Palatino Palatino
Palatino Palatino Echoes of the Past
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Ampersand Palatino Regular and Palatino Nova Italic
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Table Tableof of Contents Contents
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Zapf: Type Designer
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Zapf: Later life
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Zapf: Early days
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Palatino Typeface
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Palatino: Features
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Palatino Nova
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Herman Herman Zapf: Zapf: Early EarlyDays Days I
t all starts in a land reigned by war, violence, famine and distress after World War I. The german population had suered the consequences of its leader’s choices and a feeling of discomfort was constantly present. Those were the turbulent days in which Hermann Zapf was born. On the 8th of November of 1918 he came into the world under the complicated political and social circumstances arising from the end of war.
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German soldiers during World War I
Z His curiosity and personality allowed him to develop a strong passion for books, writing and lettering. He began experimenting at a very early age with various drawing techniques, as a result making his ďŹ rst alphabet creations.
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“The arrangement of design elements within a given structure should allow the reader to easily focus on the message� Hermann Zapf
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Hermann Zapf writting down an alphabet
Hermann Zapf a visionary typefaces designer
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Zapf: Zapf: Later Later Life Life
H
e has always had the spirit of a talented, patient and dedicated individual and these traits allowed him to do all kinds of work as a graphic artist. His journey took unexpected turns that led him to join a cartography unit in the army, work as a book designer, and ultimately become a world class typographer. One would think the range of design related experience he gained on his trips to dierent parts of the world, and all the knowledge he gathered after working in dierent positions is one of the reasons why his work is so exquisite.
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Zapf: Zapf:
Type TypeDesigner Designer
H
is careful studies of the old master calligraphers and alphabets throughout his life gave him the expertise to create letter forms unique of their kind such as the typefaces Aldus, Melior Optima, Palatino and Zapfino and Zapf Chancery. In fact, his great creations have a common element that is easy to recognize, which is his mastery of calligraphy. It’s easily discernible how Zapf’s calligraphic traces are integrated into most of the typefaces he designed.
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Palatino Palatino
Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Nn Oo Pp Qq Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv Ww Xx Yy Zz
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alatino is typeface designed side by side with the expert punch cutter August Rosenberg. Rosenberg and Zapf studied in detail the calligraphic alphabets created during the Italian Renaissance in order to create Palatino. The name of this typeface comes from the 16th century Italian Renaissance
master calligrapher Giambattista Palatino. Paying special attention to detail they created a typeface that resembled all the features of past Italian scribes but with the dierence that the new designs had larger proportions to vastly increase the typeface’s readability and functional fields.
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Features Features
Mv RP High contrast between the thickness of the strokes among diďŹ&#x20AC;erent letters brings grace and elegance to the letters.
One of the signature features of Palatino is the open bowl on the capital P and R. Is a subtle yet elegant feature characteristic of Zapfâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s calligraphic background.
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onsidered a serif humanist font given the fact that its roots spawn on the cradle of calligraphy, Palatino tries to emulate the natural qualities of the motions
of handwriting. It sits in the Old Style category as its letter forms have a diagonal stress and high contrast between the thickness of the strokes that changes accordingly from one
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Q Yx The Q in Palatino has a curved tail unique of its kind. It only touches its bowl on one point. It can also be seen the diagonal stress on the O and the Q.
The capital Y and X as well as the lower x have scooped serifs, subtle elements that emulate handwriting motions.
letter to another. Zapf intended to capture the essence of the broad nib pen strokes in his design, and succeeded in the sense that these shapes and forms do accurately
mirror the features of the renaissance scripts bringing back the grace and simplistic style of calligraphy.
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Rom Ital Bol Bold I
“Typography is two-dimensional architecture, based on experience
“Typography is two-dimensional architecture, based on experience
“Typography is two-dimensional architecture, based on experience
“Typography is two-dimensional architecture, based on experience
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man alic old Italic
experience and imagination, and guided by rules and readability.”
experience and imagination, and guided by rules and readability.”
experience and imagination, and guided by rules and readability.”
experience and imagination, and guided by rules and readability.”
Herman Zapf
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Palatino Palatino Nova Nova
PALAT T
he renowned designer he worked with to translate the Palatino font onto a digital platform was Akira Kobayashi, with whom he also expanded the
Palatino type family by designing new weights. The relevance of Zapfâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s works has endured the test of time, setting a quintessential example for future designers.
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Bibliography Zahn, Carl. “Hermann Zapf and His Design Philosophy”.
Journal of Design History. Vol 4. No 1. 1991. pp. 61-62. Web.
JSTOR. 1 April 2015.
Zapf, Hermann. “The History of Hermann Zapf”. Linotype . n.d. Web. 25
March 2015.
Zapf, Hermann. About Alphabets: Some marginal notes about Type Design.
Cambridge: MIT PRESS. 1970. Google Books. Web. 28 March 2015
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