Noah’s Ocean – stylized as Noah*s Ocean – is a Swiss premium swimwear brand that views style and sustainability as inseparable. The designs are created in Zurich and produced in a small manufactory near Porto, meaning that the company has a deliberately short supply chain. The outer fabric is made from 100% recycled post-consumer PET making the material quick-drying, velvety soft, durable, and resource-efficient. The collection currently occupies a previously unoccupied niche, the father-and-son collection and is currently being developed for the whole family.

Behind Noah’s Ocean is Robert Fritze, founder of the Zurich-based design studio Kreativfritze. With over 16 years of leadership experience in agencies and consulting firms, he describes himself as someone who combines a business mindset, design thinking, and a hands-on spirit. At Noah’s Ocean, he has consistently put this approach into practice. He’s responsible for design, development, marketing, and the online store—in other words, almost everything. The brand is managed by his wife, Vanessa Fritze. Vanessa and Robert have dedicated the brand to their son, Noah. A project for the next generation.

For every product sold, Noah’s Ocean makes a donation to selected marine conservation programs that are dedicated to protecting sea turtles and marine ecosystems. The brand identity is encapsulated in the Love Turtle, which captures the essence of their love for the ocean. The brand shares its commitment with one of its closest typographic partners: the Pangea typeface by Fontwerk. Pangea’s designer, Christoph Koeberlin, always donates 25 percent of his royalties to support the conservation and reforestation of the rainforest. Both projects demonstrate that sustainability, in the context of design, need not merely be a marketing promise, but can in fact be structurally embedded.

To complement Pangea, Robert Fritze drew upon Jan Fromm’s Nice Collection, a contemporary serif family with four optical sizes that combines clarity, personality, and readability. Fritze: “The combination of Pangea and Nice—or as I call it, ‘Nice Pangea’—conveys both Noah’s Ocean’s premium positioning and its commitment to sustainability.”

‘Nice Pangea’ appears wherever Noah’s Ocean meets its customers. At the point of sale at Jelmoli in Zurich, in the Swiss retail chain Duett Boutiques, but also at partner beach resorts, in Zurich, Küsnacht, and Germany. Billboards, shopping bags, packaging, flyers, and wet bags for swimwear carry the brand’s visual identity into everyday life. A unifying element is the slogan “Reternal Love,” a play on “eternal love” where the prefix “Re” stands for Recycle, Reuse, Refurbish, and Repair.

SDR Capital, named after the initials of founder Shefali Roy, is a London-based family office investing in finance, technology, and AI. The brand identity uses typography to express a practice grounded in conviction, precision, and a deliberate refusal to follow convention. The visual language, spanning identity and a pared-back single-page website, is built for a firm that moves through capital on its own terms.

General Sans (Frode Helland, Indian Type Foundry) provides the foundation: geometric, precise, composed. Xanh Mono (Lam Bao & Duy Dao, Yellow Type Foundry) counters it: monospaced logic that nods to the sectors SDR operates in, inflected by serifs that introduce warmth and wit. Together, they hold the identity's essential tension: composed, yet restless.

The logomark stands apart. Millionaire Script (Raphaël Verona, Altiplano) draws on the calligraphic lineage of English Roundhand and George Bickham the Elder, set against “SDR.” in General Sans. The two typefaces are joined by a single dot: the full stop above becoming the tittle of the i below. Audacity and discipline, connected by a point.

For almost a century, Pescheria Pedol has pursued a clear vision based on respect for the sea and a constant pursuit of quality in every detail. Specialists in fish and a historic reference point for the retail sale of fish products, the company has always represented an authentic balance between tradition, expertise, and passion.

Today, we discreetly present our new rebranding: an evolution of our visual identity designed to reflect even more accurately the values that define Pescheria Pedol – essentiality, rigor, and fidelity to our idea of excellence.

At the heart of this renewal is a new pictogram, a symbol that encapsulates stories of family, the sea, and daily commitment. A sign capable of guiding the company’s identity with consistency, along a path of continuity and loyalty to its roots, projected towards the future with the solidity of its history.

Together with the new pictogram, we have rethought and curated the entire visual image of Pescheria Pedol: an authentic and coherent story, capable of conveying the essence of the company through a contemporary lens.

The logo is custom drawn, based on the previous one in Copperplate Gothic. The brand typefaces are Claude Type’s Romie and Klim Type Foundry’s Pitch.

The new identity has already been rolled out to the company’s Instagram and Facebook profiles.

The new logo in custom sans-serif letters, shown on top of the previous one in Copperplate Gothic.

In 2025, the Typographische Gesellschaft Austria (Typographic Society Austria, tga) organized the anniversary edition of what is one of the best typography conferences I’ve attended. The symposium took place in late August on Burg Raabs an der Thaya – which is, hands down, the most spectacular venue for such an event.

