Style combination · Contrasts

Gothic Blackletter × Renaissance Book Typography

Its historical rival: the light, round, open humanist roman page against the dark, broken, woven gothic one. Drop one blackletter title or initial into an Aldine-style page for a deliberate clash of eras.

From the research on Gothic Blackletter & Fraktur Tradition

The humanist roman was drawn against the gothic textura it replaced in Italy: open, round and light where blackletter is dense, broken and dark.

From the research on Renaissance Book Typography

Mix them and make something Gothic Blackletter Renaissance Book Typography

A sample layout drawn from the recipe: shapes from Gothic Blackletter, their arrangement from Renaissance Book Typography, the finish from Renaissance Book Typography. 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 Renaissance Book Typography

Type from Gothic Blackletter: Blackletter
Tight setting
Colour from Gothic Blackletter: Limited spot colours
Monochrome
Form from Gothic Blackletter: Angular & zigzag
Rectilinear
Composition from Renaissance Book Typography: Classical text block
Central symmetry
Surface from Renaissance Book Typography: 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

Atlas

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

Text · Renaissance Book Typography

The printed book as shaped by humanist Italy and France: roman and italic types modelled on humanist handwriting, a single justified text block set in harmonious proportions within generous margins, and woodcut initials, borders and printer's devices as the only ornament. Its page became the default model of the Western book for the next five centuries.

EB Garamond; Renaissance Book Typography used Jenson's roman and Griffo's roman

The colours

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

Gothic Blackletter & Fraktur Tradition Renaissance Book Typography

#efe6cf ground · 36%
#1b1714 ink · 14%
#b0302a accent · 18%
#b8913a accent · 14%
#2c4a8c accent · 10%
#8a6e4b accent · 8%

As CSS

:root {
  --ground: #efe6cf;
  --ink: #1b1714;
  --accent-1: #b0302a;
  --accent-2: #b8913a;
  --accent-3: #2c4a8c;
  --accent-4: #8a6e4b;
  --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.

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 aged cream book cover reads “THE GARDEN OF REASON” above a symmetrical illustration of a fruit-bearing tree flanked by two birds and flowering plants. Black leafy vines, rust-red flowers, and ochre leaves fill a rectangular ornamental border.

c. 1460–1600 · Southern Europe, Western Europe, Central Europe Renaissance Book Typography The printed book as shaped by humanist Italy and France: roman and italic types modelled on humanist handwriting, a single justified text block set in harmonious proportions within generous margins, and woodcut initials, borders and printer's devices as the only ornament. Its page became the default model of the Western book for the next five centuries.

More combinations

With Gothic Blackletter

All 15 combinations with Gothic Blackletter

With Renaissance Book Typography

All 16 combinations with Renaissance Book Typography

Every style combination