4 minute read
FREIGHT
from For The Love Of Type
by ianmyersart
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JOSHUA DARDEN TYPE DESIGN
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Joshua Darden was born and raised in suburban Los Angeles. Joshua published his first typeface at the age of 15. He spent the next ten years of his life as an assistant for typeface development and worked for a wide range of commercial clients. Darden even worked briefly with other famous designers like David Carson. His Brooklyn based studio was established in 2004 and since then he has had the opportunity to be a guest lecturer and type critic for a number of colleges and art schools across the nation. Joshua Darden has also taught at Parsons School of Design and the School of Visual Arts.
FREIGHT TEXT FREIGHT TEXT
Freight Text is a serif typeface designed by Johsua Darden in 2005 for the Brooklyn based Darden Studio type foundry. Frieght has an extensive family with many different versions available for use which makes it versatile and capable of resolving many typographic challenges. Freight has five different weight iterations ranging from light, book, medium, bold and black. Each weight comes with its own set of italics and small caps. Freight Sans, Freight Display and Frieght Big are some of the additional members of this type family. Freight also includes micro and macro versions of the typeface which makes it useful for body text and display.
a vast and versatile superfamily
9 At the age of 15 Johsua Darden had already designed his first typeface.This was the beginning of a lifelong passion for typography and design that would land him at the helm of his own type studio. Brooklyn based Darden Studios was founded by Johsua Darden in 2004. Darden Studio is a small collective of designers and typographers who share an affinity for contemporary design aesthetics. Their extensive client list ranges across all forms of industry from advertising and marketing to consumer goods, retail, media and technology. Darden studios has created a wide variety of distinct typefaces like Birra, Corundum, Dapifer, Freight, Halyard, Jubilat and Omnes. Mr. Darden’s vision is upheld by the current CEO Joyce Ketterer who took over in 2019. The Frieght font family comes with four distinct members: Freight Sans, Freight Text, Freight Big and Freight Micro. The Freight Text font is easily legible and ideal for applications of lengthy text. Freight Text lends itself nicely to publications like newspapers, books and journals. Freight Sans is suitable for jobs involving text or display. Freight Sans comes equipped with a variety of text options such as roman and italic characters, small caps, italic small caps and old style characters. Freight Sans also features five weights. Freight micro was designed as a solution to the challenges slab serif fonts face in print and on screen. Micro works well in the smallest of point sizes as well as in larger displays. Freight Big is a perfect typeface for headlines but can also be used for text. Freight has a uniquely bold appearance that blends nicely with other members of the Freight family. TYPE STORY * *
Freight Text is a vast and versatile superfamily typeface. This contemporary typeface has only been available for fifteen years yet it continues to grow in popularity due to its suitability for handling many typographic challenges.
Freight comes in serif, sans serif, display and text. Here we will analyze the core anatomy within this typeface to help you better understand the elements at work in a well designed letterform
Freight Text has a large x-height for its lowercase letters which come close to the cap height of its uppercase letters.
Freight Text has moderate sized serifs that maintain consistent width.
The counter in Freight Text letters can be both rounded and elliptical depending on the letter. In the lowercase letter g we can see the top counter is elliptical yet much more rounded than the lower counter at the bottom.
The bowl of Freight Text letterforms is of consistent width where it attaches to the letter’s stem and grows in width as it curves around, as we can see in the lowercase letter a.
The ascenders and descenders of Freight Text are equal in length. The ascenders extend beyond the cap height and the descenders reach below the baseline a measure of half the x-height.
The rounded terminals of Freight Text is uniform among letters such as the lowercase a and lowercase r. The spine of the lowercase letter e is proportionally balanced against the transitional thinness as the letter curves and reaches its finish.
