Case Study: Avenir Typeface History - The Next Future

Descriptive Subtitle

I used the subtitle “The Next Future” for the Avenir typeface because Adrian Frutiger reworked the Avenir family to expand the range of weights and features. The result was titled “Avenir Next” and the Avenir word means “future” in French. So I combined the words “next” and “future” to get this subtitle.

History

Avenir is a geometric sans-serif typeface designed by the Swiss typeface designer Adrian Frutiger (1928–2015) in the late 20th century. It was released in 1988 by Linotype GmbH with three weights, each with a roman and an oblique version, and used Frutiger’s two-digit weight and width convention for names. The typeface family was later expanded to six weights, each with a roman and an oblique version.

Style

Frutiger considers Avenir to be his best work and intends it to be a more human version of geometric sans-serif typefaces popular in the 1930s, such as Futura (1927) designed by Paul Renner and Erbar (1922) designed by Jakob Erbar. Avenir means “future” in French and hints that the typeface owes some of its interpretation to Futura.

Usage

In 2003, the City of Amsterdam began using Avenir as the principal typeface in its corporate identity, including the famous “I Amsterdam” sign. In 2012, François Hollande used Avenir in his campaign materials during the 2012 French presidential election. In 2014, French railway company SNCF used Avenir for communication and advertising. Avenir was used by many famous companies and brands in their products, such as Apple, Snapchat, Bloomberg, Disney+, the BBC, Best Buy, Toyota, Land Rover, etc.

Physical Features & Characteristics

Sans-serif typefaces like Avenir that use minimal geometric forms are called geometric san-serifs. They first appeared in the early 1920s and are characterized by geometric construction suggesting use of a compass. Avenir has physical features such as thicker stroke verticals than horizontals, classically drawn lowercase, short ascenders to aid in legibility, and a small x-height. Avenir has characteristics such as a circular O, a horizontal tail on Q, a squared-off end to G with a bar extending to the left and a flat section below, a double-story, a single-story g, flat top vertices, a pointed bottom vertex on M, and a lowercase f taller than the uppercase F.

Sources

Linotype: https://www.linotype.com/72/avenir-family.html

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avenir_(typeface)

Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adrian_Frutiger#Avenir

Fonts: https://www.fonts.com/font/linotype/avenir/story

Typedia: http://typedia.com/explore/typeface/avenir

MyFonts: https://www.myfonts.com/collections/avenir-font-linotype

Right Reading: https://www.rightreading.com/typehead/avenir.htm

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/results search_query=avenir+typeface

Thanks for reading!