The Akko™ typeface family is the first new design from Akira Kobayashi in a very long time - and it is well worth the wait.
Early in his career, Kobayashi drew original typefaces for the likes of Adobe, ITC, FontFont, Linotype and TypeBox. In the spring of 2001 he joined Linotype as type director and for the next several years collaborated with Adrian Frutiger and Hermann Zapf in the modernization and re-issuing of their earlier designs. Kobayashi's skill and design sensitivity contributed to the success of these typefaces and his creative prowess had a profound influence on the designs - but the end product was not totally his.
For the last several months, however, he has been working on a new and original typeface family. Picture an industrial strength typeface like the Isonorm™ design. Now blend this with an organic design like the Cooper Black™ typeface. It was the idea of the fusion of these two design concepts that inspired Kobayashi to draw Akko.
"My initial idea was to create a sanserif type with a 'soft-focus' effect," says Kobayashi. "From here, the design evolved into two families, the robust and structured sanserif Akko and soft and friendly Akko Rounded."
The versions of Akko are available in six weights ranging from thin to black - each with complementary Italics. The family is available as a suite of OpenType™ Pro fonts, allowing for the automatic insertion of small caps, ligatures and alternate characters. Pro fonts also offer an extended character set supporting most Central European and many Eastern European languages.