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A great many years ago when working in game publishing I had a real fascination with doing titles in a strong, super-bold font called Bolt Bold. The truth is I rather overused it. In doing some research I find it on more than a dozen different game books I wrote in the early 80s, all quite collectable and out of print today.
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Featured Font: Vergennes...
Vergennes was originally released in 2001 and is a stylish font which combines a simple lower case character set with highly decorative calligraphic initials. It is based on samples of lettering collected in Germany in the early 1900[...]
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Illuminata was inspired by lettering from a poster from the Fillmore in the 1960s. It was originally released in 2001 as part of the Psychedelic Fonts package and then later further developed for the Oroborosgame project. This latest [...]
Classic Font: Swithin...
Swithin was designed to be our featured holiday font for 2003. It is based on samples of advertising lettering from posters produced during the 1920s. The whimsical nature of the characters and the decorative elements make it an exc[...]
Classic Font: True Golden...
True Golden is one of the cornerstone fonts in our William Morris collection. It is a unique rendering of Morris' Golden type, which he based on samples of early Jensen typefaces. Our rendering of the style has a special, authentic lo[...]
Classic Font: Engrossing...
Engrossing is one of our earliest fonts, originally released in the early 1990s. It is based on one of the very first examples of printed type in a script style. The historic source design was derived from common 17th century callig[...]
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Serenissima takes its name from a nickname for the city of Venice which means "The Serene One." It's a particularly inappropriate name considering what a huge and absolutely unserene effort went into the creation of this digital versi[...]
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We're working on a number of projects based on designs by legendary 19th century codicologist Owen Jones, who is most famous for his Grammar of Ornament. One of those projects is his book One Thousand and One Initial Letters from 18[...]
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Featured Font: Potsdam...
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Rodrigo is a new font based on a set of 16th century woodcut initials with floral, fruit and animal motifs for decoration. The designs are rather reminiscent of Italian silver work of that period, which brought to mind the lavish din[...]
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Goodfellow was first released in the spring of 1993. It was based on Art Nouveau period metal type designed for titles and logos. It became a surprise hit when Tim Burton used it as the title font for his hit animated film A Nightmare Bef[...]
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Leodegar is based on samples of 7th century Frankish hand lettering. The characters draw on the minuscule calligraphic tradition, but are a bit more decorative and somewhat whimsical. They occupy an appealing position somewhere betwee[...]
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I was playing around with some paint at our chicken coop and realized I had an opportunity to do some hands-on design work for a brush-style font, so I did a set of sample brush strokes on a piece of the recycled coroplast which cover[...]
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I was watching the television show Sons of Anarchy and on looking at the logo for the show I was struck by the similarity between the lettering used for the name of the titular motorcycle gang and our Posada font. Clearly their lette[...]
Classic Font: Black Cow...
Black Cow was originally developed back in 1998 as an addition to our Horror Fonts and Art collection. It has since been through several revisions with the addition of lots of alternate character forms. It's a super quirky font with very [...]
New Font: Treadway...
Treadway is a new, original design in the tradition of futuristic advertising scripts of the mid-20th century, inspired by fonts like Kaufmann and Gillies, but with a stronger, more clearly defined look, stripped down to its most st[...]
New Font: Vyones...
On a recent journey to an obscure and near-forgotten French province, I found myself wandering in the storied Forest of Averoigne, just a few miles outside of walled and towered Vyones, near the banks of the sleepy River Isoile. In the da[...]
New Font: San Lorenzo...
For our first font of the new year we're offering up the brand new San Lorenzo font. It's an original hand-drawn font with a rustic decorative look which is reminiscent of the ironwork on Mission Style furniture or decorative lettering cha[...]
Featured Font: Circuit...
Circuit was designed for a project back in the late 1990s and has languished in our back catalog since then because of its very specialized look, though it is featured in our Futuristic Fonts collection. We were reminded about it rec[...]
New Font – Crane Gothic

One of the artists whose works we’ve been acquiring actively in the last couple of years is influential arts and crafts era illustrator, author and designer Walter Crane. Crane’s childrens books, illustrated classics and collections of Shakespearean woodcuts are outstanding examples of the best of work of the artist as craftsman and are characterized by both technical skill and a unique retrospective vision which typefies the best of the late 19th century Arts and Crafts movement.
Although not as recognized today or as great a critical success, in many ways Crane outshines even the great William Morris. While his written works are not as highly regarded as Morris’ poems and novels and he never made the same kind of mark in interior design (though his wallpaper designs are arguably much more inventive than any of Morris’ work), Crane’s artistic and literary output was enormous, and his success in taking the arts and crafts style into the commericical mass market was remarkable. Crane had the attention to detail which is the mark of the true craftsman. He wrote, designed, illustrated and often hand lettered his books and even had a hand in the printing, binding and publishing in many cases. Crane made it his goal to produce remarkable illustrated works for children at a price which the common man could afford. He was also active as an art teacher throughout his career, mentored many students and left behind a number of very informative texts on art and design.
We’ve been working on fonts from small samples of his lettering to include in the Walter Crane package we have in development and it’s been a challenge because most of the samples we’ve had to work from are limited and require a lot of extrapolation. Then, much to our surprise, a parallel project of acquiring books by noted paleographer Lewis Day turned up a Day book with a couple of full sample alphabets hand lettered by Crane. It was a real breakthrough for the project, giving us a nucleus of the font collection which will eventually be in the package.
The first of our Walter Crane fonts is Crane Gothic, based on lettering which offers a unique and original interpretation of late gothic inscribed lettering characteristic of 16th century monumental brasses and stone carvings. It has a full character set with capitals and small caps, plus numbers and punctuation. You can download and try out the free demo version of Crane Gothic (will work on Mac or PC). If you like it you can buy the complete character set with all the extra features from our Ordering Site.

October 23, 2008 | Filed Under Featured Fonts, Fonts, Gallery, New Fonts
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[...] also have a collection of fonts based on Crane lettering in development, like our recently released Crane Gothic [...]
[...] also have a collection of fonts based on Crane lettering in development, like our recently released Crane Gothic font and plan to release more Crane fonts in the [...]
[...] also have a collection of fonts based on Crane lettering in development, like our recently released Crane Gothic font and plan to release more Crane fonts in the [...]
im looking for old styled spanish calligraphy… maybe from the romance period…. its important and asap. i was hoping you could please help me , thank you
Crane Set By Plan Toys…
[...] game books I wrote in the early 80s, all quite collectable and out of print tod [...]…