Typeface Design for Metodo

A grotesk with a century-old paper trail—from Wagner & Schmidt to Jan Tschichold to digital

Metodo is a typeface designed by Davide Tomatis, evolving from a lineage tracing back to Neue Moderne Grotesk, most likely developed by Wagner & Schmidt and later catalogued by European foundries under names including Aurora (Weber), Accidenz Grotesk (Haas), and Cairoli (Nebiolo). Tomatis began the work during his 2019 master's studies at ECAL, then continued the work after graduating. Rather than faithfully reproducing metal type details, he preserved the overall texture and tension of the rounded forms to retain an early-modernist character in a contemporary digital family. The release includes proportional and monospaced subfamilies across five weights with italics.

Set in Metodo

Insights

The source typeface circulated under at least four distinct names across major European foundries, including Weber (Aurora), Haas (Accidenz Grotesk), and Nebiolo (Cairoli), and was notably used by Jan Tschichold for the first edition of Die Neue Typographie (1928).
Tomatis prioritised preserving the metal typeface's overall texture and curve tensions—particularly in rounded shapes—over literal reproduction of period details.
The family includes a companion Metodo Mono subfamily in three weights (Regular, Medium, Bold) with italics, extending the design into fixed-width contexts.
OpenType features include four figure sets (proportional and tabular, lining and oldstyle), contextual dash alternates, alternate r/R forms, circled and black-circled numeral sets, and multilingual ordinal support.