FAIRPLEX

A family of 16 fonts
designed by Zuzana Licko

F
Licensed and distributed by Emigre Fonts
Narrow Book Wide Book
FA I R PL E X FA I R PL E X
N A R R OW B O O K WIDE BOOK
$39 $39

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUV WXYZ ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789 abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789

[Link]. Italic [Link]. Italic

FA I R PL E X FA I R PL E X
N A R R OW B O O K I TA L I C W I D E B O O K I TA L I C
$39 $39

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUV WXYZ ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

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Narrow Bold Wide Bold

FA I R PL E X FA I R PL E X
N A R R OW B O L D WIDE BOLD
$39 $39

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
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N. Bld. Italic W. Bld. Italic

FA I R PL E X FA I R PL E X
N A R R OW B O L D I TA L I C W I D E B O L D I TA L I C
$39 $39

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789 abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz123456789

FA I R PL E X N A R ROW B O O K & B O L D FA I R PL E X N A R ROW M E D I U M & B L AC K

four font package four font package
2 3
$95.00 $95.00
Narrow Medium Wide Medium
FA I R PL E X FA I R PL E X
N A R R OW M E D I U M WIDE MEDIUM
$39 $39

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abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789 abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789

N. Med. Italic W. Med. Italic

FA I R PL E X FA I R PL E X
N A R R OW M E D I U M I TA L I C W I D E M E D I U M I TA L I C
$39 $39

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Narrow Black Wide Black

FA I R PL E X FA I R PL E X
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$39 $39

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N. Blk. Italic W. Blk. Italic

FA I R PL E X FA I R PL E X
N A R R OW B L AC K I TA L I C W I D E B L AC K I TA L I C
$39 $39

ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz0123456789 abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz123456789

FA I R PL E X N A R ROW M E D I U M & B L AC K FA I R PL E X W I D E M E D I U M & B L AC K

four font package four font package
4 5
$95.00 $95.00
DESIGNING FAIRPLEX sans-serif type with serifs added on than it is to a version of serif type. This
sparked the idea that the solution to my serif problem for Fairplex Black
might be a slab serif treatment. After all, the Book weight already shared
The foundation for Fairplex began in January 1998. I wanted to develop a features of sans-serif types.
serif text face loosely based upon Garamond No.3. This resulted in many Shortly after this came the idea to angle the
false starts, some of which turned into seemingly unrelated sans-serif serifs. This was suggested by my husband, and
designs, including Tarzana and Solex. was probably conjured up from his years of sub-
As the experimentation continued, it became apparent that Fairplex conscious assimilation of the San Francisco
would not be the Garamond revival that I had originally intended; perhaps Giants logo while watching baseball, and then
I’ll return to that sometime in the future. reinforced by a similar serif treatment in John
My goal for Fairplex became that of creating Downer’s recent Council Design. The angled
a text face that would achieve legibility by avoid- serifs added visual interest to the otherwise
ing contrast, especially in the Book weight. This austere slab serifs.
was spurred by experiences with my own eye- The intermediate weights were then derived by interpolating the Book
sight, which is increasingly intolerant of high and Black, with the exception of several characters, such as the “n,” which
contrast typefaces when reading lengthy texts. required specially designed features to avoid collisions of serifs, and to yield
(Especially when combined with paperback a pleasing weight balance. A range of weights was interpolated before de-
printing and less than perfect reading condi- ciding on the Medium and Bold weights.* Zuzana Licko
tions!) As a result of its low contrast, the Fairplex
Book weight is somewhat reminiscent of a sans serif, yet the slight serifs
preserve the recognition of serif letterforms.
When creating the accompanying weights, the challenge was balancing
the contrast and stem weight with the serifs. To provide a comprehensive
nnnnnnnnnn
Book Medium Bold Black

family, I wanted the boldest weight to be quite heavy. This meant that the
Black weight would need more contrast than the Book weight in order to
avoid clogging up. But harmonizing the serifs proved difficult. The initial
serif treatments I tried didn’t stand up to the robust character of the Black
weight. Several months passed without much progress, and then one evening
I attended a talk by Alastair Johnston on his book Alphabets to Order, a sur-
vey of nineteenth century type specimens. Alastair pointed out that slab
serifs (also known as “Egyptians”) are really more of a variation on sans
* Custom weights and widths of Fairplex are available upon request.
serifs than on serif designs. In other words, slab serif type is more akin to Special thank you to John Downer and Linnea Lundquist for help and advice.

6 7
 WIDE
BLACK DETROIT EGYPTIAN CLASSIFYING FAIRPLEX
WIDE
MEDIUM ITALIC and other typographic curiosities The essence of a letterform is dictated by an inner framework –

SOOTHING
its “armature,” as the late type designer Warren Chappell called
it. A letterform with serifs has a personality greatly influenced
by how its serifs are constructed. Serifs reveal a certain kind of

SERIFS
NARROW
BOOK
attitude and orientation. In the history of type, Zuzana Licko’s
new series, Fairplex, finds a place among few antecedents. The
serifs come from primarily nontypographic sources, but the
skeletal forms are clearly recognizable as being typographic in
tradition. Fairplex is a rare combination of elements from three
NARROW
MEDIUM distinct media:

WIDE
BOLD CHROMOLITHOGRAPHY - chromolithography of the late 19th and early 20th centuries
- American sign painting during approximately the same period

NARROW
BOOK ITALIC Subconscious Assimilation - display typefaces designed between ca. 1840 and ca. 1980

NARROW
BOLD

NARROW
BLACK ITALIC
ARMATURE
typeface manufacture
FINE TYPE SPECIMEN
Figure 1. Figure 2.
WIDE
BOOK The Fairplex serif style was more common in commercial lithog-

