New Font: BigBlok
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.
New Font: Escargot...
BUY NOW TRY DEMO Custom Preview Escargot is based on lettering from the cover of an early pulp novel I came across a couple of months ago. It's a strong example of a distinctive style of sign and poster lettering fro[...]
Classic Font: Semiramis...
Semiramis was originally released in 1997. It's an arts and crafts style font based on samples of lettering from books published by the Roycrofters in the early 1900s. It has a truly unique look, the most extreme example of the decorative[...]
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[...]
Classic Font: Hadrianus...
Hadrianus was developed in 2001 as an addition to our Master Fonts selection of high-end text fonts. It was created to fill the need for a very formal Roman-style font derived from historic Latin lettering. It's one of our most attractive[...]
New Font: Diomedes...
Once again we are calling on the classic early 20th century lettering work of J. M. Bergling to produce a new font with a timeless look which combines elements of text and titling styles for a versatile and elegant effect. Diomedes[...]
Classic Font: Gjallarhorn...
Gjallarhorn is based on uncial-style lettering by artist Willy Pogany from his titles for Padraig Colum's classic collection of Scandinavian myths, The Children of Odin. It is reminiscent of runic lettering carved in wood and is evocative o[...]
Classic Font: Ulalume...
Ulalume was one of our earliest text fonts. It was originally designed in 1993 and then substantially modified in 1996, but since that time it was kind of allowed to languish in our back catalog with little attention, which was a sha[...]
New Font: Plymouth...
As you may have noticed we've been doing fonts off and on for several years based on the hand lettering of early 20th century sign-painter Frank Atkinson. Past fonts based on his lettering include Atkinson Eccenteric, Atkinson Boomtown and[...]
Featured Font: Gloriana...
Gloriana was originally released in 1999 based on samples of hand lettering in an illustated childrens book from the early 1900s. It was one of several conceptually similar fonts we did during that period, including Gaiseric, Rosalin[...]
New Font: Original Django...
In an article last week we explored the origins of the font used in Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained and a bit of the history of the Django genre of films. That was part of the process of the development of an original font bas[...]
New Font: Rodchenko...
Alexander Rodchenko (1891–1956) was one of the premier artists of the constructivist movement in Russia. Although he was a sculptor, painter and photographer, he is most remembered for his graphic design style in book and poster desig[...]
New Font: Big Show...
We've been working hard on developing a new package of fonts based on classic Letterpress designs and that package is almost complete. Rounding out the collection is our new Big Show font, which is a kind of a swanky 1960s take on the clas[...]
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[...]
Special Font: Guilford Crude...
When we were developing the Guilford font there was a whole set of early versions of the characters which ended up being discarded as the font was developed towards a more regular and consistent design. These older and quirkier varian[...]
New Font - St. Ives...
In honor of Cyber Monday, which some people are now expanding to be a whole Cyber Week, we're releasing St. Ives, a new modernistic font with unique riser and descender characters which give it an unusual linear look. It will [...]
New Font: Fougasse...
Fougasse is a bold title font which has a unique combination of elements, including an unusually heavy weight, some unusual Art Deco period character forms and rough outlines to the character which are not too pronounced, but give i[...]
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[...]
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[...]
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[...]
New Font: Gelderland...
Gelderland is a new font based on some very old typography, taken from samples of brass type from the early 19th century. It is characterized by its very detailed decorative capital letters, with multiple overlapping flourishes which[...]
New Font: Shayne...
BUY NOW TRY DEMO Custom Preview We've featured some articles on the designs of pulp novel covers from the mid-20th century, including s look at the fonts used in those designs. We've also released fonts based on those[...]
Featured Font: Froissart...
BUY NOW TRY DEMO Our Froissart font was first released in 2000 as part of our Medieval Fonts and Art package. It is an accurate recreation of the Littera Bastarda calligraphic style which was popular in the 14th and 15t[...]
Featured Font: Guilford...
Guilford is one of several fonts we've released based on the hand lettering of classic American artist Eric Sloane. It fits in with the colonial theme of many of his book designs, with an antique, rustic look. It is one of several Slo[...]
Featured Font: Illuminata...
