Sites we like: Hiut Denim, Postable, and Frank Chimero
March 16, 2012
Handmade denim, easy address books, and a tribute to making in this week’s sites we like.
Hiut Denim is a denim maker in Cardigan, on the West coast of Wales. FF Tisa’s soft slab serifs echo the classic and handmade themes, while Proxima Nova fills in with neutral small text.
Postable helps you create a complete and up-to-date address book in less than a minute. Omnes’ bold weight is pleasantly fluffy, perfect for capturing a service that is both safe and easy.
And Frank Chimero is back with a new site featuring FF Quadraat and a bit of playful (but smart) parallax scrolling. Proxima Nova counters FF Quadraat’s calligraphic impulses, while FacitWeb’s exceptional readability serves well for navigation and small text.
That’s it for this week; as always, share sites that you like in the comments. Or, browse the Gallery for more inspiration.
Parkinson Type Design joins Typekit
March 8, 2012
Rock and roll! The legendary Jim Parkinson, designer of iconic logotypes and display faces, has partnered with Typekit to bring his unique and powerful fonts to the web. Available today are Cabazon, Hotel (Solid and Open), and the Modesto family, including Condensed, Expanded, and Text (named for its lowercase letters, but still a display face — use it large).
The painterly style of these Parkinson types reminded me of this post I wrote last summer after attending a workshop led by John Downer, and I couldn’t resist putting together a few more examples (demo) of tasteful text-shadow application inspired by Jim’s photography and lettering.
Cabazon with an offset drop shadow
h1.cabazon {
font-family: "cabazon", serif;
font-weight: 400;
background-color: #fcfae6;
color: #c71b00;
text-shadow:
1px 1px 0 #fcfae6,
1px -1px 0 #fcfae6,
5px 3px 0 #000;
}
Hotel Open (in green) atop Hotel Solid, with a subtle glow
h1.hotel {
font-family: "hotel-solid", sans-serif;
font-weight: 400;
color: #086190;
background-color: #02202f;
text-shadow: 0 0 30px rgba(255,255,255,.25);
}
h1.hotel span { position: relative; }
h1.hotel span:after {
position: absolute; left: 0;
content: attr(title); /* title = "pause" */
font-family: "hotel-open", sans-serif;
font-weight: 400;
color: #bcf084;
}
Modesto Expanded, with a subtle outline and two-tone printer’s shade
h1.modesto {
font-family: "modesto-expanded", serif;
font-weight: 400;
color: #e4d457;
background-color: #a33e19;
letter-spacing: 0.5rem;
text-shadow:
1px -1px #4e1c11,
-1px -1px #4e1c11,
1px 1px #4e1c11,
-1px 1px #4e1c11,
0 1px #4e1c11,
1px 0 #4e1c11,
1px 2px #6d2718,
2px 1px #e76a4f,
2px 3px #6d2718,
3px 2px #e76a4f,
3px 4px #6d2718,
4px 3px #e76a4f,
4px 5px #6d2718,
5px 4px #e76a4f,
5px 6px #6d2718,
6px 5px #e76a4f,
6px 7px #6d2718,
7px 6px #e76a4f,
7px 8px #6d2718,
8px 7px #e76a4f,
8px 9px #6d2718,
9px 8px #e76a4f,
9px 10px #6d2718,
10px 9px #e76a4f,
10px 11px #6d2718,
11px 10px #e76a4f,
11px 12px #6d2718,
12px 11px #e76a4f,
12px 13px #6d2718,
13px 12px #e76a4f,
13px 14px #6d2718,
14px 13px #e76a4f;
}
Parkinson Type Design fonts are available to all Typekit users. Use them for your next big headline, and please join us in welcoming Jim to Typekit.
New from Typekit: Improved search
March 8, 2012
As our library gets bigger and better, finding just the right font becomes more challenging. When we updated our font browsing last fall, we focused on helping you quickly narrow down the list of fonts to just the ones that would work. Now, we’re rolling out the next stage in an ongoing effort to make it easier to find what you need: new and improved search.
Our first search system focused on finding fonts, and only finding fonts. But as Typekit has evolved, we’ve also added more content: from blog posts, to help documentation, to the recently released browse by lists, and more to come. So it was time for our search tool to branch out: the new search now turns up results for everything, not just fonts.
The new search shows results for everything — fonts, lists, blog posts, and help docs — all at once.
That means you’re just as able to discover a blog post about Urbana as you are to find Urbana itself. We still return font results first, and you can filter to see only fonts if you like. And we still include font names in the search auto-complete, so if you know exactly which font you want, you can get to it fast. But if you want to see all of the results for a term, now you can.
Search everything, or filter to see results from only one section.
As we add more kinds of content, the search results will evolve, so that they become more and more useful over time. Additionally, we’ll be analyzing our search logs, and tweaking the results based on actual usage over time. So, the more you use it, the better it will get. Start now!
Sites we like: CIR, PRE/POST, and Kern and Burn
March 2, 2012
Old and new publishing in this week’s sites we like.
The Center for Investigative Reporting is the nation’s oldest nonprofit investigative reporting organization. Moretype’s Depot New pairs with Adelle and PT Sans in a design that’s serious yet hopeful.
