Typophile - Help, looking for Victorian Gothic Revival serif and appropriate sans - Comments

My project is defunct!

dave bailey — Wed, 3 May 2006 14:44:10 -0700

My project is defunct! *throws it in the trash* :-P

type would not have been

Nick Shinn — Wed, 3 May 2006 10:51:20 -0700

type would not have been used at display size then

...in the context of this project, for signage.
They lacked the technology to make printed typography sufficiently durable (lamination, light-fast inks); also, there were sign painters on hand.
The closest they would have gotten is constructed frames where the printed signs would be protected by glass, and you can find such in old railway terminals still, for timetables, announcements, and advertisements.

type would not have been

paul d hunt — Wed, 3 May 2006 08:27:06 -0700

type would not have been used at display size then

I thought wood type was the original display typography, and correct me if i’m wrong, but didn’t it originate during the victorian era? I think tiffany works because the 70s were kind of a throwback to victorian style anyway. good job on your project, dave.

Thanks, Nick. Means a lot

dave bailey — Wed, 3 May 2006 07:40:27 -0700

Thanks, Nick. Means a lot coming from you with all your type experience. I did a lot of thinking and looking before I started the project regarding typefaces and gave up on finding ’an exact match’. Instead I interpretted what I found research-wise and tried to put my own authentic spin on it. This was a school project as well and for that reason I couldn’t go spend a great deal on a huge family. I’m quite pleased with the results though and your comments are appreciated! Many thanks to Paul Hunt though, and the P22 foundry for the Victorian family as it was a solid foundation in all my designs.

Great work! It’s nice that

Nick Shinn — Wed, 3 May 2006 07:34:48 -0700

Great work!

It’s nice that you’ve taken the plunge into incorporating decoration.
Tiffany is not authentic, in the sense that it’s not a revival of any particular 19th century face.
However, as has been noted, type would not have been used at display size then, so the very idea of a printed Victorian display/signage typeface is spurious. (Except perhaps for the British cast-iron street name signs, recently revived by Device, but in a distressed version.)
So to use a genuine display face, an original design drawn c.1970 by Ed Benguiat, a designer with amazing chops in decorative type design, in a very sympatico neo-vicky style, is a brilliant choice.

Update here guys:

dave bailey — Tue, 2 May 2006 21:59:33 -0700

Update here guys: http://typophile.com/node/19685

Apart from the type, how are

timd — Fri, 14 Apr 2006 08:32:16 -0700

Apart from the type, how are you going to present the wayfinding system? It seems to me that if you can’t photograph and sketch, they are going to be precious about fixing plates to the walls*, the process might lead to/or dictate a solution. What kind of directions are you trying to show, to the stairs or specific rooms and to what audience, are they regular or occasional visitors?
*even in a hypothetical situation
Tim

For a support font to go

SuperUltraFabulous — Fri, 14 Apr 2006 03:31:09 -0700

For a support font to go with the as yet undecided headliner I would take a look the Sackers Gothic Volume from Fonts.com and Copperplate Gothic ( this one is loaded on you mac ), Trade Gothic too. Than pair it with something that looks close to Desdemona? Or perhaps a script... its warmth might match the mood your going for.

Look at Scriptorium... they have period type you might like as well

Hope it helps you ....Mike

I think Tiffany is a great

John Nolan — Thu, 13 Apr 2006 16:22:06 -0700

I think Tiffany is a great idea. I love the figures, especially the “2”.

What about ITC Tiffany?

dave bailey — Thu, 13 Apr 2006 10:43:18 -0700

What about ITC Tiffany? Maybe that combined with a purchase of a set of ornaments to work with?

I think that I’m going to go with ITC Tiffany and buy the Victorian set from P22 to ornament the wayfinding system. This is only a 2 week long project so I need to just make a decision and go with it. Thanks for all your input.

Oh sorry, cancel my comment.

George Horton — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 11:48:35 -0700

Oh sorry, cancel my comment.

Keep in mind this is a

dave bailey — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 11:22:18 -0700

Keep in mind this is a wayfinding system so readability is a prime factor. Yes I just said one of the _r_ words.

A double edged sword this place can be, so many opinions makes the process a bit harder. I appreciate the input though!

I doubt any Scotch or Modern

George Horton — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 11:16:27 -0700

I doubt any Scotch or Modern roman, grot or advertising face would be suitable. The Revivalists would have preferred painted banners with textura in gold leaf. P22 Morris Troy?

Like I said before they

dave bailey — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 11:05:31 -0700

Like I said before they don’t allow photography of any kind, even after my professor called them and informed them of my project. >:-o So taking photos and comping in mock-ups or putting up samples in the building is gonna be pretty much impossible.

I don’t think Monticello

William Berkson — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 10:30:19 -0700

I don’t think Monticello is a Scotch roman. The others are. Miller (Font Bureau), also by Matthew Carter, is better than Georgia for these purposes, I suspect, because Georgia was designed for screen. You might also look at Goudy Modern, because of it being very American in feel it might go with the building.

Which one—Carter, Berlow, Highsmith, Goudy etc.—is best is just a matter of trying and seeing what pleases your eye in the context. I would think that taking photos and doing mock-ups with different styles would be one important step. Even better would be doing sample signs and taking them into the building...

Help, looking for Victorian Gothic Revival serif and appropriate sans

dave bailey — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 11:15:40 -0700

I’m redeveloping a wayfinding system for this building: The Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts ( http://www.pafa.org ) as a school project. I need to research typefaces that would be appropriate for the building signage and figured this would be the best place to get that help!

The building, designed by the Philadelphia firm of Frank Furness and George Hewitt, is generally considered to be primarily the work of Furness who finished the project after the partnership dissolved in 1875. Furness had been a pupil of Richard Morris Hunt who introduced him to the esthetics of the modern Gothic revival. This included John Ruskin’s appreciation of the richly colored designs of 14th-century Venice, Owen Jones’s and Christopher Dresser’s Eastern influenced ornament, and Viollet le Duc’s use of foliated decoration combined with cast-iron architecture.
Rising 70 feet above the sidewalk, the Academy must have seemed a towering fortress in 1876. Today, dwarfed by more recent buildings, it looks like a decorated jewelbox. On the facade, heavy courses of dark stone rise toward a roofline marked with such colorful elements as red and black brick patterning, fanciful floral motifs, and a bas-relief frieze depicting famous artists of the past. A gothic window dominates the central pavilion and creates a motif that recurs inside.
After entering through a low vaulted hall, the visitor steps into the spectacularly ornamented Grand Stairhall. Its staircase, bordered by richly tiled floor and walls, and bronze and mahogany banisters, sweeps upward to the gallery level. This grand space is ringed with gothic arches carrying gold rosette-studded walls. The vaulted ceiling above is painted a brilliant blue with silver stars. Beyond are the galleries where foliate columns support exposed steel beams, one of several radical design elements in the building.
The Academy is considered one of the finest surviving examples of Victorian Gothic architecture in America. It provides the museum with a magnificent setting for the presentation of its collections and special exhibitions. As the modernist architect Louis I. Kahn observed, the Academy is truly a life-giving and inspired building.

The brunt of the info is located in the archives page: http://pafa.org/archive.jsp

I have access to a fairly large selection of Studio Fonts (420 families) plus my own little archive that I’ve started. I know it’s going to be hard but I guess just suggest what you think would work and I’ll try to find one that’s hopefully similiar in quality with what I have. I don’t suppose a foundry/designer might let me use a typeface for a specific educational project and then trash it.

Any help, including just pointing me in the right direction would be great.
Thanks fellow Typophiles.