11/21/2023 0 Comments Story on gotham typefaceThis is similar to pay-per-click advertising that the giants Google and Facebook have pioneered. He also noted that many foundries are moving towards an impression-based licensing model for their typefaces in digital spaces. Netflix’s brand design lead, Noah Nathan, explained that creating their own typeface provided an opportunity to add an ownable piece that contributes positively to their brand aesthetic. So they created their own using the talents of an in-house design team at Netflix, in collaboration with Dalton Maag font foundry. According to, Netflix was paying literally millions of dollars each year to license the typeface at such a scale. While USA Today has called Gotham the font of the decade, it certainly has proven to be a typeface we can believe in.Streaming giant, Netflix, used the typeface up until 2018, when in an effort to reduce its font licensing costs, they created their own custom typeface: Netflix Sans. Earlier this year Narrow and Extra Narrow variations were introduced, creating a total of 66 Gotham styles. In 2007, after Print’s exclusivity had passed, the font became available to the general public. First used by the short-lived John Edwards campaign, it was Barack Obama's successful run that made the font more popular than ever.ĭue to its popularity, a Rounded variant was created in 2005-again the result of a commission, this time from the graphic design magazine Print. presidential elections were particularly good for Gotham. Perhaps due to its bold ‘American’ feel, the 2008 U.S. Spreading rapidly, it has been used in newspapers, corporate logos, movie posters, and packaging for brands like Coca-Cola, Netflix, Crest, and countless others. In 2002, GQ’s exclusive license had expired and the typeface was released publicly. I didn't think anything new could have been found there, but luckily for me (and the client), I was mistaken.” From Bus Terminal to Campaign Trail Interestingly, Frere-Jones admits Gotham may never had happened without the GQ commission: “The humanist and the geometric… had already been thoroughly staked out and developed by past designers. As put by Newsweek, “Unlike other sans serif typefaces, it's not German, it's not French, it's not Swiss. This process gave the design a unique quality often missing from geometric faces, while its vintage New York sources distinguish it as a notably American typeface. In drawing Gotham, Frere-Jones used the “mathematical reasoning of a draftsman” (over his instincts as type designer) allowing the letters to escape the grid wherever necessary. Tobias Frere-Jones, from a Helvetica film outtake It was born outside of type design, in some other world and has a very distinct flavor from that. It's the kind of letter an engineer would make. The lettering over the front door is this very plain geometric letter, but its not the type of letter that a type designer would make. And we both noticed the letting on the Port Authority Bus Terminal up on 42nd Street and 8th Avenue. We both grew up in the city and independently we've walked around the streets and earmarked pieces of lettering or signage that we thought would be a good seed, or starting point for a project somewhere down the line. Using the seemingly plain, geometric lettering from New York’s Port Authority Bus Terminal as the project’s touchstone, an American “working class” typeface was born. Provided with a brief to create something “masculine, new, and fresh,” type designer Tobias Frere-Jones drew influences from post-war building signage and hand-painted letters seen around New York City. Gotham was born in 2000, when men’s fashion magazine GQ commissioned New York-based Hoefler & Frere-Jones to create a new typeface for use in their publication. Perhaps most well known from the successful Obama ’08 presidential campaign, Hoefler & Frere-Jones’ Gotham has been referred to as the typeface of the decade-and it’s the subject of the fourth installment in our ‘Know your type’ series.
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