Bernhard Gothic is a family of geometric

sans serif In typography and lettering, a sans-serif, sans serif, gothic, or simply sans letterform is one that does not have extending features called "serifs" at the end of strokes. Sans-serif typefaces tend to have less stroke width variation than ser ...

typeface designed by

Lucian Bernhard Lucian Bernhard (March 15, 1883 – May 29, 1972) was a German graphic designer, type designer, professor, interior designer, and artist during the first half of the twentieth century. Career He was influential in helping create the design ...

in 1929 for the American Type Founders (ATF). Five variations by Bernhard were introduced over two years: * ''Bernhard Gothic Medium'' (1929) * ''Bernhard Gothic Light'' (1930) * ''Bernhard Gothic Light Italic'' (1930) * ''Bernhard Gothic Medium Italic'' (1930) * ''Bernhard Gothic Heavy'' (1930) * ''Bernhard Gothic Extra Heavy'' (1931) A final member of the family, ''Bernhard Gothic Medium Condensed,'' was introduced by ATF in 1936, but it is unclear as to who the designer was. Bernhard Gothic is more organic and less regular than other geometric sans-serif typefaces, including Futura, Kabel, and

Twentieth Century The 20th (twentieth) century began on January 1, 1901 (1901, MCMI), and ended on December 31, 2000 (2000, MM). The 20th century was dominated by significant events that defined the modern era: Spanish flu, Spanish flu pandemic, World War I and ...

, showing influence of Bernhard's earlier more expressionistic faces. It is a "spurless" design, similar to the contemporary

Semplicità Semplicità is a sans-serif typeface of the geometric style. It was published by the Nebiolo type foundry of Turin, Italy from around 1928. Semplicità, named for the Italian for "simplicity", is an example of the new wave of "geometric" sans-s ...

and Universal Grotesk and more recently FF Dax, in which strokes end without terminals. This gives an effect of modernism, detached from handwriting conventions.

Hot metal copies

Intertype's 1936 copy was called ''Greeting Gothic''. MacGrew, "American Metal Typefaces of the Twentieth Century," p. 33.

Digital copies

Digital copies are available from

Elsner+Flake Elsner+Flake is a trademark used by German type foundry originally called EF Designstudios but later renamed Elsner+Flake Type Consulting GmbH and is currently based in Hamburg. The company was founded in 1986 by Veronika Elsner and Günther Flake ...

, Font Company, URW++,

Berthold Berthold or Berchtold is a Germanic given name and surname. It is derived from two elements, ''berht'' meaning "bright" and ''wald'' meaning "(to) rule". It may refer to: *Bertholdt Hoover, a fictional List_of_Attack_on_Titan_characters, character ...

, Spiece Graphics,

Monotype Imaging Monotype Imaging Holdings Inc., founded as Lanston Monotype Machine Company in 1887 in Philadelphia by Tolbert Lanston, is an American (historically Anglo-American) company that specializes in digital typesetting and typeface design for use with ...

and FontHaus.

References

External links

Fonts in Use
American Type Founders typefaces Geometric sans-serif typefaces Typefaces and fonts introduced in 1930 Letterpress typefaces Digital typefaces Typefaces designed by Lucian Bernhard {{Typ-stub