Visiting the symposium allowed me to revisit some of the places I had photographed on previous occasions. This includes the script lettering on the former shop of Josef Stallecker on Hauptplatz, the municipality’s main square. On two sides of the single-story building, it mentions his profession, “Sattler Tapezierer” (“upholsterer, decorator”), and the areas of services, “Polstermöbel Bodenbelag” (“upholstered furniture, floor covering”).

With their reluctant connections and the crammed m, the low-contrast letterforms reminded me of IBM Script, a monospaced script made in the 1960s for the IBM Selectric typewriter. However, the actual source is another three decades older than that: the unknown sign maker patterned the letterforms after Signal, a foundry typeface first cast by Berthold in 1931. Its slightly awkward shapes – strung like beads on a string, with built-in connectors – have to do with the fact that metal script typefaces from that era were produced to have no overhangs, so that no delicate parts would break in the stereotyping process.

The lettering was engraved into the plaster and then painted in. I’m not sure what happened to “Josef” and “Sattler” – were these words left uncolored? Did they use a different color that faded away over the years?

Established in 1912 (by Josef’s parents?), the family business is currently run by Thomas Stallecker. It’s now located about 200 m to the west, still at Hauptplatz. The painted sign on the yellow façade reads “Raumausstatter Stallecker” (“interior decorator”) and uses Tintoretto. This bicolor typeface – a shaded variant of Aldo Manutio – was issued by Schelter & Giesecke in 1894. It got a new lease of life after Letraset issued their version in the early 1970s. Stallecker uses it in two shades of brown, with an underline for good measure.

For comparison, a resetting of the words in FDI Lettograph. This 2024 digitization is largely faithful to the original, with the exception of the p. In Signal, this letter is open at the bottom, as in German school script models (and also in formal scripts).

Metal Signal came with two forms for the lowercase r, but without one that omits the exit stroke (FDI Lettograph automatically inserts such a contextual alternate, see above). The sign painter invented an optimized terminal form for “Sattler”, but didn’t use it for “Tapezierer”. In “Stallecker”, they made up for it with an impromptu swash.

The business’s new location with the name in bichromatic Tintoretto

View of Raabs, with the castle – the conference venue featuring the tga’s pink flag – in the background

This project was conceived as part of the temporary exhibition Grandeur Nature 2025, led by the Atelier de Didactique Visuelle at HEAR in Strasbourg. The in-situ installation measures 200cm × 100cm and is made of wood and Plexiglas.

I highlighted the former Geistel printing house through four archive photos redrawn in dotted lines. The installation, intended for local residents, combines testimonials and images to revive memories of the place. The drawings on Plexiglas are superimposed on the printing house, inviting a sensitive and participatory reinterpretation of history. Each panel explores a theme (family, lithography, workers), supported by typography that evokes a memory in motion.

Matria, Klub 11 and Klub 08 make the typographic palette of this rebrand for Graeter’s, a fifth-generation family-owned, regional ice cream chain based in Cincinnati, Ohio, and one of the few (if not the only remaining) small-batch ice cream maker using the French Pot method.

I was happy to see Matria in use for this project that’s rooted in tradition/history.

Quick story about Matria: I found a sample of a typeface in my birth certificate and went on a journey to find its origins and design a typeface around it. It turns out it was based on Reform-Grotesk, a typeface from the turn of the 20th century (dated 1908) that’s led to so many well-known fonts.

My spin on it was to make it into a high-waist contemporary palette that goes from very thin condensed to black extended. I was just scrolling through this beautiful case study (lured by the amazing logo) only to have my day made by seeing this use.

Glas-Hertel is a family-owned glass company founded by Karl Hertel in Düsseldorf in 1869, as Königlich-Sächsische Hofglasmalerei. In 1928, one branch was relocated to Lippstadt, which is still in business today as Glaserei Hertel. The workshop located at Benzenbergstraße 35 in Düsseldorf-Unterbilk is permanently closed as of 2025.

The sign above the doorway features Ramona. Designed by Henry R. Möller, this all-caps slab with bracketed serifs was first cast by Schriftguss in Dresden in 1939. Its open, squarish letterforms are a good fit for a company dealing with panes of glass. The green multiline G to the right is the symbol of the German glaziers’ guild.

Documented by Monsieur Adrien in July 2025.

Wedge brings new life to a Canadian classic with its rebrand for Diana’s Seafood, a family-run business founded in 1979 and long trusted by Canada’s top chefs. For over 45 years, Diana’s has been known for its high-quality seafood. The rebrand translates this legacy for a new audience – from Michelin-starred kitchens to home tables – by positioning Diana’s as The Mother of Seafood.

