Fontographer
Concept Feedback
Free E-Newsletter
Featured Links
Top Free Fonts
- Scriptina
- ALS Script
- ChopinScript
- Coca Cola ii
- 3 theHard way RMXfenotype
- Susie's Hand
- AdineKirnberg Regular
- Walt Disney Script
- Champignon
- Black Chancery
- AdineKirnberg-Script
- Saginaw Medium
- Rothenburg Decorative Normal
- Rock it
- 2Peas Heart's Delight
- A Yummy Apology
- Jacoba Bold
- Distress
- Coronet Normal
- Bienville
- Celeste Normal
- 101 In My Yard
- 1942 report
- 2Peas Platform Shoes
- Angelica
- Monika Italic
- Metro Normal
- A Little Pot
- Old Script
- Adorable
- England Hand DB
- Amazone BT
- 4YEOstamp
- Anglo Text
- A Charming Font Superexpanded
- Texas Hero
- Arenski
- Dr Seuss
- 28 Days Later
- Bavand Regular
- Action Is, Shaded JL
- Famous Logos
- CAC Champagne
- Porcelain
- Border Corners 2
- Exmouth
- Wizardry
- 101 Anuther PictoBet
- A Star is Born
- Hancock
Recent Articles
Eric Gill got it wrong; a re-evaluation of Gill Sans
By Ben Archer
Gill Sans: Pride of England?
Gill Sans is the Helvetica of England; ubiquitous, utilitarian and yet also quite specific in its ability to point to our notions of time and place. As a graphic designer’s in-joke once put it ‘Q. How do you do British post-war design? A. Set it in Gill Sans and print it in British Racing Green’. As the preferred typeface of British establishments (the Railways, the Church, the BBC and Penguin Books), Gill Sans is part of the British visual heritage just like the Union Jack and the safety pin.
Icons of the British mid-20th century.
So to pick an argument with something that is akin to a typographic national monument might appear unwise; it is so very much ‘ours’. But it is a flawed masterpiece. How flawed? Well, monumentally flawed, in fact. In 2006, now that Gill Sans is distributed freely with Apple’s OS X and Adobe’s Creative Suite products, it is time to re-examine those flaws. Ever since Gill Sans was incorporated into the Adobe/Linotype library in the early 1990s what used to be Monotype Gill Sans became GillSans. The new compound name and the missing foundry attribution serves to distance today’s users of this type from any awareness that Monotype used to issue Gill Sans in a range of different series with alternate cuts. Readers with experience of metal and phototypesetting may recall this system, but for now, the majority of us only have this ‘bundled’ version of GillSans to go by.