The printed ephemera of the early to mid-nineteenth century is visually rich and mixes together a range of diverse type styles. In an article on 'Type mixtures' [Typography 3, Shenval Press, 1937], Jan Tschichold advocates the mixing of type styles as a means of enhancing typographic layout. I could see parallels with the printed ephemera of 100 years earlier, but now through the skilled eyes of Tschichold as a modernist. The early nineteenth century saw the emergence of the Fatface, Egyptian and Sans serif type styles. These three styles formed the base of the Trilogy type designs and allow me to explore what a trilogy in type could mean.

Influenced by much of the printed ephemera I had been looking at and by Tschichold's own type mixing I began, not by working on an accompanying Fatface, but an English Roundhand script. Over the following year I tried to make the script work, but never felt fully comfortable with the much steeper angle of the script compared to the sans and egyptian italics. As much as I was looking for contrast, the script just wasn't gelling with the other type styles. I bit the bullet and binned the script. However, the work towards the Roundhand fuelled development of a Fatface italic. This type has one weight (Heavy) and five widths (Normal, Wide, Expanded, ExtraExpanded and UltraExpanded). Aspects of the Roundhand capitals are incorporated within a set of accompanying swash caps - the high contrast and fine detailing of these introduce an ornamental flavour of Fraktur to the face. Both the Egyptian and the Fatface plug into the grid structure of the Sans, harmonising with various weights and widths.

Click here for additional information about the Trilogy Fatface typeface.