Typeface Revival for Münchenstein Text
Rescuing the forgotten third typeface of Helvetica's designer
Munchenstein Text is Nikola Djurek's revival of Horizontal, a 1965 capitals-only single-weight typeface by Max Miedinger — designer of Helvetica — that was largely overlooked over time. Djurek extended the design into a full range of weights and slants, producing a precise, geometric typeface suited to small text sizes. It is one of three complementary subfamilies (Display, Text, Slab) released in 2023 under the Munchenstein name, which references the location of the Haas Type Foundry.
Set in Munchenstein Text
Insights
- Miedinger created Horizontal in response to demand from progressive graphic designers for an extra-wide modern grotesque titling face that could pair with both serif and sans-serif text types.
- Djurek structured the revival as three distinct subfamilies with differentiated optical roles: Display for large sizes, Text for small sizes, and Slab — featuring inverted stroke contrast — for generously tracked settings.
- Munchenstein ships as both static OpenType and variable fonts, with weight and forward/backward slant axes; Munchenstein Slab additionally includes a colour-font version that cycles randomly through vivid colours per character.
- Latin, Cyrillic, and Greek support involved multiple specialist contributors: Ilya Ruderman and Anya Danilova on Cyrillic, Irene Vlachou on Greek.
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