John Downer (born 1951) is an American sign painter, typeface and logo designer.[1][2] Downer began his career as a painter of signs.[3][4][5] Among his best-known digital fonts are Iowan Old Style, Roxy, Triplex Italic, and Brothers.[6][7][8]
John Downer | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Tacoma, Wa |
| Nationality | American |
| Occupation(s) | Typeface Designer, Logo Designer, Sign Painter |
| Years active | 1969-present |
Downer studied at Washington State University and the University of Iowa.[9][10][11][12] His work was featured amongst that of others in the 2014 documentary Sign Painters.[13][14][15] He has lectured on type and sign design at conferences and at The Cooper Union.[16]
Typeface designs
edit- Iowan Old Style - Venetian old-style serif
- Roxy (Font Bureau) - stroke-modulated sans-serif
- Triplex Italic (Emigre)
- Brothers (Emigre) - chamfered display wedge-serif influenced by nineteenth-century lettering[17]
- Paperback (House Industries) - text serif face with optical sizes
- SamSans - humanist sans-serif
- Vendetta (Emigre) - inspired by old-style Venetian serif fonts but with sharpened serifs
- Council (Emigre) - condensed display wedge-serif, capitals-only
- Ironmonger (Font Bureau) - angular all-caps display alphabet inspired by lettering on buildings
- Simona (Design Lab) - serif, similar to the work of Fournier and Bodoni
Proprietary typefaces
edit- Gonnick [for cartoonist Larry Gonnick]
- Screenmax (bitmap serif typefaces at 7 pixel x-height in Roman, Italic, Bold and Black)
References
edit- ^ Downer, John. "The Art of Founding Type". Emigre. Retrieved 19 August 2015.
- ^ "A sign painter at work". Kombinat. Archived from the original on 11 September 2016. Retrieved 5 May 2016.
- ^ Hoefler, Jonathan. "John Downer at The Propagandist". Hoefler & Frere-Jones. Retrieved 21 January 2016.
- ^ "Défense D'Af: Faux Ghostsign from John Downer". Ghost Signs (blog). 22 December 2013. Retrieved 5 May 2016.
- ^ Hansford, Vanessa. "Sign Painter, John Downer". The Simple Things. Retrieved 5 May 2016.
- ^ Butterick, Matthew. "Iowan Old Style". Typography for Lawyers. Archived from the original on January 16, 2015. Retrieved 2 August 2015.
- ^ Berry, John. "An American Typeface Comes of Age". dot creative. Retrieved 2 August 2015.
- ^ Downer, John. "Call It What It Is". Emigre. Retrieved 20 March 2016.
- ^ "Alastair Johnston interviews John Downer" (PDF). Alastair Johnston. Retrieved 21 February 2016.
- ^ Thomas, Shelbi. "The Iowan Type". Iowa Alumni Magazine. University of Iowa Alumni Association. Retrieved 5 May 2016.
- ^ Peters, Yyves. "An Exhibition of Hand Lettered Posters by John Downer". FontFeed. Retrieved 5 May 2016.
- ^ "Iowa Digital Library collections: John Downer, signpainter". University of Iowa. Retrieved 30 October 2021.
- ^ Peters, Yyves. "Sign Painters Movie Explores Contemporary Sign Painting". Font Feed. Retrieved 5 May 2016.
- ^ Uuong, An (29 July 2014). "Sign Painters: a Sign of the Times". Artscope. Retrieved 5 May 2016.
- ^ Davies, Bree. "Sign Painters Shines A Colorful Light on the History of a Hidden Craft". Westword. Retrieved 5 May 2016.
- ^ "Introduction to Sign Painting". Cooper Union. Retrieved 5 May 2016.
- ^ Heck, Bethany (2 October 2017). "Brothers review". Font Review Journal. Retrieved 13 September 2019.
External links
edit- Schriftdesigner John Downer - Klingspor Museum article on John Downer's work (German)
- John Downer Speedballs (Typographica)
- Sostav (Russian) - page on Downer's lettering and influences
- Type design in Iowa - Luc Devroye's page on Downer and other Iowa-based type designers
- MyFonts
- John Downer: Paper signs
- John Downer, TYPO Berlin (German)
- Font Bureau profile page