Designed by the Montreal-based studio, the new identity combines simplicity, craftsmanship, and warmth. The monogram, formed by two fish creating a subtle D and S, serves as a mark of quality and authenticity. The logotype and titles are set in Martin by Vocal Type, customized with “fins” on the terminals of the S. The identity also features AL Milano by Alex Lescieux, used for text across six widths – from Compressed to Expanded – within a flexible typographic system that brings rhythm and character to the brand. Its use recalls the utilitarian lettering once painted on wooden fisherman crates, grounding the identity in a sense of craft and heritage.

Illustrations by Bill Rebholz add a warm and human touch that complements the typographic system.

Rodda’s is a creamery in Cornwall, England, specializing in traditional regional dairy products. It’s best known for their Cornish clotted cream.

In 1890 their great-great-grandmother, Eliza Jane Rodda started making Cornish clotted cream in her farmhouse kitchen here in the heart of Cornwall. Now they are in the fifth generation of the family business, and they still craft their Cornish Clotted Cream in the very same way, making Eliza Jane proud.

The logo in Pretorian has been in use at least since 2001. This typeface originated around the time Eliza Jane started the business. The secondary brand typeface is Century Schoolbook. The website additionally feature Local Market and Local Market Script. While the slogan “Keepers of the cream since 1890” is set in Mrs Eaves, the font used for “227g” on the label shown above is yet unidentified.

Boston-based studio Butter has designed a new identity for Rosc Venture Capital:

Rosc is a venture capital company built on a 40-year family legacy, and they needed a brand identity to catapult them into the digital age. Butter determined their differentiators at a time when VC was struggling, building a brand that showcases their particular approach to investing; one rooted in academic rigor and decades of entrepreneurial experience.

The typefaces used for the new look are Ivar Text and Headline from Letters from Sweden, Store Norske Maleri from Skriftkompani, and Stratos by Production Type.

Franzen is a fourth-generation Düsseldorf-based family business on one of Europe's leading luxury shopping streets – the Königsallee – that operates successfully in both retail and online retail. Since 1820, their portfolio has expanded from porcelain to include tableware and cookware, home accessories, jewelry and lifestyle products.

To present their high-quality products in the best possible way, Franzen uses a restrained black and white appearance. An iconic logo refers to the company's origins as a porcelain business and is based on the look of the stamps and seals of such manufacturers. The double F in the middle stands for “Familie Franzen” and symbolizes the connection to the family and customers.

The established word mark is retained, but is transferred to the new corporate typeface, FH Oscar (with customized tabular figures and a custom name: FH Hermann). A reduced graphic concept with lines from the monogram structures content such as product descriptions and prices, while leaving sufficient space for the product range. This concept is continued in the clean stationery.

In the Düsseldorf store, one of the most important brand contact points, the branding also ensures recognizability and clear structures while remaining restrained. A comprehensive style guide supports the design of internal and external media, including price tags and shop window stickers.

A digital design system is created for the new webshop, developed in collaboration with BRANDUNG. It uses the iconic F-shape and provides an intuitive shopping experience.

This extra virgin olive oil from Irpinia in Southern Italy is crafted predominantly from the native Ravece cultivar. Its true distinction lies in its deep-rooted family heritage.

Monte Augusto is typeset in Norman with a swash on the capital A. The subhead Olio di Familia dal 1803 is also shown in golden letters and uses Turquoise. The back label is mainly designed using Auster.

The Merola family has been producing oil since at least 1803, a fact marked by the date engraved on a stone tub once used for storage. Young Vincenzo sought to honor this legacy by packaging the oil in an elegant bottle, departing from the traditional large-format cans. The uniquely shaped bottle, reminiscent of balsamic vinegar, is adorned in black and gold, exuding a sense of value at first glance. The family monogram, prominently displayed on the collar, echoes the one still found at the Merola palace in the historic center of Bonito.

The label is a testament to both tradition and craftsmanship. Made with black-textured UPM Raflatac Cotton Black paper, it features a portrait of Vincenzo’s great-great-grandfather, Nicola Merola, who first began marketing the family’s olive oil in the 19th century. This portrait is printed on UPM Raflatac Genesi paper. The label is printed using three different golds: offset for the text and nutritional information, laminates for the decorative olive leaves and carriage—an image still found in the Merola palace—and cast gold for the progressive bottle numbering and the inscription "Monte Augusto," the location of the family’s olive groves. The label wraps around the bottle, die-cut to form a drop of glass at the closure, with the cap sealed by a wax stamp bearing the Merola family monogram.

Label design by BasileAdv. The website was designed by Damedia and combines headlines in Norman with text in Garamond Premier.

Homescreen

The family business Manitu has now been in existence for 25 years. Back then, my parents converted an old sports hall with an attached sports field into the club and my home. Concerts and festivals take place at weekends, mainly rock or blues music. But the club also serves as a venue for family celebrations and weddings.

