Adobe has created five Bauhaus fonts from typographic sketches and unpublished designs recovered from the legendary school of design. Via Adweek:
“Hidden Treasures: Bauhaus Dessau” is a series of five free font families that use as their starting point letter fragments and sketches by original members of the Bauhaus. Two of the font families—Xanti, named for Bauhaus designer Xanti Schawinsky, and Joost, for Joost Schmidt—can be downloaded starting today via Adobe Typekit. The rest, also linked directly to Bauhaus members, will be available in the coming months.
The fonts were developed by a team of international typographers and design students, led by renowned type designer Erik Spiekermann.
“The students at the Bauhaus were given exercises to draw letterforms, not to design typefaces. The tools did not exist to do so at a school in 1928,” he explains. “So we imagined what the students would have done had they had computers and type design software. The participants had all designed type before, so there was no risk of technical difficulties. They immediately understood both the challenge and the opportunity.”
As it did with its Munch brushes, Adobe will be issuing a set of “design challenges,” including a logo design, a business card, and a Behance project. The winner will receive a free trip to Dessau, Germany, home of the Bauhaus archives.