Yale (typeface)
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| Category | Serif |
|---|---|
| Classification | Old style serif |
| Designer(s) | Matthew Carter |
| Commissioned by | Yale University |
| Foundry | Carter & Cone |
| Date released | 2004 |
Yale is an old style serif typeface designed by Matthew Carter and first released in 2004. It was commissioned by Yale University for use in all of its signage, promotional and internal material.
In 2010, Yale was named one of the "Ten Typefaces of the Decade" by Print magazine. It is influenced by Bembo, a popular book typeface by Monotype, and is also similar to Carter's previous ITC Galliard.
Carter, who has taught at the Yale School of Art since 1976, currently holding the rank of Senior Critic, was asked to design a universal typeface for Yale University by John Gambell, the University Printer Yale was first designed for signage on all Yale University buildings. Carter's first priority was therefore readability, as well as a balance between dignity and uniqueness. Carter has said that this was the first time in designing a typeface that he focused more on capital than lowercase letters, since he knew that on the building signs the lettering would be in capitals. Carter describes:
The signs, whether free-standing or attached to walls, reminded me of inscriptions, and this led me to think about the inscriptional origins of Roman caps and the everlasting problem of reconciling capitals with lowercase. For me, the moment when the first true synthesis occurred was in the type of De Aetna. This led me in turn to the Beinecke Library to pore over their copy of the book and its type—the archetype of Roman type for me.
The late 15th century De Aetna typeface, cut by Francesco Griffo for Aldus Manutius, served as a basis for Yale, with elements of one of Carter's earlier typefaces, Galliard. Some of Yale's unique characteristics are its curved leg of the "h", its flat-topped "A", its open apertures of the "c" and "e", and the bent tops of its lowercase ascenders.
Although originally developed for use in signage, several variants have been added to the Yale family for use in print and on the web:
In 2013, Matthew Carter was commissioned by Yale to compile OpenType versions of the print faces, renamed to prevent confusion—“YaleNew.” These fonts were delivered in July 2014. They have replaced the earlier version of the typeface, described above, in the download package available to the Yale community. In addition to converting the typeface to the OpenType format, Carter reorganized the family and supplemented its fonts with additional accented characters, floating accents, a complete set of f-ligatures, true fractions, lowercase Greek characters, and manicules (fists). Carter developed these from hands found in a woodcut illustration in the Hypnerotomachia Polifili, published in 1499 by Aldus Manutius. All YaleNew fonts include the Yale logo, the Yale Shield, and the words “University” and “College” as single glyphs adjusted to visually coordinate with the Yale logo.
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