![]() Some letters also have a slight turn in the direction of seemingly straight strokes such as lowercase ‘a’ and ‘d’. A vestige of serif is to be found on most vertical straight strokes such as lowercase ‘h’ and ‘q’. The close fit of letters, the large x-height and clear legible letterforms produce evenly coloured pages. These traces of stress and serif assist the horizontal flow of the line. The apparently unstressed and serifless letter has on closer examination got a slight vertical stress, especially in the heavier weights, and a faint broadening of the tips of vertical strokes. The letterforms are based upon the nineteenth-century style of sans serifs called Grotesques and are not completely monoline. It involved a heavy investment in time and required a lot of physical space. In 1958 the new typographic adviser at The Monotype Corporation made the decision to embrace the Univers type family and the company manufactured it from the early 1960s onwards. Univers was the first typeface to be manufactured simultaneously as foundry type for hand-setting, for hot-metal composition, and for phototypesetting. For example, the capital ‘O’ is almost straight-sided in the extra condensed compared to the rounded wide ‘O’ of the expanded versions. With Univers only the proportions of strokes and letters vary and the basic bowl shapes. Previously it was quite normal for there to be greater variation between weights and styles. Univers was one of the first typefaces to be planned from the start as a family of consistent related designs. All of the sizes and weights were designed in relation to one another to produce a harmonious scale of weights. Univers was made in 21 different styles with a decimal system of classification indicating weight and width, such as 40 for light, 50 for medium, 60 for bold and where 3 denoted expanded, 7 condensed, and 9 extra condensed. It was named because of its aim for universal usefulness. It was designed by Adrian Frutiger in 1957 for traditional typefounders Deberny & Peignot of Paris. The Univers typeface did not originate with The Monotype Corporation. Type that was 14pt and larger was known as display size because of its suitability for setting as headings and titles as opposed to continuous text. Type came in points (pt) and continental standard Didot (D) sizes from as small as 4 ¼ pt and as large as 72pt or 72D. Each Monotype typeface was allocated a series number and a name. ![]() Monotype built up a remarkable collection of typefaces for hot-metal technology, starting in 1900 and adding to it until the early 1980s. From a set of matrices the owner of a Monotype machine could cast as much fresh type as they needed. Part of Monotype Loan Library collection.Īs well as manufacturing machines that composed and cast type, The Monotype Corporation manufactured matrices for hundreds of different designs of typefaces in metal. 247, manufactured by Monotype Corporation. Display (1.0") size matrices for Univers Medium Expanded (Typeface Series number: 688), 48D, Roman.
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