AVENIR
ADRIAN FRUTIGER/p4//DESIGNED THE AVENIR TYPEFACE IN 1988/p5//AVENIR HAS CHARACTERISTICS OF BOTH HUMANISTIC AND GEOMETRIC, SANS SERIF FONT/p6// AND IT’S DESIGN MAKES IT EASIER TO READ IN LONGER BODIES OF TEXT/p10//
REFERENCES AND CONCLUSION/p12// 2 2
1234567890
ABCDEFGHI JKLMNOPQR STUVWXYZ abcdefghijklm nopqrstuvwxyz 3
Frutiger was born in 1928.1 Although he works in various mediums of design, his favorite is tyopgraphy. He dium e M r has created many Avni lique fonts over the b O years, some of ook B r i them still beingAven widely used today.2 nir
Ave
His typeface designs include: Univers, Linotype Didot, Westside, Apollo, and many others. 3
4
rL
i Aven
Ave
ir Aven ue
liq b O y
v
Hea
avy
He r i n Ave
r
i Aven
que
bli O y v
a
r He i n e Av
Adrian Frutiger
liqu
Ob ight
ack
r Bl i n e Av
ue ium
Med enir
e
qu Obli
dium
ir Me n e v A
ack
Bl r i n Ave
ium
ed nir M
Ave
He designed Avenir in 1988, after seeing the need e for an u q i l updated geometric, Ob ok sans o serif that could B ir n e v be used for more A than just display.3 Avenir is named after the French word for “future.”4 t h g i ir L The typeface u is q eand Aven i l b both geometric O ium d humanistic, making e M r i n it great for any Ave length of text.5
Footnotes: 1.”Adrian Frutiger.” Identifont. July 1, 2008. Accessed November 5, 2014. http:// www.identifont.com/show?110. 2. “Adrian Frutiger.” Design Is History. Accessed November 5, 2014. http://www. designishistory.com/1940/adrian-frutiger/. 3. Frutiger, Adrian. Typefaces: The Complete Works. Basel: Birkhauser, 2008. 4. “Avenir.” Font Slate. Accessed November 5, 2014. http://fontslate.info/typefaces/avenir.html. 5. Appert, Camille. “Avenir.” Typedia. March 13, 2014. Accessed November 5, 2014. http://typedia.com/explore/typeface/avenir/.
5
Frutiger realized that, by design, the human eye was more likely to look left and right than up or down. He considered this through the designing of Avenir. He started with the “o,” which he created to be just less than a perfect circle, he then designed the rest of this typeface around it.1 Making Avenir less than mathematically perfect gave the typeface a humanistic feel on top of it’s already geometric style.
Footnotes: 1. Frutiger, Adrian. Typefaces: The Complete Works. Basel: Birkhauser, 2008. 2. “Futura.” Fonts.com. Accessed November 8, 2014. http://www.fonts.com/font/linotype/futura. 3. Bringhurst, Robert. Elements of Typographic Style. 2.5nd ed. Vancouver: Hartley& Marks, 2002. 4. “Myriad.” Fonts.com. Accessed November 8, 2014. http://www.fonts.com/font/adobe/myriad. 5. Lupton, Ellen. Thinking with Type: A Critical Guide for Designers, Writers, Editors, & Students. 1st ed. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2004.
6
Aa HYBRID Avenir (1988) Avenir is a combination of geometric and humanistic typefaces.
Aa
Aa
GEOMETRIC
HUMANISTIC
Futura (1927)2 Futura is a geometric typeface. Geometric typefaces can be recognized by their mathematically sound shapes.3
Myriad Pro (1992) Myriad is a humanistic typeface. Humanistic typafaces can be recognized by their almost handwritten appearance.4,5 7
Flat tops on uppercase M, Middle is not pointed
Aa Mm
Oo
Larger middle in Uppercase A, Flat top O is not perfect circle, it is more wide than tall
Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Avenir (Light)
Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Myriad Pro (Regular)
8 Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Futura (Medium)
Footnotes: 1. Howell, Perry. “Type Anatomy Howell.” TypographyWinter2014. January 1, 2014. Accessed November 7, 2014. http://typographywinter2014.blogspot.com/2014/01/type-anatomy_23.html.
