Conceived as a seriffed counterpart to Univers,
initially created with the help of André Gürtler under the working
title Champion. After it was accepted by Bauer, art
director Konrad F. Bauer named it Serifa. The Regular
and Bold were released in 1966 as foundry type. In 1977, Frutiger
expanded the family into 9 styles (4 weights with obliques plus a
Semibold Condensed) for the phototype version by Stempel/Linotype.
“Linotype dropped both thin weights and the semibold condensed
weight for digital readaptation. Adobe sold Serifa in
the same six weights, while Elsner+Flake and Scangraphic have the
two thin weights in their range. URW++ have Serifa in
thin, light, regular, semibold and bold upright weights, plus a
unique stencil weight. Bitstream has it […] in all nine original
Stempel weights.” [Osterer More…
Conceived as a seriffed counterpart to Univers, initially created with the help of André Gürtler under the working title Champion. After it was accepted by Bauer, art director Konrad F. Bauer named it Serifa. The Regular and Bold were released in 1966 as foundry type. In 1977, Frutiger expanded the family into 9 styles (4 weights with obliques plus a Semibold Condensed) for the phototype version by Stempel/Linotype. “Linotype dropped both thin weights and the semibold condensed weight for digital readaptation. Adobe sold Serifa in the same six weights, while Elsner+Flake and Scangraphic have the two thin weights in their range. URW++ have Serifa in thin, light, regular, semibold and bold upright weights, plus a unique stencil weight. Bitstream has it […] in all nine original Stempel weights.” [Osterer & Stamm 2008]
Frutiger’s own Glypha is a narrower version with a more moderate x-height.
