17 designers favorite fontsListThumbs

17 designers favorite fonts
November 19, 2008
Everyone has their favorite fonts. Fonts that are very versatile and work well for a variety of projects. With that in mind we asked some very well known designers and digital artists what their top 3 serif and top 3 san-serif fonts would be. Among the artists we spoke with are Eduardo Recife, Tom Lane and Radim Malinic.
Also, we would like to know what your top 3 serif and san-serif fonts would be. Leave a comment with the list so everyone will be able to see your favorite.
Jonathan Wong - www.artofwong.com
San Serif



Serif




Eduardo Recife - www.misprintedtype.com/v4/
San Serif



Serif




Eric Sin - www.projectsd.net
San Serif



Serif




Brian Smith - www.skynerve.com
San Serif



Serif




David Mondou-Labbe - www.m0oo.com
San Serif



Serif



Karan Singh - www.wakeupmrsingh.com
San Serif



Serif

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Ehren Kallman - www.nnuvo.org
San Serif



Serif



Perttu Murto - www.perttumurto.com
San Serif



Serif




Kai Isselhorst - www.dopaminart.com
San Serif



Serif




Rik Oostenbroek - www.secretshowcase.com
San Serif



Serif




Alexander Radsby - www.aeform.net
San Serif



Serif




Christopher Haines - www.neondistractions.com
San Serif



Serif



Mike Harrison - www.destill.net
San Serif



Serif




Nick Delaney - www.vandal.nu
San Serif



Serif



Leigh Flurry - www.fontdeli.co.uk
San Serif


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Serif




Tom Lane - www.gingermonkeydesign.com
San Serif



Serif




Radim Malinic - www.brandnu.co.uk
San Serif



Serif








32 Comments
Premium!
nice resources, thx
My top 3:
Serif - Garamond, Trajan Pro and Bodoni.
San serif - Century Gothic, Square and Helvetica
elvog.deviantart.com
flickr.com/photos/elvog/
good to see some times new roman love
Stainless all the way.
My Top 3:
Serif - Arno Pro, Garamond and Trajan Pro.
San serif - Helvetica, Myriad Pro and Futura.
Great resources!
Valeu!
lol at the people choosing arial, fail.
Wow, a lot of the same ones.. not much diversity here.
Agree with a lot of them tho
Surprising to see so many designers choosing Arial. Also surprising that Univers wasn't mentioned even once!
I would love to see more topics on fonts! :)
@Anonymous: Yes, Fail to everyone using Arial... but also FAIL using Times New Roman. Helveta is also just like Arial... and in my opinion also FAIL :)
Great work Abduzeedo!
My fave has to be Trajan Pro!
I might have to reconsider now! some nice inspiration here!
What? No Comic Sans? (Okay, now that that's out of the way...)
Surprised to see Arial there--multiple times, no less.
Sans Serif - Corbel, Arial, Cooper Black
Serif - Palatino, Times New Roman, Georgia
Yeah, that's a nice idea for a post. Interesting to see some of the usual suspects here, and I too was surprised to see Arial on the list - there are similar fonts with much more style :)
When someone says 'Arial' it's just shorthand for "I don't honestly know know very much about typography."
Also, these are typefaces, not fonts.
This is amateur hour.
Very surprised not to see Univers as well
San Serif - Univers , Helvetica , Avant Garde
Serif - Boton , Georgia , Baskerville
Fascinating. Arial surprises me. I would have assumed that all designers had read up on the history and opinions of the main fonts they use. I just can't bring myself to use Arial when Helvetica or Akzidenz exists.
I am quite partial to Helvetica Neue, I use it all over my website http://nuttersmark.com but I think it's time I branch out. These are great suggestions and I've already changed the font on one of my new sites thanks to this article. Thanks!
Stop trashing Arial!
All typefaces have specific uses and Arial is by far the best standard typeface to use on websites built on html/css.
I think "Impact" is a good font for designing.
hmmm... seems to me some people have a problem with Arial even though it's just as respectable a font as Helvetica, stop being arrogant.
@ PatrickKeefe:
Get with the times old man, we call them fonts now not typefaces. I bet you are still using a typewriter too. HA!
Nice post with very great fonts! But no download link? I'm disappointed :<
my favourite fonts are FLAMA, LISBOA AND KLAVIKA.
Ok i'm sorry I have to comment on this:
@ Webby: Typeface is the CORRECT term for what is displayed here. Font refers to the digital file for a typeface, and Fontfamily refers to several variations of the same typeface, where the variations include various weights, thicknesses and slants.
@ All those that are Arial fans:
Arial is the bastard typeface of the digital world. Its basically the product of a group of people at Microsoft in the 80's who decided they wanted to cash in on the success of the sans serif typeface and compete with Adobe in the type department. Its a ripoff of Helvetica, which Myriad is also by the way, and is modified slightly to circumvent copyright laws. So what they did is essentially took something that was near perfect, modified it AWAY from its original form and made it screen viewable and then made it Truetype. This was never done in Postscript format, and therefore is not even recognized as a proper printer font, and is ONLY suitable for view on screen. If you actually worked with Arial you would know that the kerning and spacing are atrocious, and same with the actual design of it. And to call someone "arrogant" who knows a better quality product over another one is simply ignorant. As web guys don't forget that design is based on print first, and just because the web does not include the tools to properly set type yet, doesnt mean that we should settle for mediocracy. The differences between Helvetica and Arial are not significant on the web, in print its very significant. Oh and wow all the artwork shown here is print based! And not one of them uses Arial...
It's kind of sad on how some people trash Arial. Just because of it's history. But any good designer will use the best typeface to suit the design they are working on. So if it's Arial then it's Arial. Arial is different than Helvetica which gives it a bracket of it's own. Thus in turn allows for a designer to actually like it. There could be a numerous amount of reasons for a designer to like Arial. I've liked typefaces because of one letter, or a bowl or an ear. It's not that uncommon.
Its not because of its history it just looks bad, and apprently i'm not the only one that thinks that way. Myriad Pro has the same history as Arial, in that it was a ripoff of helvetica done by Apple, but its much more beautiful than Arial will ever be, and has a very comprehensive family than Arial does, especially the open type version.
And yes you pick the best typeface for the job, in a small publication, poster, pamphlet or something like that its less evident, but if the very type heavy and requires several members of the font family for the typographic elements then you are very limited in creating a cohesive typographic layout, because Arial doesn't allow you the flexibility.
Verdana is even a nicer font for the web than Arial is, and I would use that over Arial anyday.
hi.do you have the bigcaslon-medium fonts?
we need it,would you send to me if you have?
thank you very much!
San-serif - Century Gothic, Avant Garde and Franklin Gothic Demi Cond (If that's one)
Serif - Bodoni, Georgia and Dodoni.
Interesting to see the designer's favourite typefaces, and their artwork for comparison. I find it interesting to wonder whether the typefaces were chosen by the designer because of their style, or their style was influenced by a typeface.
Either way, my personal favourites are:
Sans Serif:
Avenir
Helvetica Neue
Myriad Pro
Serif:
ITC Century
Warnock Pro
Bell MT Standard
And Consolas, even though its a mainly sans serif type, with a few serifs and mono-spaced, its still fantastic for coding.
For the sake of it, here's one of my designs:
http://inkgrass.lazymoon.org/2008/04/19/past-the-tree-2008-wallpapers/
helvetica-serifa las mejores quien me podria ayudar a encontrar diferentes digramaciones
Good site, admin.
This post is design perfection at its best!
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