Clarendon Typeface

Clarendon

Clarendon

Clarendon

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C ontens About the Typeface The Designer History of the typeface Serif Fonts and Their Peculiarities Type Anatomy

C ontens Type Family Comparison and Analysis Applications Branding / Usage References

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Square Serifs and Equal Strokes (Slab Serif )

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Curved and Slender Serifs (Roman)

Truncated Serifs and Unequal Strokes (Lonic)

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About The Typeface

There is an entry in the Oxford English Dictionary explaining ‘Clarendon, a thick-faced condensed type, in capital and small letters, made in many size.

But Clarendon typeface is lol more than just bold, condensed letters. They were and still are used on several levels of visual communication - asa display typeface, newspaper face, etc.

Clarendon is an ionic typeface with tunicated and bracketed serifs, a result of the combination of roman and slaf serif letter forms. The letters behave as a slab serif typeface with a curve that softens it’s sharpserifs orasoroman face with the ends of the serifs chopped off.

This typeface has been believed to have been influenced by the typeface Double Pica tonic caslon, which was introduced in 1844.

Though a few letters still owned some slabsorif features (like the “E” & “t” have no middle arm, as shown below), most of the typical clarendon characterictics can be seen.

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Credits

Designer(s) Foundry(ies) Release Year Country of Origin Classification Original Format Distributor(s) Tags

Robert Besley Fann Street Foundry 1845 United Kingdom Serif, Slab Serif, Clarendon Metal (Foundry) Adobe, Linotype, Monotype, MyFonts 1800s, egyptian, english, historic, slab serif, wide,wood, wood type

Background Clarendon is an English slab-serif typeface that was created in England by Robert Besley for the Fann Street Foundry in 1845. Besley went as far as trying to patent the typeface, and Clarendon is now known as the first registered typeface. However, the patents at the time lasted only three years; as soon as the typeface became popular, it was copied by other foundries. The original matrices and punches remained at Stephenson Blake and later resided at the Type Museum, London. They were marketed by Stephenson Blake as Consort, though some additional weights (a bold and italics) were cut in the 1950s.

It was named after the Clarendon Press in Oxford.

The typeface was reworked by the Monotype foundry in 1935. It was revised by Hermann Eidenbenz in 1953.

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P eculiarities Peculiarities

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odern serif fonts �irst appeared at the end of the 18th century. Also known as Didone serif typefaces, the family of modern serifs fonts has vivid differences from the old style serif fonts. These are the extreme high line contrast, vertical stress instead of diagonal, and long and �ine serifs. Vertical lines of the modern serif fonts are usually very heavy, which, in combination with thin and light serifs, makes a text, printed in modern serif font, less readable.

he �irst slab serif font was presented in the early 19th century by Vincent Figgins under the name Antique. However, in view of public craze in Europe for everything Egyptian at those times, the slab serif fonts were commonly called Egyptian. Virtually no difference between thick and thin lines of the letters is the key feature of slab serifs. With the bold and rectangular shapes, slab serif fonts often have �ixed width, which means that every letter occupies the same horizontal space.

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Clarendon serif font is sometimes classi�ied as the subtype of slab serif fonts. However, unlike traditional slab serifs, Clarendon font has some brackets at the junction of a stem and serifs.

Also, Clarendon fonts usually feature heavy and square-cut serifs. This font group was widely used in the Old West in “wanted” posters and later on traf�ic signs in the USA. Now Clarendon font can be found on the logotypes of many companies with Sony among them.

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Along with the serif fonts, designed in accord-

ance with particular typography rules or tradition, such as old style serif fonts or modern serifs, there are also many freeform serif fonts, developed these days. Designers, inspired by a rich legacy of serif fonts and modern trends in typography, use all their imagination to present serif fonts in a fresh and sometimes completely unexpected way.

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ating back to the middle of the 15th century, old style serif fonts are considered to be based on the humanist calligraphy. The key features of the old style serif fonts are low line contrast (when there is only a slight difference between thick and thin lines forming a letter) and diagonal stress (the thinnest parts of the letters are those at the angles). It is believed that the combination of diagonal stress and bracketed serifs in old style serif fonts creates a special positive word picture, which is especially favorable for the ease of reading and perception.

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veryone knows Times New Roman font, which is commonly used as the default font in computer text editors. This font, created in 1932, is the most vivid representative of the transitional serif fonts, which �irst appeared in the middle of the 18th century and now stands between old style and modern serifs in the typical font classi�ication. Unlike old style serifs, transitional serif fonts feature higher line contrast with more distinctive difference between thick and thin lines. Transitional serif fonts are sometimes called “baroque fonts”.

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Crossbars are centralised

Large x-height

Double storeyed, with a curved tail

Ascenders are equal in heigh to cap height

Large, defined, hooked stroke Curved leg with a tail

Upright stems have parallel edges

Contrast between thick and thin stroke is medium

Fully rounded ears

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Flat apex

Double storeyed, with a curved tail

Long, elaborate tail

Axis of contrast is vertical

Slightly square curves

Width is slightly expanded

Double stroeyed with closed tail

Vertical spur

g9 Clarendon Light

Clarendon

Clarendon Heavy

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Clarendon Bold Condensed

Clarendon Black

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COMPARISON

Larger counterform, and the serif on top is at an angle

The tail is shorter ans is not elaborate The terminals are at an angle Larger counterform

Curling tail

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old Style Less elaborately curled ear Angled serif

Truncated termial Curled ear

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COMPARISON Larger cap height

Century Counterform made by the tail is bigger Width is reduced

Contrast is strokes is more

No curling tail, ear is not so rounded

Less rounded ear, larger counterform

Thinner strokes

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Truncated termanal

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Elongated and less rounded ear

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Client CasCioppo Brothers Studio Turnstyle Designer Madeleine Eiche Principal Typefaces Trade Gothic, Clarendon Bold, Century Gothic, and Helvetica Neue

Client DILU Studio Evenson Design Group Designer Mark Sojka Creative Director Stan Evenson Principal Typeface Clarendon

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Client Virgin Entertainment Studio konnectDesign Designers David Whitcraft and Caroline Plasencia Creative Director Karen Knecht Principal Typefaces Clarendon, Mrs Eaves, Helvetica Inserat, and Futura

Client Pan Macmillan Studio Jawa and Midwich Designers Simon Dovar and Nils Davey Principal Typeface Clarendon

Client DILU Studio Evenson Design Group Designer Mark Sojka Creative Director Stan Evenson Principal Typeface Clarendon

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Client Bottletree Studio TEN Designer Roy Burns Principal Typefaces Clarendon and FF Trixie

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References Book / E-book: - Best of graphic TYPOGRAPHY - The complete Manual of Typography

Wedside: - www.myfont.com - www.issuu.com - www.wikipedia.com - www.google.com - www.font.com

Branding/Usage

8 Clare

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ndon

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Design by Tan Shi Man MMD 46