Typeface Review

Malaga

Reviewed by Tiffany Wardle de Sousa on March 5, 2008

Xavier Dupré is one of those designers who can’t help mixing a lot of flavor into his typefaces.

At first glance Malaga has all the earmarks of a sturdy old style serif that would hold up well to any amount of reading. Healthy spacing, large x-height, short ascenders and descenders. It is the second glance that has you realizing that it is perfect as well for larger headlines and bolder statements. He’s given us a range of widths and weights to suit any book, ad, poster, billboard, packaging or POP display. Really, this is no ordinary, two glance, serif. The details are worth a zoomed-in view and I highly recommend spending time with it at large sizes. The flat top ‘a’, the return flick on the lowercase ‘y’, the clever curve of the cross-stroke on the italic ‘t’. No detail was left to chance. It’s also the perfect partner for his other Emigre release, Vista Sans.

Tiffany Wardle de Sousa is a typographer living and working in San Jose, California. She earned her MA in the Theory and History of Typography & Graphic Communication at The University of Reading. Active in the type community, Tiffany has written for several design publications, served as a SOTA board member, and was a Typophile moderator.

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