From Industrial Revolution to Modernism and Beyond
Slab serif typefaces first appeared in the early nineteenth century as a product of the Industrial Revolution’s growing demand for bold fonts to advertise the new consumer goods.
Roughly a century later, during the interwar period, a first revival of the “Egyptians”, as these faces were misleadingly called, emerged. They now generally displayed less stroke contrast and embraced a more geometric aesthetic, akin to their contemporary sans serif counterparts.
Embodying modernist ideals of clarity and functionality, these were sleek, architectural designs, austere, intentionally monolithic, and sometimes of brutalist elegance, seemingly owing more to the compass and the ruler than to the pen. This was the starting point of APN Ggantija.
Modernist slab serif typefaces occupy a middle ground between serif and sans serif faces. They are more subdued than typical serif typefaces, but more extroverted than many sans serif designs. A bit like dressed up sans serifs, but without being too tied up to a specific era—for example, they generally avoid Art Nouveau or Art Deco mannerisms.
During the late 1960s to late 1970s, a second revival took place, when Adrian Frutiger and Herb Lubalin released their interpretations of slab serif typefaces. From this period, APN Ggantija inherits its rather large x-height.
However, since the geometrically constructed modernist typefaces turned out to be not that functional after all, APN Ggantija also incorporates certain features of humanist faces. These features, along with some alternative glyphs, significantly improve legibility and readability, even in surprisingly small sizes. Consequently, APN Ggantija can be used not only as a display typeface but also excels in body text settings, be it in the analog or digital realm, across various genres and registers.
Furthermore, unlike most of today’s slabs, APN Ggantija is not simply based on a pre-existing sans with slabs slapped on. Instead, it's a purposefully drawn slab, created from the ground up. And, unlike most older typefaces in this category, APN Ggantija includes fully featured true italics.
But Why “Ġgantija”?
I started working on APN Ggantija during a stay on the Maltese island of Gozo, in an apartment nearly within walking distance of the megalithic temple complex of the same name. These UNESCO World Heritage Site temples rank among the earliest free-standing stone buildings and amongst the oldest existing man-made religious structures in the world, with over 5,500 years of age, predating the Egyptian pyramids by a millennium.
It wasn’t my first time on Gozo, though. I feel at home in Malta, grounded, safe, inspired, I’ve known it since my childhood days, and it’s where I still go, to find peace and to recharge. But beyond personal history and geographic proximity, an aesthetic connection exists between the typeface and the site:
The temple's façade and internal walls consist of upright limestone slabs, topped by horizontal stone blocks. When designing a typeface named like this structure, what category more fitting than a—quite blocky—slab serif?
And then of course there’s the name itself, “Ġgantija”, the giantess: To some ears she might sound exotic (pronounced roughly “Juh-gan-tee-ya”), even more exotic probably than the Egyptian sites and cities the early "Egyptian" typefaces were curiously named after…
(Patrick Nell)
