Design Open Discussion – What Are Your Favorite Fonts?
This discussion is pretty cut and dry – name your favorite fonts and why you like them so much. Be as detailed as possible – for example, there are font families that I really enjoy, but only in certain weights. I highly encourage you to also post a link to a specimen of the font (FontShop is a good resource for font specimens). Feel free to post as many as you like – I am going to try to do something fun with the results, so get as many people involved in this as you can. In addition for those of you who do not know, the more people that you get involved by commenting, the more I donate to a good cause.
I look forward to hearing your thoughts. I will be keeping this post open for a couple weeks to get as many responses as possible. Honestly, I would like to get over 50 people’s responses to this question. Post earlier and post often!
Update: I have posted this discussion again this week in the hope that more folks respond – obviously, I feel far short of the amount of comments I was hoping to get. Please, if you have not yet put in your two cents, take the short time to do so.
The Discussion
12 Comments
helvetica because it’s classic, no bullshit and strong without being overbearing or pretentious.
caslon for the same reasons, just serif.
arial rounded because it’s fun, a sort of comic relief with all its bubblieness.
andale mono because its angular and momospaced and appeals to my left hemisphere.
Helvetica because i never get the chance to use it.
Comic sans because i don’t feel that is used enough either
DIN – Bold (only if used in all caps)
Futura Light – love the slender feel of this, but still friendly – not too mod or dated.
Phinster Fine – lovely rounded letters.
Myriad – simple, versatile little font.
I’m sure I’ll think of more, but those came to mind first.
Univers, American typewriter, Rockwell.
Helvetica and Helvetica Neue—Truly a classic. One of the most versatile typeface ever. Not to mention the best web typeface in my book…
Meta–Another great San Serif along the lines of Helvetica.
Sabon–Elegant, timeless, versatile Serif typeface.
Rosewood Fill– Along the lines of Clarendon. An homage to the woodtype look.
Mrs. Eaves, Cholla, Filosophia– My selection from Emigre. I love most of their typefaces.
I love DIN and Interstate Light – though I am quite impartial to Comic Sans ;)
I really like the readability and beauty of Trebuchet MS, although it’s a MS font. Text blocks appear uncongested and leightweight. In reference to the previous comment: I refuse to tolerate Comic Sans, imho there is nothing worse.
I have to admit a soft spot for Palatino (http://www.fontshop.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=verity.search&font_categories_search=font_name_search&searchstr=palatino&image.x=0&image.y=0)
It’s a nice clean font that I think brings a really elegant touch as headers on the web. Admittedly, a serif, so not the best for long/dense prose, but just a work of art!
I also throw my backing to helvetica and arial (just plain arial).. tried and true classics.
Oh, and while on the topic of fonts: have you ever worked with Windows and Mac and had the fonts be named as a different variation of the font on each? Highly annoying and unnecessary. Just to pre-empt the comments about avoiding Windows, I am trying with all my might :)
Verdana has always been my favorite web font.
Recently I was doing some work with Trajan and I like it a lot (for its style).
Trebuchet MS would be my favourite, closely followed by Georgia although I’m not really a fan of other serifs (Palatino is nice though). Both with no italics or boldness.
Trebuchet, in my opinion, is best used in headers with nice soft and neutral colours. Georgia I like in around 14pt dark grey but not in long blocks of text. Kinda specific but it’s what I like.
Fonts that I hate – most typewriter fonts (i.e., the font that I’m seeing as I’m writing this). They all have weirdly large gaps between words when you type and everything looks very unattractive to me.
Oh, and Comic Sans I can’t stand, like most people reading this!
I’m a couple years late to the game, but I thought as well mention many of my favorite typefaces are shown in my Flickr gallery.
And here are some updated links for the old, broken ones in lorissa’s comment: Futura Light and Myriad.