Erbar (typeface)
 | |
| Category | Sans-serif |
|---|---|
| Classification | Geometric sans-serif |
| Designer(s) | Jakob Erbar |
| Foundry | Ludwig & Mayer |
| Date released | 1922-30 |
| Re-issuing foundries | Linotype, Continental Type Founders Association |
In typography, Erbar or Erbar-Grotesk was the first geometric sans-serif typeface ever created. Designer Jakob Erbar's aim was to design a printing type which would be free of all individual characteristics, possess thoroughly legible letter forms, and be a purely typographic creation. His conclusion was that this could only work if the type form was developed from a fundamental element, the circle.[1]
The font
Erbar was originally cast by the Ludwig & Mayer foundry of Frankfurt, Germany, with machine composition matrices later being offered by German and then American Linotype.[2] Erbar was later exported to the United States and sold by the Continental Type Founders Association.[3] A digital version is sold today by Linotype.
Erbar was cast in four weights with italic and condensed faces. Other variants were offered:
- Lumina, an open face version.
- Lux, a version with contrasting outlines.
- Phospohor, a bold, in-line version.[4]
Influence on other typefaces
The success of Erbar inspired the creation of many new geometric sans-serif faces by competing foundries including Futura, Metro, Vogue, Spartan, Twentieth Century, and Century Gothic among others. Of these, Futura proved to be the most successful and this, along with Jakob Erbar's early death, the small size of Erbar's Ludwig & Mayer Foundry and the international reach of Futura's Bauer Type Foundry, lead to the misapprehension that Futura, and not Erbar, was the first of the geometric sans-serif faces.
References
- Friedl, Ott, and Stein, Typography: an Encyclopedic Survey of Type Design and Techniques Throughout History. Black Dog & Levinthal Publishers: 1998. ISBN 1-57912-023-7.
- Jaspert, W. Pincus, W. Turner Berry and A.F. Johnson. The Encyclopedia of Type Faces. Blandford Press Lts.: 1953, 1983. ISBN 0-7137-1347-X.
- ↑ Tracy, Walter.Letters of Credit: a View of Type Design. Gordon Fraser, 1998
- ↑ Jaspert, Pincus, Berry and Johnson.The Encyclopedia of Type Faces. Blandford Press Lts.: 1953, 1983. Pp. 269-70
- ↑ Specimen Book of Continental Types, Continental Type Founders Association, N.Y.C., 1929.
- ↑ Jaspert, Pincus, Berry and Johnson.The Encyclopedia of Type Faces. Blandford Press Lts.: 1953, 1983. Pp. 269-70