Typeface Design for the Lisbeth Font Family
An italic family with no roman — built entirely on its own terms
Lisbeth is an italic-only type family by Louisa Fröhlich, released through TypeTogether in 2017. Designed with branding and magazine use in mind, it comprises five text weights plus a high-contrast display style, all without a roman counterpart. Its near-upright angle and large x-height are cited by the foundry as supporting comfortable reading in longer texts, while slightly condensed proportions allow more information in a given area. A twisted-stroke concept gives the display style heightened visual drama.
Set in Lisbeth
Insights
- The family has no roman style; every weight is italic, conceived independently rather than derived from an upright counterpart.
- Stroke contrast scales with weight: nearly absent in the thin, pronounced in the heavier text weights, and pushed to an extreme in the display style.
- The slightly condensed width is intended to impart more information in a smaller area; the near-upright angle and large x-height are cited as enabling comfortable reading in longer texts.
- The character set includes proportional lining and oldstyle figures, tabular figures, superscripts, subscripts, fractions, ligatures, and contextual alternates across Latin-A extended coverage.
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