Berkeley Oldstyle
The University of California Old Style, the basis for ITC Berkeley Oldstyle, was one of Frederic Goudy’s favorite designs. In 1937, a friend asked Goudy if he would consider drawing a face for the exclusive use of the University of California Press at Berkeley. Goudy accepted the task gladly and, a little over a year later, produced the foundation for the new type family.
ITC Berkeley Oldstyle carries the flavor and dynamics of the Goudy’s original University of California Old Style without being a slavish copy. In fact, there is a little of several other Goudy designs in ITC Berkeley Oldstyle, Goudy Oldstyle, Deepdene, and even a hint of Booklet Oldstyle. The design is characterized by its calligraphic weight stress, smooth weight transitions, and classic x–height. These traits, in addition to the ample ascenders and descenders, provide for both high levels of character legibility and text color that is light and inviting.
Conduit
Mark van Bronkhorst claims he had parking lot signs in mind when he designed ITC Conduit “It’s the kind of lettering you might find on boilers, assembly diagrams, and desiccant packets: plain, grid–based, visually incompetent, yet legible and direct.” Unlike most typefaces, where each letter is carefully rendered, ITC Conduit was constructed from a set of character parts: straight strokes and round corners.
It’s hard to imagine a typographer referring to ITC Conduit as being beautiful–or even handsome. “Quirky” doesn’t quite fit the description either; although letters like the lowercase ‘g’ and ‘s’ are clearly idiosyncratic. Somehow it’s naive shapes, and graceless proportions strike a familiar chord. Or, as Erik Spiekermann said, “The beauty in ITC Conduit is that it doesn’t pretend to be anything that it’s not. It may not be pretty, but it is versatile, legible and easy to work with – a wonderfully stupid typeface.”