of letters for both machines and humans. OCR-B is replacing OCR-A.

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Rusticana was designed in 1992 by Adrian Frutiger for Linotype’s Type Before Gutenberg series. Rusticana is based on very early Roman inscriptions, which were in turn based on earlier Greek forms.

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Pompeijana is part of Linotype’s Type Before Gutenberg series. Adrian Frutiger designed Pompeijana in 1992 modeling it on the “scriptura actuari” (scriptura=writing; actuari=fast) used by the Romans for handwriting and stone and bronze inscriptions since the first century BC; this style of lettering is also seen on inscriptions six centuries later. These early letters were made quickly with a brush held at a steep angle, producing characters with horizontal strokes that are wider than the vertical strokes.

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Designed by Adrian Frutiger for Linotype in 1984, Versailles is a wedge-serif typeface in four weights. The design is based on late-nineteenth-century French Latine types, which are characterized by strong triangular serifs.

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Designed as a typewriter face for IBM, Courier was redrawn by Adrian Frutiger for IBM Selectric series. A typical fixed pitch design, monotone in weight and slab serif in concept. Used to emulate typewriter output for reports, tabular work and technical documentation.

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Mentone is a new general purpose typeface, an attempt at extending the line of the great sans-serifs of the previous century, Frutiger - Stone Sans - Myriad.

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Informa is a comprehensive sans serif text family based on traditional lettering in contrast, proportion, rhythm and stroke. In particular its proportions were based on a 1978 award-winning flare-serif film type called Signa, by Swiss design trio Team 77.

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Informa is a comprehensive sans serif text family based on traditional lettering in contrast, proportion, rhythm and stroke. In particular its proportions were based on a 1978 award-winning flare-serif film type called Signa, by Swiss design trio Team 77.

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Courier is a monospaced typeface for use in tabular material, technical documentation, and word processing. It was designed in the mid-1900s by Howard Kettler of IBM as a typewriter face, and was later redrawn by Adrian Frutiger for the IBM Selectric series.

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Wilton’s "Benjamin-Regular" is a delightful twist on a classic - reminiscent of Franklin Gothic, Helvetica and Frutiger with it’s own contemporary twist.

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The type family in four basic styles was designed in ParaType (ParaGraph) in 1992 by Tagir Safayev.

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Chianti was designed at Bitstream by senior designer Dennis Pasternak in 1991 and initially released in 1995. The intent behind the design was to provide a humanist sanserif of high readability at a wide range of sizes and weights.

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This face was designed by Andre Guertler’s class in room 505 at the Kuenstgewerbeschule in Basel. It follows the principles of Frutiger’s Egyptienne, and won the first of the VGC type competitions.

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The Charlotte Sans family of typefaces was designed specifically to co-ordinate with Charlotte roman typefaces in style, weight, and color. Designer Michael Gills created Charlotte Sans on screen with FontStudio software, and has achieved a perfect balance between the humanistic qualities of Gill Sans and the evenness of color in the Frutiger series. Highly versatile on its own, and compatible with its roman counterpart, the Charlotte Sans family offers a spectrum of choices for more creative typographic expression.

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In 1968, American Type Founders produced OCR-A, one of the first optical character recognition typefaces to meet the criteria set by the U.S. Bureau of Standards. The design is simple so that it can be read by a machine, but it is slightly more difficult for the human eye to read.

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The idea of a brand-new grotesk is certainly rather foolish – there are already lots of these typefaces in the world and, quite simply, nothing is more beautiful than the original Gill. The sans-serif chapter of typography is now closed by hundreds of technically perfect imitations of Syntax and Frutiger, which are, however, for the most part based on the cool din-aesthetics. The only chance, when looking for inspiration, is to go very far...

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ALS Direct is an open and dynamic typeface with clear-cut letterforms that make it instantly readable. It lends text a neutral, yet agreeable and modern feel.

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In 1968, American Type Founders produced OCR-A, one of the first optical character recognition typefaces to meet the criteria set by the U.S. Bureau of Standards. The design is simple so that it can be read by a machine, but it is slightly more difficult for the human eye to read.

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For people who know my type design work, Lithium may appear as one of my more unusual typefaces. This was my intention, as it was inspired out of another type design experience, but needs to stand on its own.

