Brian Burns

I’ve been an admirer of Martin Majoor’s FF Scala typeface since reading ‘Thinking with Type’ by Ellen Lupton during my second year in college.

If you don’t know your counters from your bowls or your baselines from your x-heights, I’d highly recommend that you engross yourself in its content for an afternoon or two. It’s also worth bookmarking the accompanying ‘Thinking with Type’ website.

The vast majority of copy in the book is set in Scala. An exceptional choice in my opinion, as it’s an absolute pleasure to read. Don’t take my word for it though. Spiekermann’s FontShop thinks so too; having recently dedicated a little corner of the WWW to Majoor’s wonderfully Dutch creation.

Hidden deep in the ‘Free Downloads’ section of Scala’s mini-site is a fantastic specimen PDF of Scala. It was written by none other than Ms. Lupton herself, who was also responsible for the design of the document. Her insight into Karl Marx’s Commodity Fetishism theory, makes for interesting reading.

As a writer who is also a designer, I often compose my words directly on the page, and I am happiest when writing in Scala. Its crisp geometry and humanist references make Scala at home with both the visual and literary qualities of the written word. Scala’s x-height, which may be unfashionably large by today’s standards, has always sat well with me, reminding me of my own bottom-heavy figure.

Perhaps a little too much information Ellen? But, thanks.

With a redesign of my portfolio site on the cards, I’m hoping that this healthy-rumped collection of glyphs will be available on Typekit *very* soon!