History

New Alphabet is a personal, experimental project of Crouwel. The typeface embraces the limitations of the cathode ray tube technology used by early data display screens and phototypesetting

Phototypesetting

Phototypesetting was a method of setting type, rendered obsolete with the popularity of the personal computer and desktop publishing software, that uses a photographic process to generate columns of type on a scroll of photographic paper...

 equipment and thus only contains horizontal and vertical strokes. Conventional typefaces can suffer under these limitations, because the level of detail is not high enough. Crouwel wanted to adapt his design to work for the new technologies, instead of adapting the technologies to meet the design. Since his letter shapes only contain horizontals and verticals, some of the letters are unconventional, while others are difficult to recognize at all. Because of this, the typeface was received with mixed feelings by his peers.

Most of the letters are based on a grid of 5 by 9 units, with 45-degree corners. There is no differentiation between uppercase and lowercase. Many of his peers were of the opinion that the design was too experimental and that it went too far. So much so, that it got a lot of newspaper coverage, which sparked a lively debate. For Crouwel it was mostly a theoretical exercise, ‘The New Alphabet was over-the-top and never meant to be really used. It was unreadable.’

Digital New Alphabet

New Alphabet was digitized in 1996 by Freda Sack and David Quay from The Foundry in London. It is part of the Architype 3 Crouwel Collection, and it constists of three weights. Other typefaces designed by Crouwel in the same collection are Gridnik

Gridnik (typeface)

Gridnik is a geometrical typeface designed by Dutch graphic designer Wim Crouwel, in 1974. It is the digital version of the typewriter typeface Olivetti Politene.-History:...

, Fodor

Fodor (typeface)

Fodor is a geometrical typeface designed by Dutch graphic designer Wim Crouwel, around 1973.- History :Fodor was designed for the covers of the magazine published by Museum Fodor in Amsterdam. The main text on the covers were set with a electric typewriter, and the monospaced typeface that it used...

, Stedelijk and Catalogue.

External links

• Architype 3 Crouwel collection on the website of The Foundry.