Before printing, every book is copied by hand. In monasteries and later in urban workshops, scribes write codified scripts with a pen. Northern Europe is dominated by gothic textura, dense, vertical and angular. In Italy, humanist scholars return to a rounder, more legible hand inspired by the Carolingian minuscule. These two worlds, the broken letter and the round letter, will serve as models for the first printing types.

Read also: Blackletter, Script, Hairline, Thick stroke

In Mainz, Johannes Gutenberg develops a complete system: movable type cast in a lead alloy with a hand mould, a press adapted from wine presses and an oil-based ink. His 42-line Bible, completed around 1455, imitates the textura of manuscripts and uses close to 300 different sorts, ligatures and abbreviations included. Text can now be set, printed and reset: typography is born.

Read also: Lead type, Type case, Typesetting, Uppercase, Lowercase, Ligature

Printing reaches Italy and moves away from gothic letters. In Venice, Nicolas Jenson cuts a remarkably clear roman type in 1470, still regarded as one of the finest of its kind. At the end of the century, printer Aldus Manutius and punchcutter Francesco Griffo refine the roman, then create the first italic in 1501 for small-format books. Roman and italic, with their serifs and moderate contrast, set the standard for centuries.

Read also: Humanist serif, Roman, Serif, Contrast

In Paris, Claude Garamont cuts punches of a new elegance, following in the footsteps of Aldus Manutius. His romans and the Grecs du roi cut for King Francis I spread across Europe, notably through Christophe Plantin's workshop in Antwerp. The Vox classification later groups this style under the name Garalde, a blend of Garamond and Aldus. Many modern "Garamonds" are partly based on the types of Jean Jannon, cut a century later.

Read also: Claude Garamont, Garamond, Garalde, Sabon

The 18th century rationalises the letter. The Romain du roi commissioned by Louis XIV, then the types of William Caslon and John Baskerville, pave the way for transitional faces, more contrasted and more vertical. Around 1784, Firmin Didot in Paris and Giambattista Bodoni in Parma push this logic to the extreme: heavy thick strokes, very fine hairlines, a vertical axis and thin, unbracketed serifs. Didones embody the spirit of the Enlightenment and remain a code of luxury and fashion today.

Read also: Firmin Didot, Didot, Giambattista Bodoni, Bodoni, Didone, Transitional, William Caslon, Baskerville

The industrial revolution changes the scale. Posters, newspapers and advertising need letters that can be read from afar: very bold faces, slab serifs and large wood types appear. Presses become mechanical, then typesetting itself is automated: Ottmar Mergenthaler's Linotype, launched in 1886, casts whole lines, while the Monotype casts each character separately. These machines dominate newspapers and publishing until the 1960s.

Read also: Slab serif, Display, Linotype, Monotype, Linotype (foundry), Monotype (foundry)

In 1816, William Caslon IV's foundry shows one of the first letters without serifs. Considered crude at the time, these letters are soon nicknamed "grotesques". They take hold in posters and commerce, then grow more refined at the end of the century. Akzidenz-Grotesk, released by the Berthold foundry from 1898, becomes the European reference, while in the United States Franklin Gothic sets the American model in 1902.

Read also: Grotesque, Sans serif, Akzidenz-Grotesk, Franklin Gothic

Founded in Weimar in 1919, the Bauhaus champions a functional typography, free of ornament. Herbert Bayer designs a universal alphabet without capitals there in 1925. In 1927, Paul Renner releases Futura, which does not come from the school but shares its geometric spirit. A year later, Jan Tschichold sets out the principles of "the new typography": asymmetric layouts, sans serifs, clear hierarchy. These ideas lay the foundations of modern graphic design.

Read also: Geometric sans, Futura, Jan Tschichold, Gill Sans, Hierarchy, Grid

In Switzerland, the International Typographic Style seeks neutrality and objectivity. In 1957, Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann design Neue Haas Grotesk for the Haas foundry, renamed Helvetica in 1960. The same year, Adrian Frutiger releases Univers, the first family conceived as a complete system of weights and widths. Neo-grotesques and the modular grid become the language of companies, transport networks and institutions around the world.

Read also: Neo-grotesque, Neue Haas Grotesk, Helvetica, Max Miedinger, Univers, Adrian Frutiger

The letter leaves lead behind for light. Phototypesetters project characters from matrices on film or disc onto photographic paper. Setting type becomes faster and cheaper, and sizes can vary at will. Combined with offset printing, phototypesetting allows very tight letter spacing and a new graphic freedom. In this context, Adrian Frutiger designs the signage typeface for Paris Charles de Gaulle airport, released in 1976 under the name Frutiger.

Read also: Phototypesetting, Offset printing, Frutiger, Tracking, Hermann Zapf, Optima

The Macintosh, Adobe's PostScript language and the first layout software bring typesetting into the office: this is desktop publishing. Fonts become software. The Emigre foundry, founded in 1984, explores the constraints of screens and printers. Apple and Microsoft adopt the TrueType format, and Matthew Carter designs Verdana and Georgia for Microsoft, both built for the screen. Hinting becomes an essential craft.

Read also: Emigre, Adobe Fonts, TTF, Pixel, Hinting, Matthew Carter, Verdana, Georgia

In 1996, Microsoft and Adobe announce the OpenType format, which brings TrueType and PostScript together in a single cross-platform file for Mac and PC. Built on Unicode, it can hold tens of thousands of glyphs and enables advanced features: ligatures, alternate figures, small capitals, stylistic sets. With the arrival of WOFF and then WOFF2, professional fonts also reach the web.

Read also: OpenType, OTF, Unicode, Glyph, Character set, Stylistic sets, Alternates, WOFF, WOFF2

In 2016, Adobe, Apple, Google and Microsoft jointly introduce variable fonts, an extension of OpenType. A single file now contains one or more axes of variation, such as weight, width or optical size, and every position in between. Websites become lighter and brand identities more refined: a brand can fine-tune its typography to the pixel, or even animate it.

Read also: Variable fonts, Variable fonts (classification), Weight, Width, Inter

Artificial intelligence is entering type designers' tools: generative sketches, spacing assistance, extending character sets to new scripts. It also raises questions of rights, licensing and originality. Yet drawing a letter remains a matter of judgment: proportions, rhythm, the consistency of a family. Independent foundries continue to champion authored typography, where every detail is intentional.

Read also: Kerning, Rhythm, Klim, Grilli Type, Dinamo, Velvetyne

Every technology creates its own aesthetic. Lead, machines, light and then pixels have each left their mark on the shape of letters.

The classics always come back. Garamond, Didot and Akzidenz-Grotesk are redrawn by every generation, because they meet needs that do not change: reading, recognising, trusting.

Legibility depends on context. A letter designed for a poster, a newspaper or a screen does not follow the same rules.

Choosing a typeface means choosing a story. At Bonhomme, we start from that story to build identities that make sense and stand the test of time.

Garamond, Didot, Bodoni, Akzidenz-Grotesk, Futura, Helvetica, Univers, Frutiger, OpenType, Variable fonts

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