This sharp but approachable family takes its cues from the brutal simplicity of Josef Albers’ reductive lettering and the informal stencils made by graphic designer Jacno for the French Théâtre National Populaire in the 1950s.
The use of stencil technique predates movable type and goes back to the 17th century. It started picking up momentum in the 19th century and at the beginning of the 20th century it caught the attention of designers and architects such as Le Corbusier who adopted Didot-like stencils for labelling architectural drawings. It is used frequently for signage in industrial and urban environments but it has also become quite popular among graffiti artists.
Most stencil typefaces are adapted from existing non-stencil typefaces, but PF Spine is rather distinct in its construction as it was developed using for its skeleton a minimalistic range of triangular shapes, curves and lines with drastic stroke omissions, carefully designed to provide a harmonious balance and visual uniformity in all supported languages.
This typeface comes in 4 styles including two versions for making 3D layered stencils with different shades of grey or colour for each layer. The 3D layers have been reworked to ensure sequential letters without breaks, by eliminating the inter-character white space that usually builds up inside the shadow, making room for an even flow which is determined by the upper and lower part of the letterforms.
Furthermore, PF Spine provides advanced typographic features including alternate glyphs for initial, medial and final glyphs. It supports Latin, Greek and Cyrillic.