Benedikt

A stainless Renaissance antiqua with provocative italics, derived from monumental roman letterforms and their wax tablet counterparts.

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A font with character

Benedikt comes with many unique characteristics. Some of them catch your eye, but are still highly functional and improve readability; others are more subtle – in a way that users and readers rarely actively notice. All of them together evoke a sense of diversity and humanity.

Many details and variants in this font show up automatically thanks to a large number of integrated OpenType features. Users don’t have to bother: It just looks good!

Contextual variants like this alternative »k« will be inserted automatically via the calt OpenType feature to improve the type color and evoke a warm character. These small details are what makes »Benedikt« stand out.
More contextual alternates in »Benedikt«
Users can choose between six extraordinary g‑variants!
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Professional figure sets for every use case: Old style / lining – proportional / tabular: »Benedikt« has them all!

Stylistic roots

The design of the Benedikt family is rooted in our custom work for the Hans-Benedikt foundation in Augsburg. These custom capital letters made out of stainless steel demonstrate our affinity for Roman monumental writing.

Art piece (pyramid shape) on the campus of Hochschule Augsburg featuring custom stainless steel lettering by Hans R. Heitmann
Art piece (pyramid shape) on the campus of Hochschule Augsburg featuring custom stainless steel lettering by Hans R. Heitmann
Detailed view of the capital letters B, E, N in stainless steel

The challenge now was to design additional members of the type family. First came the upright lowercase letters, which retain the monumental character of Roman capitals. They stand out from the usual antiqua approach – and therefore have a Roman appearance, e. g.: columnar shafts, a symmetrical structure and an uppercase R on x‑height.

3D rendering of Benedict italics engraved into a smooth, white surface

Provocative Italics

Of course, a matching italic is also needed. We refrained from using italics from the 16th century as a starting point, as in our opinion they are more representative of the calligraphic developments of the 15th and 16th centuries than of an actual rediscovery of antiquity. Therefore, they show a great distance to Roman shapes and are not the suitable in this case.

Roman handwriting from the 6th century
Roman handwriting from the 6th century.

Roman italics were carved into wax tablets (among others). These slender shapes without significant stroke contrast served as the source of inspiration for Benedikt Italic, which is in turn reminiscent of contemporary rounded fonts. According to our Finaltype philosophy, the distinguishing character of an italic must be absolutely guaranteed! In the case of this unusual combination (upright fonts with monumental character and italics with wax tablet character), highlighting is very distinct. Benedikt Italic in combination with the upright version is therefore completely new, excels in performing its intended function, and is historically justified to boot.

3D-Rendering of a stylized roman wax tablet with engraving of a pangram set in Benedikt italic

True Small Caps

»Benedikt« contains true small caps, which integrate well into the text and qualify this font for professional use cases. The small caps include diacritics, numbers and currency symbols als well as fitting mathematical operators.

Small Caps vs. All Caps: Comparison between true small caps in »Benedikt« with a scaled down version of regular capitals
»Benedikt« comes with diacritics for more than 36 languages
In our opinion, languages other than English should be treated with respect as well. That’s why our diactitics receive the same amount of care as the 26 base glyphs.
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