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 [...]
Renaissance Fonts and Art Collection

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The Renaissance saw the movement of literature into vernacular languages, the beginnings of printing and mass book production and the popularization of fiction and writing of all sorts aimed at a wider, commercial audience. In accord with the humanist philosophy of the Renaissance there was a demand for more practical, accessible forms of lettering and a trend away from the artificiality of gothic and medieval styles. As with so many things, Renaissance scribes and artists found inspiration by throwing out the past millenium of history and going farther back, looking to the lettering styles of Rome for inspiration.
Rediscovered Roman lettering styles were adapted to fit the practical needs of Italian businessmen and record keepers and ultimately improved on to meet the sophisticated needs of Renaissance writers like Dante, Machiavelli and Boccacio. This produced the lettering styles which we traditionally associate with the Renaissance. They needed writing which was easy to reproduce in larger volume than ever before, but readable to a broad audience. Letter forms had to be attractive, but simpler and less exacting, requiring fewer strokes, permitting a flowing hand, and abandonning elaborate decoration and dramatic variations in weight and thickness. The lettering styles of the Renaissance had a huge influence on early type designers and established design principles and basic letter forms which live on in modern type designs.
Our Renaissance font collection includes 10 unique fonts based on designs from the Renaissance. These include three variations of humanistic cursive (Palmieri, Castiglione and Hanes), plus two more unusual examples of quirky italian cursives (Fiorenza and the new Alleghieri), a unique Roman style hand-lettered font (Rudolfo and Rudolfo Swash), a fully-developed example of Trajan-style Roman lettering, the basis for most formal Renaissance lettering (Hadrianus), plus a classic flouished cursive (Trinculo) and a set of floral intials from the Quattrocento (Fraticelli). There’s a little bit of everything from the period, from early period cursive like Palmieri to more practical late Renaissance lettering like Fiorenza.
The package also includes a selection of frames, borders, initials and emblems designed by Evelyn Paul based on Renaissance period book decorations. These include illuminations and decorations in both color and black and white, as well as a few selected full-page decorative plates. In combination with the varied selection of fonts they provide just what you need to give any document a full-fledged Renaissance look.
The new and expanded edition of the Renaissance Fonts & Art package is a great deal with all of the fonts and art for only $79. It comes for either Windows or MacOS computers and includes both Postscript and TrueType fonts. You can order by phone at 1-512-656-8011, or to order online just CLICK HERE

To get an idea of what our Renaissance fonts are like, try out the demo version of our latest one, Alleghieri. It doesn’t have all of the punctuation and variant characters, but should give you a good feel for the font.
Alleghieri was developed from several different examples of late Renaissance lettering. While it is based on a style which is clearly intended for quick, easy writing, we’ve preserved many of the unusual character forms and elaborations to give it a lot of personality. The result is stylish and unique, with a real feel of the Renaissance, but great readability as well. The full version includes a large selection of variant character forms and special characters.
Click here to download the working trial version of Alleghieri for either WINDOWS or MacOS Or you can purchase this font online and get it quickly by email, including all the alternate and additional characters – BUY IT NOW
October 23, 2011 | Filed Under Collections, Historic
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2012 Font and Art Sampler...
At the end of every year we put together a special sampler package of releases from that year. This year our 2012 Font and Art Sampler has a large and outstanding collection selected from the many releases we've had during the year. It's th[more]
Walter Crane's The Baby's Bouque...
We've done a lot of work with books designed and illustrated by Walter Crane. Two of the first we did were The Baby's Own Aesop and The Baby's Opera. Those two are part of a trilogy of small-format children's books which Crane designed [more]
Featured Font: Rudolfo...
Rudolfo brings some of the quirkiest character of the Renaissance to visual live and now it does it in an even more dramatic way with a new version that includes three complete separate variants of the font for maximum variety and imp[more]
American Beauties by Harrison Fi...
This is something very different from our usual offerings, but it caught my eye at a rare book store and I just couldn't resist it. American Beauties was published in 1909 and takes its theme from the popular show rose of the same name. I[more]
Viking Fonts and Art Collection...