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Frutiger Capitalis Regular and Outline belong to the group of typefaces for the Linotype’s Type Before Gutenberg project. However, they are not based on direct historical sources. At first glance, they may seem related to the roman type Capitalis Monumentalis, but upon closer examination, the fonts reveal a vitality unknown to the characters the Romans etched in stone. Frutiger confesses that creating Capitalis was “a liberation”. After working on so many sophisticated and meticulously designed typefaces, Frutiger Capitalis was a breath of fresh air.

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Frutiger Next is Adrian Frutiger’s and Linotype’s completely new interpretation of the well known typeface, Frutiger. The goal was to create a complete system of weights, and priority was placed on retaining the aesthetic aspects of the original characters while optically adjusting the contrast between weights.

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In 1968, Adrian Frutiger was commissioned to develop a sign and directional system for the new Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris. Though everyone thought he would want to use his successful Univers font family, Frutiger decided instead to make a new sans serif typeface that would be suitable for the specific legibility requirements of airport signage: easy recognition from the distances and angles of driving and walking. The resulting font was in accord with the modern architecture of the airport.

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Linotype Univers is a completely reworked version of the original Univers typeface family designed by Adrian Frutiger in 1957. After a long process of painstakingly detailed revision, Frutiger and the design staff at Linotype completed this large joint project in 1997. All the existing weights were completely redrawn, with careful attention paid to making the proportions more consistent with each other and improving fine details such as curves and thick-to-thin stroke ratios. By following Frutiger’s original designs, the humanist character of the sans serif, Univers, now comes through more distinctly. The systemized numbering system has also been updated. With its sturdy, clean forms Linotype Univers can facilitate an expression of cool elegance and rational competence.

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In creating Vectora, Adrian Frutiger was influenced by American Gothic styles, especially those of Morris F. Benton’s Franklin Gothic and News Gothic. Vectora is light and balanced, giving text legibility and a harmonious appearance.

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This slab serif font of Adrian Frutiger is extremely legible and robust, making it suitable for most any use. Based on the forms of Univers, Serifa makes a harmonious and timeless impression.

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Pompeijana is a part of the 1990 collection ‘Type before Gutenberg 2’, which includes twelve contemporary typefaces each representative of a particular era. Pompeijana is Adrian Frutiger’s contribution to the project ‘Type before Gutenberg’. He based the forms of this capital typeface on the writing of the Romans in Pompei. The decorative look of the alphabet is achieved by purely graphic means, placing the emphasis of the top and foot of the letters with heavy horizontals and diamond-shaped serifs. Frutiger completed his typeface with the weight Borders, a font consisting of numerous ornaments true to the style of the alphabet. The ornaments can be combined to form different borders and offer an optimal addition to the elegant Pompeijana. Pompeijana is best combined with modern sans serif typefaces.

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Undertaken in 1957 for Deberny & Peignot, Adrian Frutiger’s Meridien develops the Latin form into a classical text face of brilliant texture. Effective distribution of this exceptional face has been limited to France. Monotype Apollo can be seen as the Monotype version of this design; Sofratype’s Opera is a newstext version.

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Glypha was designed by Adrian Frutiger and appeared with D. Stempel AG in 1977. The font consists of ten cuts and is formally based on its predecessor, Serifa, although its lower case letters are a bit larger. Like Serifa, Glypha is also based on the general scheme used to design Univers.

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Herculanum is a part of the 1990 program “Type before Gutenberg”, which included the work of twelve contemporary font designers and represented styles from across the ages.

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Deberny & Peignot’s elegant humanist slabserif designed as a photocomposition textface by Adrian Frutiger in 1956.

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Ondine is one of the early typefaces of Adrian Frutiger. It looks as though it were written with a broad tipped pen, however, Frutiger actually cut the forms out of a piece of paper with scissors. The forms of Ondine are reminiscent of the humanist period, the high point of the Italian Renaissance text typefaces of the 15th century. This movement was centered in Florence, the base of the Humanist movement overall, and the home of a famous type school of the time. The main goal of the educated writers was to faithfully recreate the writing of the admired literary works, whose aesthetic was as important as their content. Ondine displays a regular and open character. Texts set in this typeface give the impression of being hundreds of years old. Ondine should be used in point sizes of 12 and larger and is best for short texts and headlines.

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Rusticana is a part of the 1990 program “Type before Gutenberg”, which included the work of twelve contemporary font designers and represented styles from across the ages. Linotype offers a package including all these fonts on its web page, www.fonts.de. Rusticana was designed by Adrian Frutiger and appeared with Linotype in 1993. Its historical roots go back to the Roman Capitalis, the all caps engraved writing of ancient Rome which reached its peak in the first century. From this style evolved other Roman forms, and one, Rustica, proved particularly good for text on bronze, as opposed to in stone. The Rusticana of Frutiger has open, seemingly irregular forms which lend a distinctive rhythm to text.