Uppercase Q has flat tail
W is not pointed at corners, nor is it as narrow as in Myriad Pro
Qq Rr Ww Yy R has straight tail1 that is coming off bowl, notice how it is not connecting to stem Lowercase Y has very curved descender1
Nn Oo Pp Qq Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv Ww Xx Yy Zz
Nn Oo Pp Qq Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv Ww Xx Yy Zz Nn Oo Pp Qq Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv Ww Xx Yy 9Zz
By making the typeface more humanistic, it in turn made it easier on the eyes and therefore made it easier to read in longer bodies of text.1 Which is what set it apart from other geometric typefaces of the time.
10
Footnotes: 1. Frutiger, Adrian. �Typefaces: The Complete Works.� Basel: Birkhauser, 2008.
Avenir (Book) “…There were historic geometrics from the ‘20s, like Futura or Kabel – typefaces which were becoming popular again. I had seen the success of Herb Lubalin and Tom Carnase’s ITC Avant Garde Gothic, and I felt that a new graphic era had begun. These new geometric alphabets, however, remained display faces; they weren’t any use for setting printed body text…” —Adrian Frutiger, Typefaces: The Complete Works Futura (Medium) “…There were historic geometrics from the ‘20s, like Futura or Kabel – typefaces which were becoming popular again. I had seen the success of Herb Lubalin and Tom Carnase’s ITC Avant Garde Gothic, and I felt that a new graphic era had begun. These new geometric alphabets, however, remained display faces; they weren’t any use for setting printed body text…” —Adrian Frutiger, Typefaces: The Complete Works Myriad Pro (Regular) “…There were historic geometrics from the ‘20s, like Futura or Kabel – typefaces which were becoming popular again. I had seen the success of Herb Lubalin and Tom Carnase’s ITC Avant Garde Gothic, and I felt that a new graphic era had begun. These new geometric alphabets, however, remained display faces; they weren’t any use for setting printed body text…” —Adrian Frutiger, Typefaces: The Complete11Works
References:
“Adrian Frutiger.” Design Is History. Accessed November 5, 2014. http://www.designishistory.com/1940/adrian-frutiger/. “Adrian Frutiger.” Identifont. July 1, 2008. Accessed November 5, 2014. http://www.identifont.com/show?110. Appert, Camille. “Avenir.” Typedia. March 13, 2014. Accessed November 5, 2014. http://typedia.com/explore/ typeface/avenir/. “Avenir.” Font Slate. Accessed November 5, 2014. http://fontslate.info/typefaces/avenir.html. Bringhurst, Robert. Elements of Typographic Style. 2.5nd ed. Vancouver: Hartley& Marks, 2002. Frutiger, Adrian. “Typefaces: The Complete Works.” Basel: Birkhauser, 2008. “Futura.” Fonts.com. Accessed November 8, 2014. http://www.fonts.com/font/linotype/futura. “How Sans-Serif Typeface Styles Affect Readability.” UX Movement. September 27, 2012. Accessed November 4, 2014. http://uxmovement.com/content/how-sans-serif-typeface-styles-affect-readability/. Howell, Perry. “Type Anatomy Howell.” TypographyWinter2014. January 1, 2014. Accessed November 7, 2014. http://typographywinter2014.blogspot.com/2014/01/type-anatomy_23.html. Lupton, Ellen. Thinking with Type: A Critical Guide for Designers, Writers, Editors, & Students. 1st ed. New York: Designed by: Tiffany Dunn The simplicity of Avenir as a typeface, and it’s ability to look good even when paired with different weights of itself and even different colors are what drew me to this font. Learning about the thought that went into it’s design made me appreciate it even more.