For a PDF of art samples click HERE Click any font to see a larger sample. Vafthrudnir is a new, original font design which draws on the tradition of Germanic uncial and early gothic calligraphy. It is desi[more]
Louis Rhead Floral Borders...
At the start of the previous century the Rhead brothers (Louis, George and Frederick) were leading figures in the California Arts and Crafts movement. They were heavily influenced by William Morris and the Pre-Raphaelites and are best know[more]
The Colonial Fonts Collection...
Click any font to see a larger sample. In our imaginations we associate the colonial period with images of idealism, revolution and adventure. It was a time of great men and ideas and of rogues and vi[more]
A Special Offer on Our Font Club...
As a special offer to round out the fall, we're offering a one-time discount on new and renewal memberships in our Font Club. The Font Club is a unique subscription service where you get the complete versions of each of our featured new fon[more]
Gothic Fonts Collection...
Our gothic font collection is a compilation of our most interesting fonts based on gothic type and late medieval calligraphy. It covers the range from the historical styles in which gothic printing had its inspiration to the ornate heigh[more]
Special Font: Art Deco Borders...
We released the Art Deco Borders font as a special Font Club bonus font in 2009 and then somehow forgot to ever release it for purchase as a single font to the general market. A terrible oversight because it's such an excellent font w[more]
Folkard Font featured in Bard's ...
Bard's Tale is a venerable computer game which has gone through many versions and updates. In its latest incarnation as a multiplayer roleplaying game App for tablets and smartphones it has gone through a look and feel upgrade, and part of [more]
The Art of Eleanor Brickdale...
Eleanor Fortesque Brickdale was one of the great illustrators of the later Victorian era, even though she is not as well known as some of her male contemporaries. She was strongly influenced by the Pre-Raphaelites like Waterhouse and Mi[more]
Recreating the Django Font...
Since there seemed to be some real interest in seeing a fully developed font similar to the one used for the titles for the new Tarantino movie Django Unchained, I decided to take it on as a project. This kind of project always involves a l[more]
Futuristic Fonts - Updated and E...
Click to see larger sample. It's not easy to define what the future of font design will be, but we can certainly identify fonts which look like something from what we imagine the future to be[more]
New Font: Cantoria Initials...
After quite a few new fonts in a row with a modern look and two based on constructivist designs by Alexander Rodchenko, it seemed like it was about time to do something more antique and historic in character.This set of initials and[more]
Folkard Spotted in Bar Harbor...
I'm on vacation in Maine with the family and happened to be visiting Bar Harbor, Maine's legendary tourist town. Among the many chic restaurants, my eye was caught by the sign on a brand restaurant called the Lazy Lobster, a little bistro [more]
Dora Curtis Arthurian Art...
With the release of our Arthurian Fonts and Art Collection finally looming at the end of this year, we've been putting out some mini-packages of Arthurian art by artists like Herbert Cole and Katherine Cameron. This mini-p[more]
Wayland, Wayland, Shoe Me My Mar...
Some while ago we added to our library an early 20th century book called Singing Games for Children which contains a dozen sets of detailed instructions for classic singing and dancing games for children - not the ones we're familiar with t[more]
Try Our New Font Preview Tool...
After a long search we've managed to find a new tool called Typeshow which will allow visitors to the site to create custom samples of any of our fonts. It is similar in design to the Texter tool which we experimented with in the past, but [more]
Carmilla on Pop-Up Books...
Traditionally certain of our fonts have gotten a lot more public exposure than others have. There was a time a few months ago when I thought I'd go nuts if I saw another book or game with Windlass on the cover. But the pattern is cyclic a[more]
Carmilla Font at Central Market...
I stopped off for lunch at the cafe in our local Central Market (upscale grocery store owned by HEB) and was surprised to find that among the posters on their walls promoting various events at the store there was a poster for a "Day of the [more]
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I think I’m in Love all over again!
Hello,
Do you have a collection of fonts that include Rudolpho Swash and other fonts that are like this?
If so, could you please send me this information?
Thank you!
Scott
Do you just specifically want fonts which are swashed? Most of them can be found in this package and the Colonial Fonts package.
Dave