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Helvetica is a commonly-used sans-serif typeface developed in 1957 by Swiss type designer Max Miedinger.
History
Helvetica was created by Miedinger for the Haas’sche Schriftgießerei (Haas Typefoundry) of Switzerland, who were looking for a more modern version of the Akzidenz Grotesk typeface, which was created more than 50 years earlier in 1898. Originally named Haas-Grotesk, the font was changed in 1960 to Helvetica — derived from Helvetia, the Roman name for Switzerland. The International Typographic Style of graphic design (also called the Swiss Style) used sans-serif fonts like Akzidenz almost exclusively, and its designers made use of the new font immediately.
Helvetica vs. Arial
The typeface Arial, distributed with Microsoft Windows, has the same widths as Helvetica and very similar characters, and was essentially created as a cheaper replacement for Helvetica. But unlike true Helvetica clones such as Swiss BT, Arial differs from Helvetica in many ways, and most graphic designers consider it to be an inferior typeface. This has also led to criticism of Microsoft for causing the widespread use of Arial in amateur design projects. Supporters of Arial argue that some of the variations have been made to both the letterforms and the spacing between characters, in order to make it more readable on screen and at various resolutions. However, most designers feel these changes have led to a font which looks very poor in print and it is rarely used in that context. One of the easiest ways to distinguish between the two is to look at the uppercase R. The protruding tail on Helvetica's upper case R is one of the quickest ways to distinguish it from other sans-serif typefaces. Another way is to look at the tail of the lowercase a (lower right), where Helvetica's is much longer (though it uses short tails in bold and black weights). Other letters such as C and S are also distinctive. Helvetica's terminals for these letters are perfectly horizontal, while Arial and some other typefaces use diagonal terminals. This same effect can be seen on the lower case e, which is essentially a lowercase c with a horizontal line added.
Helvetica is a Trademark of Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG, which may be registered in certain jurisdictions, exclusively licensed through Linotype GmbH, a wholly owned subsidiary of Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG.
Other similar typefaces
In 1983, Linotype released the Helvetica Neue (German for “Helvetica New”) typeface, based on Helvetica.
Usage
While Univers is acknowledged to be the most used Latin typeface in the world, Helvetica is widely used in countries such as France, the United Kingdom and the Nordic countries. Variants of the typeface are used in the Canadian government’s corporate identity program. Helvetica is also widely used in signs, television news identities, and names of numerous consumer products in the United States
Helvetica is also one of the default typefaces for the Mac OS system. The typeface Nimbus Sans (one of the default typefaces for GNU/Linux) is based on Helvetica, as is Bitstream’s Swiss 721 BT, which even bases its name on the same theme. Helvetica recently replaced Akzidenz Grotesk as the font used for the signs of the New York City Subway system.
Further reading
- The Scourge of Arial—a discussion on how Arial was created as an alternative to Helvetica
- Distinguishing Helvetica from Arial
External links
Typefaces | Sans-serif typefaces
Helvetica (Schriftart) | Helvética | Helvetica | Helvetica | Helvetica | ヘルベチカ | Helvetica | Helvetica
"Helvetica"