Style combination · Contrasts

Gothic Blackletter × Celtic Revival Illumination

The other national script of the same decades: Fraktur set German text until its ban in 1941, as Gaelic type set Irish until the mid-twentieth century; set the dark, broken gothic weave against the round, open insular letter.

From the research on Celtic Revival Illumination & Lettering

Mix them and make something Gothic Blackletter Celtic Revival Illumination

A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from Celtic Revival Illumination, their arrangement from Celtic Revival Illumination, the finish from Gothic Blackletter. Not a real work, and not an image of either style.

What each style brings

Each part of the design comes from the style with the stronger say in it, and each style gives at least two.

Gothic Blackletter & Fraktur Tradition Celtic Revival Illumination & Lettering

Type from Gothic Blackletter: Blackletter
Tight setting
Colour from Gothic Blackletter: Limited spot colours
Monochrome
Form from Celtic Revival Illumination: Geometric tessellation
Abundant decoration
Composition from Celtic Revival Illumination: Framed panels
Central symmetry
Surface from Gothic Blackletter: Paper & letterpress bite
Carved line

The type

Open fonts standing in for each style’s own type, which is often hand-drawn or commercial.

Display · Gothic Blackletter

Civic

UnifrakturMaguntia, standing in for Gutenberg's 42-line Bible textura (Mainz, c. 1454–55)

Text · Celtic Revival Illumination

Ornament and lettering of the Celtic Revival in Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man, modelled on Insular gospel books such as Kells and on carved stone crosses. Text sits in closed, symmetrical frames of knotwork, key pattern, spirals and interlaced beasts, its letters drawn in insular forms, knotted into the ornament or set in Gaelic type, in deep flat colours on vellum or paper. Its makers carried it from illuminated books and addresses to a nationalist memorial book, Gaelic League mastheads, magazines, the Irish Free State's first stamps and Liberty silver.

EB Garamond; Celtic Revival Illumination used Hand-drawn lettering after the majuscule and half-uncial of the Insular manuscripts, drawn into the ornament and Archibald Knox's interlaced Celtic lettering, drawn so densely into the ornament that it must be studied to be read

The colours

The ground and leading colours come from Gothic Blackletter, with a counter-accent from Celtic Revival Illumination. The ink reads on the ground at 4.5:1 or more.

Gothic Blackletter & Fraktur Tradition Celtic Revival Illumination & Lettering

#efe6cf ground · 36%
#1b1714 ink · 14%
#b0302a accent · 18%
#b8902e accent · 14%
#2c4a8c accent · 10%
#1f5a3d accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #efe6cf;
  --ink: #1b1714;
  --accent-1: #b0302a;
  --accent-2: #b8902e;
  --accent-3: #2c4a8c;
  --accent-4: #1f5a3d;
  --font-display: "UnifrakturMaguntia", serif;
  --font-text: "EB Garamond", serif;
}

Use it with care

Gothic Blackletter & Fraktur Tradition: Blackletter carries political weight in German-speaking countries: the Nazi regime pushed Fraktur as the German script in its first years before banning it in January 1941 as supposed 'Schwabacher Jewish letters', and neo-Nazis still use broken scripts. In the United States, too, certain blackletter faces are associated with hate groups, on tattoos and clothing. Check how a blackletter wordmark will read, especially for anything German, national or political. Cholo placas are territorial inscriptions of Los Angeles Latino street writing with their own codes: do not copy a real neighbourhood's placa or roll call, and commission or credit Chicano letterers (such as Chaz Bojórquez) rather than borrowing their menace as decoration.

Celtic Revival Illumination & Lettering: Its models are Christian gospel books and crosses, and many of its emblems are national and partisan: Leabhar na hAiséirghe is a memorial to the republican dead of 1916–23, including the Civil War, and the Celtic Cross stamp was adapted from a Sinn Féin label, so do not use these as neutral 'Irish' decoration where nationalist imagery is contested, as in Northern Ireland. The 1922 Map of Ireland stamp left out the border, and some in Northern Ireland and Britain read it as a claim to the northern counties, so an undivided map of the island is itself a political statement. A square cross interlocked with or surrounded by a circle is a widespread white-supremacist symbol, while the traditional Celtic cross has a long vertical shaft, so draw the cross accordingly and check knotwork marks in context. 'Celtic' and 'Irish' are not exclusive labels for Kells-type ornament: Insular art was made across Britain and Ireland, the Lindisfarne Gospels in Northumbria, and Kells itself possibly begun on Iona. George Bain died in 1968, so his drawings remain in copyright in the UK until the end of 2038: construct new knots by his methods rather than tracing his plates, and have any Irish or Scottish Gaelic text checked by a fluent reader.

The two styles

Large black Gothic lettering reading “Frost Wacht” fills an aged cream poster, surrounded by curling black foliage, red berries, and two inward-facing black birds. Red, blue, and ochre starbursts and a zigzag border frame the symmetrical design.

c. 1180–present · Central Europe, Western Europe, Northern Europe, Southern Europe, North America, Global / networked Gothic Blackletter & Fraktur Tradition The broken scripts of the Latin West. Textualis, a book hand from the late 12th century (Rotunda its rounder Italian form), went into type with Gutenberg's 42-line Bible (Mainz, c. 1454–55); Schwabacher followed from 1472, and Fraktur was cut for Maximilian I's Prayer Book (1513). Curves break into angles; tight justified pages read as a dark, even weave with red rubrics. Fraktur set German text until the Nazi ban of 1941. Elsewhere it had long become a display letter, and today signals age, gravity or menace on mastheads, beer labels, metal logos and cholo lettering.

An ornate illuminated-manuscript-style poster reads “BRIGHT PATHS,” surrounded by gold Celtic knotwork, spirals, and patterned borders in blue, green, and rust red. Mirrored birds flank a sun above the lettering, while two deer frame a winding river through green hills below.

1861–1951 · Western Europe Celtic Revival Illumination & Lettering Ornament and lettering of the Celtic Revival in Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Man, modelled on Insular gospel books such as Kells and on carved stone crosses. Text sits in closed, symmetrical frames of knotwork, key pattern, spirals and interlaced beasts, its letters drawn in insular forms, knotted into the ornament or set in Gaelic type, in deep flat colours on vellum or paper. Its makers carried it from illuminated books and addresses to a nationalist memorial book, Gaelic League mastheads, magazines, the Irish Free State's first stamps and Liberty silver.

More combinations

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With Celtic Revival Illumination

All 10 combinations with Celtic Revival Illumination

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