Romanisch Spitz
Type Revival (ECAL)Upon arriving in Switzerland from Tel Aviv, the first place I took my family was the Paper Museum in Basel. I tried to infuse them with my love for letters and my enthusiasm for print in general. Already at the entrance, we stood amazed in front of the large waterwheel that operated this enormous machine. It seemed that every room we entered during the visit held a secret and made us feel as if we were inside the belly of a horrid fairytale. In every corner, there was a secret that needed deciphering. So we climbed up the stairs, reached hidden rooms, and met people who seemed frozen in time. In our wanderings, we reached the attic, and there, to our astonishment, a library arose. We sat there like three monks in “The Name of the Rose,” opened dusty books, and conjured up cruel wizards and princesses imprisoned in magical castles.
Romanisch Spitz embodies all these experiences. A sharp, angular typeface, hiding in its essence the cruelty of the Inquisition and the beauty of a young maiden’s hair. When you play with it a bit, when you knead it, it brings with it the scent of the Grimm Brothers with their innocence, beauty, and cruelty to our modern era, which is still cruel but in different and various ways. “Romanisch Spitz” is a contemporary typeface that can serve both as titles and as body text, in medieval tales and in self-help books for the new age. A typeface, which was once upon a time was used for church pamphlets and, in its updated version, can be used on a poster for a Pearl Jam concert or as the title font for a Netflix series.
Mentored by Alice Savoie
Photos by Visvaldas Morkevicius
Schelter & Giesecke’s Romanisch a.k.a. Romanische Antiqua includes Nr. 20 (1889*) with Kursiv (1896), halbfett (1895) with (obliqued) Kursiv (1898), schmal halbfett (1897), breit mager with Kursiv (1898),
a light Nr. 22 (1902), and schmal (1904). [Wetzig 1926–40]*) Apparently an error: other sources date the release of Romanisch to 1896. [S&G 1912 specimen, Archiv] The halbfett was registered April 1895. [Reichsanzeiger] Some styles available with Cyrillics. Adopted for the Typograph [Wetzig 1926–40]. The halbfett is based on De Vinne [Bertheau 1995].
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