1950 British Empire Games – Pennant font(s)

[Christian]

Hello all

First post here – very interesting to see some of the answers already on the board.

I’m trying to identify the font(s) used on the attached image – a sporting pennant from the middle of the 20th century.

As the pennant suggests, this was created for the 1950 British Empire Games in Auckland, New Zealand.

And of course, this is type which has probably been embroidered, so possibly an imperfect match?

If not a perfect match, any close suggestions would be gratefully received – the really unique feature that sticks out to me is the rounded part on the lower case “k”, as well as the sharply pointed descender on the numeral “9”.

Thanks for any suggestions.

Best, Christian

[Kevin Thompson]

I strongly suspect that the sample you posted was hand-lettered, not typeset.

 

Some similar typefaces for Auckland:

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/itc/wade-sans-light/

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/canadatype/cotillion-pro/

 

For 1950:

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/urw/danmark/

 

For British Empire Games, you could modify Latin 725:

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/bitstream/latin-725/

[Christian]

Hello Kevin

Thanks for taking the time to make some suggestions and yes – I should probably think of these examples as hand-lettered rather than typographically perfect.

The Auckland and 1950 suggestions are spot-on.

For British Empire Games, as you say, I will probably have some more work to do e.g. the "non-symmetrical" style of the Upper Case B.

Cheers again – a great starting point.

Best, Christian