Publisher: WordshapeThis typeface is the definitive version of Oswald Bruce Cooper's lost typeface Cooper Fullface Italic.
At the end of 1927, Oswald Bruce Cooper yearned to produce a heavy "modern-day" face- similar to Broadway and other display screen enters height and percentage, however more nuanced while being a thick, black type. The Barnhart Brothers & & Spindler foundry, for whom Cooper had developed a variety of typefaces, saw the potential of the typeface as a huge seller. Richard McArther, General Supervisor of the foundry, described it as "the hotsy things", though he was highly vital of a variety of characters in the initial style. He requested a succeeding variety of adjustments, consisting of the addition of Dwiggins-inspired serifs to the face to make it differ from similarly-weighted typefaces then on the market. He wished to imbue the face with a significant amount of "old-timey" flavor in order to impart a sense of originality to the face and have it offer throughout both Modern and Bodoni/Didot market segments.
The resulting typeface was called Cooper Fullface, a jaunty and swollen caricature of a Didone with fantastic possible for display advertising work. The final kind of the face was a controlled and consistent balance of cartoonishness and earnest visual braggadocio, the bouncy, circus fairway-like swing of the original drawings of the letters taken down substantially and figures redrawn and redrawn for maximum readability.
A specimen sheet was mailed out in 1929, and created moderate sales, but too late- Barnhart Brothers & & Spindler closed its foundry division soon thereafter as part of ATF's corporate roll-up of production. The American Type Founders continued to produce the face and offer it at a good pace, relabeling it Cooper Modern.
Cooper developed a matching italic for Cooper Fullface, but it was never ever released. The BB&S foundry closure led to the foundry devices being shipped to New Jersey a couple of weeks shy of the typeface's completion. It is unfortunate, as the accompanying italic is perhaps Cooper's masterpiece, a dynamic Bodoni-esque italic with more than a little bit of impact from 19th Century display types, particularly in the treatment of the ball serifs on the uppercase "A", "J", "M", and "N". Cooper Fullface Italic stands as the until-now missing out on bookend to Cooper's profession as a type designer.
This digital release is the revival of that lost Cooper typeface, Cooper Fullface Italic. Within are 2 typefaces- Cooper Fullface Italic and Cooper Fullface Italic Fancy. The two faces cover the variety of Cooper's original drawings- the Fancy typeface utilizing a number of alternate characters.
These 2 typefaces are the outcome of looking into Cooper's initial illustrations and series of engraved evidence for both typefaces. The typefaces consist of the initial ligatures, initial Oz Cooper ornaments, fancy swash characters, and a variety of punctuation and diacritics, et al, that fill out a full character set. The typefaces have been lovingly kerned for the smoothest outcome in text setting.
Pair Cooper Fullface Italic with ITC Ozwald for a full variety of display screen options.
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