Newsletter February 2006
Introducing Parisine Plus PTF family.
Introducing 5 custom fonts families: Renault Identité, AlphaPoste, Parisine Office, Deréon, Mencken Text/Head.
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Malakoff, France, 13 February 2006. Porchez Typofonderie introduce their second OpenType family for retail market designed by Jean François Porchez (see bio here after). A family of twelve weights complete with all of the most common OpenType features (more than 900 glyphs and 40 000 kerning pairs by weight). Starting at 210 Euros for a licence covering 8 workstations.
Special offer for clients
Available through 30 April 2006.
To celebrate the launch of the Parisine Plus PTF, clients benefit a special price of only 168 Eeuros (standard price at euros 210). To access this special offer, you must login at , then jump to your account page (www.typofonderie.c…). In case of problems, you may contact us (see here after).
Upgrades
All our OpenType font families have user licenses with a minimum of 8 cpus. As such, upgrades from Parisine Plus packs purchased before the 1st March 2006 consist of a free OpenType upgrade to any purchases of a licence of 8 cpus or greater. For the users of the basic 2-cpu licence, the upgrade will cost 70 euros (the difference between 2 and 8 cpus). Contact us with your previous purchase details to take advantage of this offer.
Parisine Plus packs in PostScript Type 1 formats are still available separately and will not updated when bought after the 28st February 2006. Conversely, no crossgrades to PostScript Type 1 formats are available to users of the Parisine Plus PTF OpenType version.
About the design of Parisine Plus PTF
Parisine Plus was born in 1999, alongside its brother, Parisine. Parisine Plus, designed by Jean François Porchez, was always a sort of critic in reaction to the subjective functionalism of Parisine. In fact, when Parisine try to express neutrality (a very relative term…), Parisine Plus has fun with contrasts and not-so-obvious additions for a Sans family. It seems that Parisine Plus is a precursor in the way it offers many ligatures and strange forms we generally find more in serif typefaces families that express historical connotations.
With the introduction of OpenType, it was natural to expand on Parisine Plus’ concept, circa 1999, with the addition of features such the alternates and ligatures more readily accessible in software as time progressed. Groups of similarly-styled alternate characters (called stylistic sets) offer many combinations to the user, ranging from muted variations to extreme, colorful effects to apply to text:
1. Fancy alternates;
2. Fancy and uncommon ligatures (fi… and st… ligatures are activated through the usual ligature and special ligature features);
3. Formal alternates;
4. a-a alternates;
5. Disconnected c cedillas (for visual harmony with Parisine Plus in PostScript Type 1 format);
6. Arrows in positions from A-a to H-h.
In addition, the family has Small Caps, 4 sets of figures, fractions along with other goodies.
Each member of the family is composed of more than 900 glyphs (around 11 000 for the full family of 12 series) and feature around 40 000 kerning pairs (around 500 000 pairs for the full family). Many months of adjustments were necessary to finalise this complex family. For cross-platform compatibility, it continues to follow the earlier Parisine’s arrangement of sub-families: Clair and its regular, italic, bold, bold italic; the standard and its 4 fonts; and the Sombre with its 4 fonts.
Welcome to “Parisine Plus Reloaded” and have fun.
Custom fonts
Mencken Text/Head
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The Mencken family was created by Jean François Porchez for The Baltimore Sun in 2005. The first objective was to replace the previous custom fonts designed in the middle of the nineties which, according the reader survey conducted by The Sun, was one of the first points of dissatisfaction. Focus groups conducted during the redesign period liked the Mencken family; tests with online reader panels showed 75 percent preferred Mencken over the previous Sun typefaces. After the redesign launch, The Sun has received lots of feedback. Some reader response was particularly enjoyable: “It’s easier to read with the new type even though the type is designed by the French.”
The Mencken family include various members, each of them specially designed for their own function. See the dedicated page created by The Sun at the launch of the redesign.
Mencken Text (in addition the subhead) is a low contrast Transitional-style typeface designed with an oblique axis, an emphasis on horizontals and possesses open counters. The Text family features more Didonesque capitals to harmonise with the Head versions.
Mencken Head (and various narrow widths) is a high contrast typeface designed in the style of the Didot (typical french typeface from the end of 18th century) not so common in North America today. The objective was to make more legible and simple headlines with a unique flavour.
A multi-format typeface family, Mencken appears in OpenType format, as well as Type 1 PostScript and TrueType (Type 1 and TrueType formats contain a special encoding for fractions as well as several additional fonts for small caps and all caps).
The family’s name Mencken is a tribute to H.L. Mencken’s journalistic contributions to The Sun. According to the London Daily Mail, Mencken ventured beyond the typewriter into the world of typography. Because he felt Americans did not recognize irony when they read it, he proposed the creation of a special typeface to be called ironics, with the text slanting in the opposite direction from italic types, to indicate the author’s humour.
Mencken Text/Head is a typeface family in which its reserved use is for The Baltimore Sun until September 2008; after which, it can be used for all project types.
Mencken won a Creative Review Type Awards in January 2006.
Parisine Office
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Parisine Office was created by Jean François Prochez for RATP in 2005. It is based on Parisine, designed in 1996, which was created to solely fulfil the unique needs of signage. Year after year, its use was broadened to include maps and external communication. Concerned with consistency during the revision of their internal and external communication guidelines, RATP chose to evolve its typographic practices by abandoning Gill Sans, in use since the early 90s. The organization has strengthened its main logo with the expansion of the Parisine family.
