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Maleficent types and where to find them

Posted by in Interview, New releases on Feb/2024

We are thrilled to introduce a new addition to our font family, and this time, it comes with the signature style of Valerio Monopoli – an Italian graphic designer hailing from Rome and currently making waves in Barcelona. Valerio has already left an indelible mark on the typography scene, notably with the development of his font families for Pangram Pangram (Gatwick, Migra, and Räder), Blaze Type (Sapfir,  Sagittaire), Colllettivo (Absans), and Cast (Gil Modern) foundries, each time showcasing his incredible skill and originality as a type designer. Now, Valerio brings…read more

A walk in deep dreams: designing type with artificial intelligence.

Posted by in Case studies, News on Nov/2022

In early summer 2022, two image generation softwares based on neural networks were released in open beta to the public: Dall-E by OpenAI and Midjourney AI. We had been interested in artificial intelligence and creativity assisted by neural networks since long time, and had been already admirers of their “unreasonable effectiveness“. But these new models not only far outperformed the older ones, but even our best expectations on the quality of imagery and design generated by neural networks.   While everybody was hooked on the capacity of these models to produce beautiful sci-fi concept art or realistic photographic imagery from…read more

A beautiful mistake

Posted by in Editorial, Trip on Sep/2022

Cover image ©OFFF TLV 2022  In May 2022 we were contacted by Nitsan Rozenberg and Liri Argov, co-directors of OFFF TLV, the Tel Aviv branch of the worldwide famous OFFF Festival. They asked us to design the catalog for the forthcoming edition, and as soon as they mentioned the proposed theme “OFFF*UCK, celebrating mistakes“, we were immediately hooked. The idea behind the festival theme, created by Awesome studio and described in their “OFFF*UCK manifesto”, is that mistakes are an essential part of the creative process, and that we should embrace them…read more

Aldo Novarese and the exploration of Design Space

Posted by in New releases on Mar/2021

A true work of art – a poem, a statue, a melody – is a form that pre-exists in the possibilities of language, of marble, of musical notation. The artist discovers it like a theorem. Italo Calvino 1. Archive discoveries Our exploration of Aldo Novarese’s design space began in 2019, with a visit to Archivio Tipografico in Turin. Born as a love project from a bunch of graphic designers and typographers, Archivio Tipografico is a collaborative space for the preservation, study and practice of the typographic arts, set in a printing office that hosts…read more

Coppa stadio: la radiocronaca

Posted by in Promotion on Feb/2021

Coppa Stadio è il primo torneo italiano di poster design calcistico, ideato da Zetafonts in occasione del revival del carattere Stadio di Aldo Novarese. Abbiamo invitato venti tra i migliori studi grafici e illustratori digitali italiani a giocare con le lettere di Novarese per realizzare un poster dedicato ad una squadra di calcio della propria regione di appartenenza. Ne è emerso un torneo grafico tra squadre di ogni categoria, da capofila di serie A a piccoli club delle categorie più basse. Un torneo inclusivo e ludico, che fa scendere in campo squadre di serie A come il Verona (scelto dai veneti di Happycentro), il Napoli o la Roma (realizzato Allfontsarebastards) accanto a club meno noti come l’Atletico Van Goof (scelto per l’Emilia da Rupert Graphic).

Stadio Cup

Posted by in New releases, Promotion on Feb/2021

On the occasion of the birth centenary of Italian type master Aldo Novarese, Zetafonts foundry has created a revival of Stadio, a typeface created by Novarese in the seventies and published only as a rub-on transfer by R41, Letraset’s Italian competitor. To honour its football-inspired name and its vintage look, Zetafonts foundry has organized the first Italian football poster tournament: Coppa Stadio. Twenty of the best Italian graphic studios and digital illustrators were invited to play with Novarese’s letters to create a poster dedicated to a football team from their home region.

100 Years of Novarese: Stadio Now

Posted by in New releases on Dec/2020

2020 is not only the year of Covid. For typography lovers it also marks the 100th birth anniversary of Aldo Novarese, Italian master of type design. To celebrate it, Zetafonts is going to release the digital revival of Stadio, a forgotten reverse contrast masterpiece designed by Novarese in 1974 and published only as rub-on transfer. Our revival, Stadio Now, is a full family with nineteen variants that explore all the possibilities of the original design space. It is available for pre-release on Zetafonts website, with exclusive perks for supporters.

A brutal victory

Posted by in Awards on Oct/2020

While researching the typography trends for our 2020 Type Trends Look Book we became aware of the many influences of late 19th century sans serif typefaces on our contemporary taste for typeface design. We called this trend “brutal grotesque”, referring to the many quirks and mistakes easily found in vintage pre-digital lead type and printed specimens that had become distinguishing features in contemporary fonts. Slightly off proportions in letters, unexpected calligraphic solutions, uneven and slanted cuts, and the occasional appearance of type design most loved “wrong” feature: reverse contrast. Hagrid and Boring Sans – both presented in the 2020 Trend Book – were our first published explorations in this style. But both were designed while working on a more complex project that ended up being published as the last of our “brutal style” typefaces, that has been chosen as one of the winners of Communication Arts Magazine 11th Annual Typography Competition …

Rediscovering Cairoli

Posted by in New releases on May/2020

This new technique is that of the deliberate anachronism and the erroneous attribution. This technique, whose applications are infinite, prompts us to go through the Odyssey as if it were posterior to the Aeneid and the book Le jardin du Centaure of Madame Henri Bachelier as if it were by Madame Henri Bachelier. This technique fills the most placid works with adventure. (Jorge Luis Borges) Specimen pages for Cairoli Tonda Neretta 1. The case of the old specimen It was at the October 2019 TypeThursday Florence meeting that we first discovered…read more

Virus Fonts, London

Posted by in Studio Visits on Feb/2016

Jonathan Barnbrook is one of our design heroes. He created some of the most successful postmodern typefaces for Emigre, including Mason – now part of the digital collection of MOMA. He designed the definitive art book for Damien Hirst, I Want To Spend the Rest of My Life Everywhere, with Everyone, One to One, Always, Forever, Now. In 1999 he participated in the First Things First Manifesto signed by graphic designers, students and photographers who proposed a reversal of priorities in the way graphic design was used commercially. He designed the covers for David Bowie…read more