Sites we like: from Warby Parker, Two Paper Dolls, and more
January 27, 2012
An extra large sites we like to get your weekend off to a good start.
Warby Parker’s 2011 Annual Report pairs Robert Slimbach’s Utopia with Mark Simonson’s Proxima Nova Condensed, and some nice CSS transitions.
The American Alliance of Unpaid Public Servants celebrates the First Ladies of the United States with Alternate Gothic No. 2 D and Garamond Premier Pro Display.
Contents — a new magazine at the intersection of content strategy, online publishing, and new-school editorial work — pairs Abril Display with FF Meta Serif. (Read why Typekit’s Tim Brown calls Abril one of his favorite typefaces of 2011.)
Love to knit showcases knit apparel made by hand in New Zealand, with the help of FF Tisa.
And last but not least, the United Pixelworkers are back with a new (stunning) design featuring their signature Hellenic Wide and Futura PT. Be sure to make your browser both small and large, as this responsive design performs especially well in the extremes.
That’s all for this week; share sites that you like in the comments.
Screening for Linotype: The Film, Tuesday, February 21st
January 26, 2012
The Linotype’s unique 90-key keyboard.
Typekit is proud to be hosting the West coast premiere of Linotype: The Film, a feature-length documentary centered around the Linotype type casting machine. Called the “Eighth Wonder of the World” by Thomas Edison, the Linotype revolutionized printing and society. The film tells the surprisingly emotional story of the people connected to the Linotype and how it impacted the world.
Director Doug Wilson will be on hand to answer questions after the screening. Arrive early for drinks sponsored by Typekit. Tickets are on sale now, but space is limited, so act fast!
New from Typekit: Browse by list
January 25, 2012
Starting today, Typekit is rolling out a new way to browse fonts: lists. Lists have been curated by Typekit staff and feature an editorialized means of browsing. Each list features fonts organized by theme, intended use, or defining characteristic. Some of our favorite lists include a list of great rounded fonts, a list of fonts that are good for longform, and a list of condensed headline fonts.
New on Typekit: browse by list.
Lists are a great place to start when you aren’t quite sure what font you’re after. Need something casual, but aren’t sure what that means? Start with the this list of casual fonts and see where it takes you. Tired of Georgia, but don’t know what else to use? Check out this list of good Georgia alternatives. Looking for something with impact, but daunted by the number of choices? See which fat faces are our favorites.
A list of our favorite fat faces.
A list of great condensed headline fonts.
If you find a font you like, you can add it to your favorites or to a kit.
We’re starting with a small number of lists, with many more to come — take a look and let us know in the comments if there’s a list you’d love to see. Meanwhile, we’re continuing to work on a number of other projects, including improvements to search and more robust font detail pages — all of which will help you find and evaluate fonts quickly and expertly. Stay tuned!
San Francisco Creative Mornings: Friday, January 27th, with Tae Kim
January 23, 2012
Typekit is proud to once again host the San Francisco chapter of Creative Mornings at our headquarters in the Mission. This week’s speaker is Anchorage native, Tae Kim, a former Design Director for The North Face and Timbuk2 and co-founder of Alite Designs — an outdoor company that makes it simple and fun for people to enjoy being outside.
The event is free, and breakfast is on us. But be sure to RSVP as space is limited. We hope to see you there!
Sites we like: Massive Health, Four Seasons, PandoDaily
January 20, 2012
Better healthcare, lodging, and tech news in this week’s sites we like.
Massive Health aims to make health tools that people love to use. Proxima Nova delivers both headlines and body text, its geometric shape and friendly air reinforcing the positive, accessible message.
Four Seasons combines Museo Sans, League Gothic, and Adobe Garamond for an upscale and chic look. Museo Sans’ wide, open letterforms contrast nicely with League Gothic’s condensed headlines, while Adobe Garamond lends a bit of sophistication.
And new tech site PandoDaily features ARS Maquette. We noted ARS Maquette last week as well; here it joins up with SuperClarendon (and a responsive layout) for a design that feels both smart and current.
That’s all for this week; share sites that you like in the comments.
Freight Text from Phil’s Fonts
January 18, 2012
We’re thrilled to welcome another of Joshua Darden’s typefaces to Typekit: Freight Text Pro. Although it was designed for printed text, its calligraphic forms and tailored outlines translate beautifully to the web. It’s a smart, efficient serif for both short- and long-form reading.