PRE/POST is a publisher poking and prodding at the future of the book. FF Meta Condensed and FF Tisa make for a friendly, forward-looking pair.
Kern and Burn is an online and print publication that curates discussions, interviews, and essays about design entrepreneurship. Here, again, is Adelle, this time confident and classy in both headlines and paragraphs; while Nimbus Sans serves well as small, neutral text.
That’s all for this week; share sites that you like in the comments, or peruse the Gallery for more inspiration.
We’re hiring engineers!
February 23, 2012
We’re growing fast, and that means we need help. To keep pace with all the amazing things happening at Typekit, we are looking for two engineers to join our San Francisco team: a Rails engineer and an API engineer. You’ll get a chance to join a fine-tuned development organization with some of the best people working on the web today. More importantly, you’ll get to work on making life better for all of Typekit’s users.
You can apply for the roles here and here. We look forward to learning more about you.
More fonts from TypeTogether
February 22, 2012
Today we’ve added four new styles of Skolar (Light and Extra Bold, with italics), and two new styles of Abril Display (Black and Black Italic), plus a new typeface — Bree Serif, the friendly upright italic and serif cousin of TypeTogether’s Bree. All of these fonts are served with PostScript-based outlines for smooth rendering at display sizes.
Top to bottom: Abril Display Black & Black Italic, Skolar Web Light Italic & Extra Bold
Upgrade to a Personal plan or higher to use the new styles of Skolar and Abril Display. If you’re already a paying Typekit customer, enjoy all of 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.
Update to Typekit’s Android support
February 21, 2012
Starting today, we’ve added support for Typekit fonts on the new Chrome for Android. This new browser adds support for the WOFF file format — the industry standard and our preferred format wherever it’s supported. To get this latest update, just republish your kits.
Additionally, we’ve updated our support for the default Android browser. Typekit has supported fonts on this browser since Android 2.2 added support for OpenType fonts in the fall of 2010. But beginning with Android 3.1, that font support changed: with that version, Android dropped support for the name table obfuscation that Typekit uses to make sure our commercial fonts are not installable when served on the web.
As much as we work hard to make sure Typekit’s fonts work everywhere, we also have an obligation to our foundry partners to ensure reasonable protections for their fonts. As such, in order to continue serving fonts to the default Android browser on Android 3.1+, we are revising our support to use SVG fonts instead of OpenType fonts. SVG fonts are not installable in the first place, so they do not need the same level of protection as OpenType fonts. Unfortunately, SVG fonts also have some drawbacks: they can have larger file sizes, and they do not support advanced OpenType features. But even with these drawbacks, we believe SVG fonts are the best option for supporting the default browser on Android 3.1+; Android devices running 2.2–3.0 will continue to receive OpenType fonts.
In time, we hope that the new Chrome Browser for Android will replace the default, making for a better browsing experience and increasing the number of commonly used browsers that support the WOFF standard.
As before, you can enable or disable sending fonts to Android or other mobile devices in your Kit Editor (under Kit Settings > Mobile Settings). If you are supporting Android, you need only republish your kits to get the latest updates.
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 Cori Johnson, Hollywood native and designer at Rolling Orange, an agency whose clients include Princeton, Stanford, and the New York Philharmonic. Cori also has two solid years of experience in unemployment and job hunting, and has read countless articles about resume fluffing, cover letter writing, interview survival, dealing with rejection, salary negotiation, and other nightmares. She dreams of a world where job seekers and job creators alike can survive the hiring process without going insane.
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: ConvergeSE 2012, Quovo, and Offscreen Magazine
February 17, 2012
Workshops, smart investments, and going offscreen in this week’s sites we like.
ConvergeSE 2012 combines Proxima Nova Extra Condensed and Proxima Nova in a responsive design that manages to be both energetic and practiced. (Bonus points for the scrolling effect on the dinosaur.)
Quovo is a simple tool that helps you invest smarter. The now classic combination of Museo Sans and Museo Slab make for a friendly and inviting design, a departure from your typical investment website.
Offscreen Magazine is a new publication looking at the people behind the bits and pixels. Calluna delivers a classy but contemporary design.
That’s all for this week; share sites that you like in the comments.
Coming this spring: Adobe Creative Cloud
February 16, 2012
This spring will see the release of Adobe’s much-anticipated Creative Cloud service, a new subscription service where you can create, publish, and share your work using Adobe Creative Suite applications, Adobe Touch Apps, and services. We’re excited to announce that a Typekit plan will be included with every Creative Cloud subscription.
What does this mean for you? If you choose to subscribe to Creative Cloud, you’ll receive a Typekit Portfolio plan along with your subscription. You will get all the applications that come with Creative Suite and a Typekit account with access to our full library — all for just $49.99 a month.
If you are an existing Typekit user on the Personal, Portfolio, or Performance plan, you will be able to upgrade to a Creative Cloud subscription. When you do so, you’ll receive a prorated refund for the time remaining on your current Typekit plan. But this upgrade is entirely optional: if you prefer, you can stick with your current Typekit plan just as it is. All of Typekit’s plans will continue to be available as standalone accounts.
As we get closer to the Creative Cloud release, we’ll provide more detail about how you can upgrade. In the meantime, if you have any questions, feel free to ask them here or write support@typekit.com.