This new variation is also the first to be designed in OpenType, a font format that can be used in either Windows or MacOS. With a character set surpassing the usual 250 to a size of more than 600, Parisine Office allows the composition of numerous Latin-script European languages, a major feature that will help RATP when it expands abroad.
Because the original Parisine possesses a wide body, Parisine Office was developed to allow support for older documents set in Gill Sans without changing the length of text. In addition, this typeface offers many standard and decorative ligatures for careful use. Several sets of figures are provided—standard, oldstyle, and lining—in tabular and proportional widths, depending on the version. Miniscule figures, necessary for fractions, are also included.
Parisine Office is a typeface family in which its reserved use is for RATP communication until June 2008; after which, it can be used for all project types. Outside RATP, this family requires licencing corresponding to the number of workstations in which it is installed, assuming work is done for RATP.
With your authorisation from RATP, contact Porchez Typofonderie to obtain licencing.
Deréon
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Deréon family was created in 2005 for Beyoncé (& Tina) Knowles,, a music celebrity who launched her fashion line House of Deréon for which we created the lettering of the brand under the direction of Soohyen Park at AR Media.
Initially the art director started to use Caledonia (1938) and naturally we wanted to kept some links to this innovative typeface created by W. A. Dwiggins (1880-1956). Caledonia can be considered a lively and expressive version of the “Scottish Didone” typefaces Bulmer and Martin created around 1790. For Deréon we expanded the initial concept by Dwiggins by designing a clear angle on some counters in order to make the letters more dynamic and sharp for display use, which is the main function of the family. Deréon is more that just an allusion to Dwiggins work; the new family features triangular sharp serifs (not at all Didonesque), as well as many other distinctive elements to fit the House of Deréon branding concept. During the development process, the music of Beyoncé was also very influential. Her music is a mixture of classic Soul and 70’s R’n’B mixed with contemporary Hip Hop and Rap “effects.” To transcribe this musical style visually, we combined round and romantic forms given by the bowls, swashes (in reference to classic Soul), and sharp, angular forms as perviously described (in reference to Hip Hop and music created with the help of new technologies). The result is a multi-effect typeface at the fringe of various styles combined into one.
This typeface family, created in OpenType format, features many alternates, swashes, and dingbats, and will be used as the main support for communication of the new Beyoncé brand, House of Deréon. The Alternates fonts are provided to let users of Quark Xpress and other non-Unicode applications have access to the supplementary glyphs.
Note on the text setting: The caps swashes in text are just here to show the design, as its not at all intended for all caps use!
Its a six-year exclusive typeface family, not publicly available until 2011.
Deréon won a Creative Review Type Awards in January 2006.
Alpha Poste
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Alpha Poste is custom typeface designed by Jean François Porchez in January 2005 for the identity and logotype of La Banque Postale launched in January 2006 in France as a subdivision of Groupe La Poste. The style is a Sanserif version of the original lettering designed by Jean François Porchez back in 1993. This new and exclusive typeface (who will never be available for others uses) developed in OpenType version is used for the branding of the various activities of the new bank.
Renault Identité
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Is a custom typeface designed in 2004 by Jean François Porchez for Renault group, via Publicis worldwide. The new typeface, developed from the Renault lettering created by Eric de Berranger, will cover all latin languages. Built in OpenType format, the use is restricted to Renault brands in various countries. Its an exclusive typeface of Renault who never will be available.
Best Wishes 2006
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+ Archive from 1996 to now.
Font orders
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Typofonderie.com ecommerce is secured by Atos Origin (French leader), you can buy in complete trust and download your fonts immediately. Credit card information is directly handled by the bank.
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If you would like further information, please contact:
Porchez Typofonderie
www.typofonderie.c…
14 rue Paul Bert
92240 Malakoff, France
33 (0) 146 542 692 Telephone
33 (0) 146 540 464 Fax
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About Porchez Typofonderie
This foundry was unofficially born circa 1994, and launched their first retail typefaces in 1995 with Apolline, Angie Sans and Anisette. It was the first sale which made the foundry official! The objective of the foundry was to offer the typefaces designed by Jean François Porchez in a exclusive way without the help of retail or local distributors. It was also seen as a way to control all sales and support. Through the years, there have been interns and few other people who have worked internally or externally with Jean Francois Porchez.
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About Jean François Porchez
After training as a graphic designer, during which time he focused on type design, Jean François Porchez worked as a type director at Dragon Rouge. By 1994, he had created the new typeface for Le Monde newspapers. Today he designs custom typefaces for The Baltimore Sun, Beyoncé Knowles, Costa Crocieres, France Télécom, Peugeot, RATP (Public Transport in Paris), as well as distributing internationally his retail typefaces via his typofonderie.com website. For the Linotype Library Platinum collection, he has created a revival of the Sabon, a Jan Tschichold revival of Garamond.
He is the President of the Association Typographique Internationale (ATypI). He teaches type design at ENSAD (France) as well as acting as a visiting lecturer for the Type Design MA at the University of Reading (United Kingdom). He also contributes regularly to conferences and international publications. He was awarded the Prix Charles Peignot in 1998. FF Angie (1990) & Apolline (1993) were prize-winning entries in the Morisawa typeface competition. Costa received a Certificate of Excellence in Type Design at the TDC2 2000. Ambroise, Anisette, Anisette Petite, Charente, Le Monde Journal, & Le Monde Courrier were all prize-winning entries in the Bukva:raz international competition (2001). Deréon and Mencken won a Creative Review Type Awards (2006).