Freight Text Book (source text)
Freight Text is available in six weights, each with a matching italic. Its four basic styles have been manually TrueType hinted to render well at text sizes, and the remaining eight styles are served with PostScript-based outlines for smooth rendering at larger sizes.
Freight Text Semibold Italic and Light
Upgrade to a Portfolio plan or higher for access to Freight Text Pro. If you’re already a Portfolio plan customer, enjoy the new fonts! If you’ve never given Typekit a try, sign up — it’s free! Upgrading is easy, whenever you’re ready.
Some lesser seen fonts and a classic pairing in this week’s sites we like.
Michael James Milton produces pocket squares handcrafted in San Francisco. The humanist sans serif, Open Sans, makes for warm body text, while the slab serif, Kulturista, provides a muscular counterpoint. (Oh, and the pocket squares are lovely, too.)
York Associates help their customers communicate professionally anywhere on the globe. ARS Maquette (available from ARS Type and transferrable to your Typekit account) is equally successful as very large headline text and small print. Paired with a monochromatic color palette, the effect is confident and impartial.
DePauw University opts for a classy look, with Adobe Caslon and Futura PT. Carol Twombly’s Caslon revival is traditional but not stuffy; in its company, the light weight of Futura PT is both elegant and academic.
That’s all for this week; we’ll be back with more sites we like next week.
Futura Condensed from ParaType
January 10, 2012
Help us ring in the new year with Futura PT Condensed, a new width of Futura PT (one of your favorite fonts). Four distinct weights (with matching italics) and a narrow stature make it useful in a variety of situations, and meticulous TrueType hinting by ParaType means it’ll look crisp at small sizes.
Futura Condensed Extra Bold, Medium, and Bold with Freight Sans Book (source text). Image courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech.
Futura Condensed’s middle weights are great for small chunks of text like navigation and subheads. Recalling a tip from Mark Boulton’s 2005 series on Better Typography:
When reversing colour out, e.g. white text on black, make sure you increase the leading, tracking, and decrease your font-weight.
That advice certainly applies in the case of our example, above. White-on-black Futura Condensed Medium nav items, their letter-spacing increased ever-so-slightly, are a good optical match for the black-on-white Futura Condensed Bold headlines below.
Upgrade to a Personal plan or higher to take advantage of Futura PT Condensed. If you’re already a paying Typekit customer, well, enjoy the new fonts! If you’ve never given Typekit a try, sign up (it’s free!) and upgrade to a paid plan whenever you’re ready.
Great brands, beautiful apps, and green design in this week’s sites we like.
Brand Manual builds lasting brands centered around well designed products and services. FF Speak lends a casual, youthful feel, contrasting nicely with the more authoritative copy and color palette.
Create Digital Media makes beautiful apps for iPhone, iPad, and Android. Museo Sans Rounded pairs up with a subtle linen texture and colorful animations for a design that speaks to both craft and play.
And Cast Iron Design uses a wealth of typefaces to produce a pleasantly kitschy, old-world-meets-new design that speaks to their mission of environmental responsibility. I’m especially smitten with the text shadows on both Rosewood Fill and Corner Store.
That’s all for this week; share sites that you like in the comments!
More than 4 billion font views, and growing
December 20, 2011
A year ago, we gave our first close look at the numbers behind Typekit’s web font service; since then, web fonts have moved from an exciting frontier to the mainstream, with adoptions across a range of sites (both large and small) and continued, exceptional growth.
Today, Typekit delivers nearly 4 billion font views per month. What’s more, font views have consistently doubled every four months for the past two years: an amazing rate that shows enthusiasm for web fonts is in no danger of waning.
Font views have doubled every four months for the past two years, reaching over 4 billion views this November.
And this traffic is global: over 100 countries serve more than 1 million font views each month, from Australia to India, South Africa, Brazil, and nearly everywhere in between.
Web fonts are truly global, with traffic across 239 countries and territories.
Moreover, web fonts are not merely the province of blogs and designer portfolios. Typekit’s Enterprise Plans serve fonts to really massive sites, including The New York Times, Wired, Zynga, The New Yorker, Gawker, and more. Together these sites serve more than 2 billion fonts per month—just over half of our total traffic.
And we’re still growing: bigger sites (and more of them) are on the horizon, as web fonts move from nice-to-have to can’t-live-without. We’re honored to have come this far, and excited for what the future brings. Here’s to a great new year.
