Japanese Blackletter?

[isokon]

This topic was imported from the Typophile platform

Does anyone know of one? let alone a good one?

[Kunihiko_Okano]

What do you mean Japanese blackletter?
Do you mean Japanese typeface resembles Blackletter style?

[hrant]

What about Korean euro-medieval? ;-)
http://www.flickr.com/photos/48413419@N00/4102838389
(Actually that was just an excuse to track this thread.)

hhp

[Kunihiko_Okano]

Looks nice:-)
How about this one?
Japanese Blackletter reminds me of this font.
It might be interesting for titles.
TA-Quadra（TA-クワドラ）from Font 1000.(Specimen PDF)
http://www.font1000.com/font-file/TA600/TA600-quadra.pdf
http://www.zizis.net/quadra.html

[capthaddock]

That font's hilarious, Kunihiko... and rather ugly if you ask me — like those imitation-Chinese Latin fonts you sometimes see at cheap Chinese take-out restaurants in the West.

A more authentic equivalent might be one of those Meiji-era fonts.

[Riccardo Sartori]

I've always felt the heaviest "mincho" having some "fraktur" aesthetics about them.

[Kunihiko_Okano]

Hi Paul,
I know what you mean and I agree with your opinion,
I just showed the font has Blackletter like element.
But I thought it would be nice for fancy logos, say, the poster for theater play:-)

There several kind of Japanese typefaces that were inspired by European typeface styles in Meiji and Taisho-era. For example, Japanese cosmetic maker Shiseido has a corporate font originated in Taisho era, which has been used for its branding items. It seemed that the form of this font came from Socho （宋朝体）style, but I feel it has the similar feeling of Blackletters as the end of the strokes are very sharp and horizontal strokes are bended like Blackletter's stems. The skeleton is very unique but I think it is very beautiful and elegant.
(Quoted from Japanese design magazine "Design Note".)

 

Japanese typeface and Latin typeface are completely different constitution.
I would like to know what isokon focus on when he looks for Japanese Blackletter.

[hrant]

Not directly relevant, but the blackletter aesthetic has previous been migrated to a non-Latin script with success - see the Hebrew component of Kaas. Highly notable.

hhp

[johnbutler]

Greetings Isokon,

I highly recommend you look into the work of Jun Takechi. You can find some examples of his designs in Applied Typography 7 and Applied Typography 8 from the Japan Typography Association, published in 1997 and 1998, respectively. There may be more examples in previous or later editions, but those books are very expensive and very hard to track down.

He designs both Japanese and Latin type. Much of his Latin work reminds me of the work of Margot Chase or Jonathan Barnbrook.

[isokon]

Thanks, I'll check him out.

[quadibloc]

I remember encountering a .PDF specimen of a Chinese font, offered by a major typefounder, that was designed with serifs as if it were a Roman font, but I haven't been able to turn it up again by web searches. I am going to continue trying to locate it, as it would be relevant to this thread.

[Riccardo Sartori]

Chinese blackletter: https://typography.guru/forums/topic/108280-forwarding

[quadibloc]

...which led to this: http://www.typographyserved.com/gallery/Chinese-Gothic/4850969

And here's more information on that typeface, http://www.designer-daily.com/chinese-gothic-30024, as opposed to a Latin typeface of a similar name from Harold's Fonts.