Fit

Not many type designers will tell you that their typeface isn’t readable, but David Jonathan Ross, in his description of Fit, proclaims that “it is not recommended for setting any copy that you actually want people to read.” He’s right, of course. Fit is ridiculously unreadable. And yet it’s fantastic.

Fit may appear simple, but it clearly required a lot of complex thinking to make it work so well. I adore the sense of volume in the enormously chunky Ultra Extended, and I admire that spindly Skyline Style. The counters and the letterspacing remain equal, producing fascinating optics from a lively interaction between foreground and background. One can have some serious fun with Fit.
 
The s, y, and t are brilliant. The letter L is the only one that gets on my nerves. But then again, it always gets on my nerves, in any typeface, because it’s just a boring letterform surrounding a big empty asymmetrical space.

Fit is a perfectly defined typeface in that the letterforms are influenced by the technology used to reproduce them. Variable font technology will soon permeate much of web typography; this could be a wonderful thing or it could be a hot mess. In the meantime, though, I hope to see more innovative applications of typographic technology like Fit. 

I am an actual card-carrying member of DJR’s Font-of-the-Month Club. If you haven’t yet joined, you should.

Dr. Shelley Gruendler, founder of Type Camp, is a typographer, designer, and educator who teaches, lectures, and publishes internationally on typography and design. She holds a PhD and an MA in the History and Theory of Typography and Graphic Communication from the University of Reading, England.