Typeface Design for Nickel Gothic
1918 banknote lettering recast as a high-impact display family
Nickel Gothic is a display sans-serif by David Jonathan Ross, derived from lettering on a 1918 Chinese banknote. Its range spans Compressed to Wide widths and includes both Oblique and Backslant styles. The family's defining structural feature—flat tops and bottoms contrasted with stadium-like interior shapes—concentrates weight in the corners of each letterform, an effect Ross calls 'shoulderpads.'
Set in Nickel Gothic
Insights
- The 1918 banknote source carries overtones of mid-century squared sans serifs such as Microgramma and Eurostile, as well as 1970s gothics—a cross-era resonance the designer acknowledges.
- Flat horizontal extremes paired with stadium-like interior shapes push mass into the corners, giving the typeface what the source describes as strength, sturdiness, and impact.
- Ross named the corner-weight effect 'shoulderpads,' indicating it was a consciously identified design outcome.
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