An Introduction To The AVENIR Family By Stacey Chen O V E R V I E W l Avenir was designed by Adrian Frutiger. l The typeface was first released in 1988 with three weights, before being expanded to six weights. l In 2004, together with Akira Kobayashi, Frutiger reworked the Avenir family. l Avenir has now become a common font in web, print, and graphic design, etc. l Frutiger was born in Unterseen, Switzerland 1928. l At age 16, Frutiger was apprenticed as a compositor to a printer, while taking classes in woodcuts and drawing. l With his second wife, Frutiger had two daughters, who both experienced mental health problems and committed suicide as adolescents. l Frutiger spent most of his professional career working in Paris and living in France, returning to Switzerland later in life. A D R I A N F R U T I G E R l Charles Peignot of Deberny Et Peignot recruited Frutiger based on the quality of the wood- engraved illustrations of his essay. l Impressed by the success of Futura typeface, Peignot encouraged a new, geometric sans-serif type in competition. l Frutiger disliked the regimentation of Futura, and persuaded Peignot that the new sans-serif be based on the realist model. l In 1988, Frutiger completed the family Avenir. Frutiger intended the font to be a more human version of geometric sans-serif types popular in the 1930s, such as Erbar and Futura. A D R I A N F R U T I G E R “Avenir” = “Future” French English A V E N I R i s l Futura is a geometric sans-serif typeface designed in 1927 by Paul Renner. l Futura rejected the approach of previous sans-serif designs, which were based on the models of sign- painting, condensed lettering and 19th century serif typefaces, in favor of simple geometric forms: near-perfect circles, triangles and squares. l Futura is based on strokes of near-even weight, which are low in contrast. l The lowercase has tall ascenders and uses a single- story ‘a’ and ‘g’. The uppercase characters present proportions similar to those of classical Roman capitals. F U T U R A l Jakob Erbar designed Erbar in 1922, to l The success of Erbar inspired the creation pursue an ideal typeface that would be free of many new geometric sans-serif, including of all individual characteristics, possess Futura, Metro, Vogue, Spartan, Twentieth thoroughly legible letter forms, and be a Century, and Century Gothic, etc. purely typographic creation. E R B A R Avenir Avenir Oblique Avenir Roman Light Light Oblique Medium Medium Oblique Heavy Heavy Oblique A V E N I R N E X T l Between 2004–2007, Frutiger, together with Linotype's in-house type designer Akira Kobayashi, reworked the Avenir family to address on-screen display issues. The result was titled Avenir Next. l Avenir Next’s set of weights includes: ultra light, thin, light, regular, medium, demi bold, bold and heavy. A V E N I R I N U S E C I T A T I O N http://juliemattei.com/files/gimgs/32_avenir3.jpg http://deltafonts.com/wp-content/uploads/Spotify-Logo.jpg http://deltafonts.com/spotify-font/ http://fontmeme.com/avenir/ http://fontslogo.com/at-t-logo-font/ http://www.landanano.com/blog/the-print-univers-will-never-be-the-same https://www.fontshop.com/content/adrian-frutiger-1928-2015 http://thewildmagazine.com/bold-issue/it-all-began-with-futura/ https://www.myfonts.com/fonts/urw/erbar/ .