calendas t&c, a font for a ‘classic’ magazine

calendas t&c is a custom font for town & country, a monthly american lifestyle magazine. it is the oldest continually published general interest magazine in the united states.

in 2011, edward leida, the awarded creative manager, contacted us to develop new weights of our font calendas for the redesign of the magazine he was running. the original font calendas was a contemporary reinterpretation of the classic renaissance forms first launched as a text font. based on the original typeface, edward, was looking for a ‘more feminine’ version for its use as a text font and a display version, more elegant, for its use in medium sizes and headlines.

(image: calendas-t-c-07.jpg caption: a comparison of calendas text regular (left) and display regular (right).)

against the text version, the display version appears more fluid, stylized and its use in big sizes allows to admire the subtle details of the drawing of its forms and its careful construction. the high contrast among the strokes and the calligraphic gesture of some of its endings become more evident in this version.

(image: calendas-t-c-12.jpg caption: ampersands show a unique and elegant design in both weights, regular (left) & italic (right).)

the original family, developed basically to work as a text font, counted with only three weights (regular, bold & italic). the own requirements of an editorial design made necessary the development of new weights as bold italic, semibold and semibold italic to complete the family.

in order to give more versatility, the display italic version includes a set of alternative swash characters that emphasize even more the calligraphic aspect of the font and, at the same time, allows to enrich the design of the headlines.