More Fonts with Duplexed Weights?

General Discussions

21 Aug 2009 — 6:22pm

Hello Guys et Dolls:

In the fabulous FAQ section on the H&FJ foundry website we learn of five fonts that have “weight duplexed” tabular numerals. These are highly useful for financial reports and statements (as they’ve mentioned), however; wouldn’t we also find this valuable for creating resumes, invoices and even cookbooks?

Yes, of course. We love the optically perfect—both horizontally and vertically!

http://www.typography.com/ask/recentTopic.php?rtID=90

Archer
Chronicle Text
Gotham
Mercury Text
Whitney

Surely, these select H&FJ types aren’t the last word in fonts that allow you to mix bold and regular weights without repagination.

If you know of the other fonts or foundries that have this highly desirable feature please spill the beans.

Mike Diaz :-)

Nick Shinn
21 Aug 2009 — 8:10pm

Most of mine:

Scotch Modern
Figgins Sans
FF Oneleigh OT
Pratt Pro
Beaufort Pro
Bodoni Egyptian
Panoptica

I also believe that Chester Jenkins at Village is very keen on this feature.

Reed Reibstein
21 Aug 2009 — 8:44pm

Amplitude Classified
All the faces of Font Bureau's Readability Series have grades, e.g. Quiosco, which can double for bolder weights. Same for Greta Text.

Paul Cutler
21 Aug 2009 — 9:12pm

I'm keen on this feature as well. Grades make color so much easier.

pbc

SuperUltraFabulous
21 Aug 2009 — 10:49pm

Ohhhhh...

So grades = weight duplex?

Here is Galaxie Polaris Book and Bold:

Are these duplexed?

When I have a bunch of numbers they look pretty good. But if I zoom in I see it’s not exactly lined up, then again we’re not even sure if Galaxie is duplexed.

Are grades/duplex text/numerals more difficult to make?

Mike Diaz :-)

Reed Reibstein
21 Aug 2009 — 10:39pm

Well, grades are designed, according to H&FJ, "using the same set of character widths, so designers prototyping with one font can switch grades later without affecting copyfit." So, yes, typefaces with grades have weight duplexing, albeit in smaller increments than a typical roman and bold, for example.

If I understand your question, I don't think you'll find many typefaces that are duplexed between weights (rather than grades), since that would really mess-up the spacing in many cases. Some monospaced faces are duplexed between weights, and if you look for unaltered digital versions of Linotype faces you'll find duplexed italics, e.g. in Sabon. Another type family that's duplexed is the delightful Klimax.

Stephen Coles
21 Aug 2009 — 10:39pm

Different concepts. Grades, at least as defined as H&FJ, are slight weight variations on a single weight, usually used for optimizing the quality of text on different papers or presses. Poynter is another example.

H&FJ is defining a family with duplexed weights as one that shares the same width among all its weights. Other families like this:

Maya Samuels
Delicato
Alwyn
Faricy
Hedley
Mic 32