Emigre Fonts

In 1985, Ber­ke­ley-based gra­phic design com­pa­ny Emigre, the publis­her of the legen­da­ry design maga­zi­ne of the same name, laun­ched one of the first inde­pen­dent digi­tal type found­ries to explo­re the new design pos­si­bi­li­ties offe­red by the Mac­In­tosh com­pu­ter. To announ­ce each of their new typeface relea­ses, Emigre publis­hed small book­lets dis­play­ing the vir­tu­es of the fonts and reve­aling the pro­ces­ses used to design them.

By crea­ting spe­ci­fic con­texts, many of the­se so cal­led type spe­ci­mens went bey­ond being simp­le sales tools. In fact the Emigre book­lets were meant to be enjoy­ed as much for the typefaces as for their eso­te­ric con­tent. Emigre bro­ke rules and rai­sed eye­brows, win­ning them both world-wide acc­laim and much cri­ti­cism. Ulti­mate­ly, Emigres typefaces came to defi­ne an era. They were one of the first digi­tal type found­ries to sell typefaces online, and they crea­ted the model for hund­reds of small found­ries who fol­lo­wed in their footsteps.

Five of Emigres digi­tal typefaces were inclu­ded in MoMA’s per­ma­nent design collection.The type spe­ci­mens fea­tured in this book are a selec­tion of some of Emigres most memo­r­able pro­duc­tions of the past 30 years.