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The Didot family were active as designers for about 100 years in the 18th and 19th centuries. They were printers, publishers, typeface designers, inventors and intellectuals. Around 1800 the Didot family owned the most important print shop and font foundry in France. Pierre Didot, the printer, published a document with the typefaces of his brother, Firmin Didot, the typeface designer. The strong clear forms of this alphabet display objective, rational characteristics and are representative of the time and philosophy of the Enlightenment. Adrian Frutiger’s Didot is a sensitive interpretation of the French Modern Face Didot. Another model for this design is the Henriade, an historical printing of the original Didot from 1818. The font Didot gives text a classic and elegant feel.

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Univers was designed by Adrian Frutiger on Swiss principles for Charles Peignot at Deberny & Peignot.

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Westside was designed by Adrian Frutiger in 1989 and is a kind of wood type. It is reminiscent of dusty streets, Wild West heroes and swinging saloon doors. The origins of this kind of typeface can be found in the early 19th century. Called Italian or Italienne, these typefaces quickly became very popular. They are distinguished by square serifs whose width is larger than the stroke width of the characters. When the letters are set together, the heavy serifs build dark horizontal bands. Westside is a particularly decorative typeface which will have a marked effect when used expertly. It is perfect for headlines in larger point sizes, which will highlight its special character.

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Adrian Frutiger designed Avenir in 1988, after years of having an interest in sans serif typefaces. In an interview with Linotype, he said he felt an obligation to design a linear sans in the tradition of Erbar and Futura, but to also make use of the experience and stylistic developments of the twentieth century.

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Centennial appeared in 1986 in honor of Linotype’s 100th birthday. The roman and light cuts of the font are reminiscent of the Century typeface, particularly on that of Linn B. Benton and Morris F. Benton, designed around the turn of the 19th century for the American Type Founders. Like Century, Centennial too embodies a cool, reserved neutrality.

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The origins of the font Versailles go back to the 19th century in France when, with the introduction of lithography, alphabets could contain freer forms. The basic forms are Modern Face with triangular serifs. The direct influence for Versailles was the writing on the back of the memorial to Charles Garnier, the architect of the Paris Opera. Versailles is a classic font for advertisements, perfect for shorter texts and titles/headlines and it makes an impression of elegance and strength.

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Ergo is a relatively new font oriented on the form philosophy of Univers and Frutiger, namely, that a font which the eye should see as “correct” cannot be constructed. The eye tends to enlarge horizontals and to perceive verticals as weaker, and the stroke differences of Ergo are therefore designed to accommodate this tendency. Ergo makes a dynamic and modern impression and is extremely legible.

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The goal of this font design was to create forms which could be used and reproduced electronically and remain legible. Technicians from the European Computer Manufacturers’ Association and Adrian Frutiger combined strict mathematical criteria with typographic tradition to solve both technical and aesthetic problems. OCR was the resulting font and was made a world standard in 1973. The font has an objective, technical character and was created specifically for multimedia, although its distinctive appearance has also made it a popular typographical trend.

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Charlotte Sans was designed by Michael Gills to coordinate with the Charlotte serif typefaces in style, weight, and color. It is the perfect balance between the humanistic qualities of Gill Sans and the evenness in color of Frutiger. Charlotte Sans is highly versatile on its own as well as compatible with its serif counterpart and offers designers a wide range of possibilities.

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Neo Contact is the typeface used on the packaging of Marlboro cigarettes (Marlboro “Reds,” the main line of the brand). The typeface is bold and condensed, designed in the Egyptienne style. Egyptienne types were first designed in the 1800s, as type founders - especially in the westward-expanding United States - began to dream up newer, bolder styles of letters for advertising usage. During the 1800s, it became increasingly important for businesses to set themselves, and their products, apart from competitors. This desire has remained with corporations, as well as with advertisers and designers, into the 21st century.
In addition to cigarette packaging, Neo Contact (as part of Marlboro’s branding efforts) can be seen on numerous items, including Ferrari’s F1 racers, and at Formula 1 race tracks.

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I started designing this typeface about half a year after learning that Frutiger was not a new brand of sweets and that Garamond is not the name of a fragrance.

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