My brother (Brian Pfitzmann) is a computer scientist and created and designed the website with the help of his former work colleague Oliver Opaterni. Oliver Opaterni is a UX designer at SAP and completed his bachelor's and master's degrees in interface design at the FH Potsdam.

The logo for the club was designed by my father 25 years ago, so my brother tried to find a font that looked as similar as possible to the logo font. Balthazar is used for headlines, and Neue Helvetica for all other typography – a clear font that is easy to read. An attempt was made to create a cozy mood and pick up on the atmosphere of the club. A warm color theme was used and images that express joy were added.

Parfümerie Brückner Bublitz is a high-end perfumery with two stores in Munich’s city center. Founded in 1893 by Philippine and Magnus Brückner, the company was appointed Purveyor to the Royal Bavarian Court in 1905. Margarete Bublitz took over in 1952. Since 1990, the family business is led by her granddaughter, Tanja Bublitz.

The red neon sign above the entrance to the main store in Munich’s New Town Hall is based on Charme. Designed by Helmut Matheis and first cast by Ludwig & Mayer in 1957, the brush script had to lose all its stroke contrast for this application. You can see it in its original form on the smaller sign below.

The sign in Charme was installed sometime before January 2018. A photo from August 2017 still shows the previous version, which also features a monolinear script, but with custom and more animated letterforms. That version can also be seen in an undated photo (late 1960s?) on a festschrift published for the 130-year anniversary in 2023.

Documented by Monsieur Adrien in June 2024.

The previous sign with custom script lettering, as seen in May 2011

The Kapellenhof is one of the largest wineries in Rheinhessen. The Schätzel family is the fifth generation of the family to successfully run the 18-hectare vineyard. The fascination and enthusiasm can be felt and seen in every move and every decision.

Studio Oeding designed a cuvée series of selected wines and the combination of joy and history that Kapellenhof associates with these wines and grape varieties. The design consists of various components that together capture the viewer’s attention.

The chosen colors are bold and positive, the illustrations are based on editions of previous generations of the Kapellenhof. The third component is humor, which is expressed with entertaining illustrations and unexpected image compositions that make everyone stop at the wine rack.

Dudler is used for nearly all text, except for the blurb which uses Barlow. Photography by Bernd Westphal, illustration by Beto Val.

R&R Smith is a family apple distribution business established in 1938. The orchard is situated in the Huon Valley, a once thriving apple-growing region that exported apples all over the globe and earned Tasmania the title of the Apple Isle.

The rebrand is a contemporary re-imagining of the golden era of the Apple Isle, with a versatile suite brand assets that draw on nostalgic references to traditional apple box typography and illustration styles. The main typeface is Optician Sans, used with a custom apple-shaped ampersand.

Art direction and design graphic by Roman Seban for the bilingual book Tableau de famille /Family portrait. It tells the complete story of the Henner company, a major operator about social protection in France since the 1930s.

The book is composed with Moulin (Commercial Type) and Cogito (Production Type).

“Henner” composed in Moulin Super is shown embossed on the cover. Each chapter is printed with a fifth metallic Pantone color in addition to process colors.

17×24 cm, 248 pages

Chevron Parquet is a renowned Swedish wooden flooring specialist, and a family business. “With a deep-rooted passion for wood, we produce high-end wooden floors based on our desire to embrace and show the real strength of fine craftmanship.”

For their rebranding, Studio Nineties designed a minimal and clean visual identity, centred around the natural wood tones and textures. The brand typeface is Bastardo Grotesk, also used for the logo. On the website, all typography uses Acid Grotesk and FH Ronaldson Condensed.

Hans Wagner butcher’s shop on the corner of Methfesselstraße and Müggenkampstraße was an institution in Hamburg-Eimsbüttel. The company was founded by Theodor Wagner, a butcher’s apprentice from the Ore Mountains, who came to Altona in 1890 and bought his master’s shop on Große Bergstraße two years later. The branch in Eimsbüttel was opened in 1905. At the end of 2022, Michael and Sandra Wagner had to close the family business for good. [source: Hamburger Abendblatt]

In 1950, the shop front featured blackletter and sans-serif lettering. The neon sign with Brush Script and caps from a generic grotesk was probably installed in the mid-20th century.

Established in 1867, Moosehead Breweries is Canada’s oldest independent brewery, located in Saint John, New Brunswick. Since the recent rebrand, the wordmark is using Royal Theatre Serif from Playtype. Royal Theater is joined by Balboa by Parkinson Type Design as the second main brand typeface.

Conflict Advertising Inc. comments on the rebrand:

The Small Batch subbrand combines Acme Gothic by Mark Simonson Studio with Fairwater Script (with stylistic alternates) by Laura Worthington Design.

The Radler subbrand uses Spirits by Latinotype.