ITC Goudy Sans
ITC Goudy Sans is different than most sans serif typefaces, which tend to have a quiet, conservative structure. Instead, ITC Goudy Sans is friendly, almost playful, with an unusual cursive italic. Unlike the obliqued roman italics that are typical of its sans serif cousins, Goudy Sans italic has a light, flowing quality that both complements and enhances the roman design.
Most of Frederic Goudy’s designs were serif typestyles based on historical tradition. While not a serif face, ITC Goudy Sans has definite ties with classic letter shapes and exhibits a strong lineage with ancient Roman epigraphy.
The ITC Goudy Sans family developed in three stages. First, Goudy created the three designs of Heavy, Light, and Light Italic for Lanston Monotype in the 1920s. According to Goudy, “I attempted to give to my type a definite expression of freedom and a personal quality not always found in this kind of letter.”
Many years later, Compugraphic Corporation (the precursor to Monotype Imaging) revived Goudy’s original work for photocomposition. In the process, several improvements were made to the original design, and three more faces were added to the family. Finally, ITC re-released the design under a license agreement with Compugraphic, and the family was enlarged again to its present size of four weights, corresponding italics with small caps and old style figures for the Book and Medium weights.
All typefaces seem to have limitations (especially those with strong personalities), but few applications are outside the range of ITC Goudy Sans. It can be an excellent communicator. Advertising copy, promotional material, catalogs, brochures and even lengthy text copy are ideally suited to ITC Goudy Sans’ capabilities.