Americana
raphy and American sign painting (Fig. 1) than it was in type, but
it had no single, established, standard form. Lettering artists

WINK
WIDE
MEDIUM introduced their own interpretations. In sign painting, this serif
mode, with its pronounced bracketing and angled terminals, was
known as the “Detroit” style during the early 1900s. In the lithog-
raphy trade, there may have been another name, but it seems to
have had no given name in the realm of type, in which names of
WIDE letter styles and serif kinds were generally known by their rou-
BLACK

7
 WIDE
BLACK ITALIC

WIDE
BOLD
flames
COLD WATER CANYON
tine inclusion in the full names of the faces. In the sign trade of
a century ago, Fairplex would likely have been classified as a
“Detroit Egyptian” lettering style: “Detroit” referring to the kind
of serif, and “Egyptian” referring to its basically monoline struc-
ture or “armature”(Fig. 2).
Neither “Detroit” nor “Egyptian” are widely used terms in
NARROW
BOLD ITALIC Indigenous shrubs of Santa Monica today’s classifications of types. Alas, in the one area of printing

PLANOGRAPHIC
where Fairplex has definite ancestors, namely planographic
WIDE printing employed to manufacture product labels, there seems
BOLD

PRINTING
to be no compendium of all the lettering styles available. Maybe
they weren’t all documented.
The one place where the fashion remains in modern use is on
NARROW
BOOK
granite grave markers, which are inscribed not by hand any more,
but instead by masking and sandblasting (Fig. 3).
NARROW
sliding aluminum doors

QUALITY
MEDIUM

NARROW
BLACK

WIDE
BLACK ITALIC agri business Figure 3.

In any case, even though Fairplex is indeed a new typeface

design, it sits squarely in a camp of commercial lettering first
NARROW
BOOK BAKERSFIELD, CALIF. seen in common use more than a century ago. It is therefore a
very likely candidate for the same kinds of color effects that

WIDE
MEDIUM Light Sweet Crude helped this grand style rise to prominence initially: inlines, out-
lines, centerlines and shadows. John Downer

NARROW
BOOK

NARROW
BLACK
FANDANGO
YUMMY YUCCA CALCULATOR
IMAGE SOURCES
FIGURE 1: Snow King Baking Powder cardboard sign from Country Store Antiques by Don and
Carol Raycraft. Photocopy detail from a photo by Carol Raycraft
FIGURE 2: From Atkinson’s Sign Painting up to Now, 1909, by Frank H. Atkinson. Published by
Frederick J. Drake & Company, Chicago.
FIGURE 3: Gravemarker at St. Joseph Cemetery, Iowa City. Photo by John Downer.

11
FA I R PL E X N A R R O W B O O K , B O L D & ITALICS 1 0/ 13 P O I N T

If one is inclined to wonder at first how so many dwellers came to be in the

loneliest land that ever came out of GOD’s hands, what they do there and
N A R R OW B O O K & B O L D $ 9 5 . 0 0
M M M M
why stay, one does not wonder so much after having lived there. None other
than this long brown land lays such a hold on the affections. The rainbow
WIDE BOOK & BOLD $95.00
M M M M
hills, the tender bluish mists, the luminous radiance of the spring, have the
lotus charm. They trick the sense of time, so that once inhabiting there you
N A R R OW M E D I U M & B L AC K $ 9 5 . 0 0
M M M M
always mean to go away without quite realizing that you have not done it.
FAIRPLEX WIDE BOOK, BOLD & ITALICS 10/13 POINT
W I D E M E D I U M & B L AC K $ 9 5 . 0 0
M M M M
If one is inclined to wonder at first how so many dwellers came
to be in the loneliest land that ever came out of GOD’s hands,
what they do there and why stay, one does not wonder so ***************************
much after having lived there. None other than this long brown BUY ALL 16 FAIRPLEX FONTS WIDE
MEDIUM

FOR $299
land lays such a hold on the affections. The rainbow hills, the
tender bluish mists, the luminous radiance of the spring, have
the lotus charm. They trick the sense of time, so that once

81
WIDE
inhabiting there you always mean to go away without quite MEDIUM

AND SAVE
realizing that you have not done it.
FA I R PL E X N A R R OW M E D I U M , B L AC K & I TA L I C S 1 0/ 1 3 P O I N T
WIDE
Men who have lived there, miners and cattle-men, will tell you this, not so BLACK
fluently, but emphatically, cursing the land and going back to it. For one
WIDE
thing there is the divinest, cleanest air to be breathed anywhere in GODs BLACK

world. Some day the world will understand that, and the little oases on the
windy tops of hills will harbor for healing its ailing, house-weary broods.
There is promise there of great wealth in ores and earths, which is no wealth
by reason of being so far removed from water and workable conditions,
but men are bewitched by it and tempted to try the impossible.
FA I R P L E X W I D E M E D I U M , B L A C K & I T A L I C S 1 0 / 1 3 P O I N T

Men who have lived there, miners and cattle-men, will tell
you this, not so fluently, but emphatically, cursing the land
and going back to it. For one thing there is the divinest, clean-
est air to be breathed anywhere in GOD’s world. Some day
the world will understand that, and the little oases on the
windy tops of hills will harbor for healing its ailing, house-
weary broods. There is promise there of great wealth in ores

DOLLARS!
and earths, which is no wealth by reason of being so far re-
moved from water and workable conditions, but men are
bewitched by it and tempted to try the impossible. WIDE
MEDIUM

Text excerpted from The Land of Little Rain by Mary Austin. Houghton, Mifflin & Company, 1903.
***************************