Some time back, a few basic characters were drawn out (possibly inspired by some vintage sheet music) and set aside for a future font project. Despite being incomplete for a few years, this once-forgotten design is now available as Deco Revival JNL, in both regular and oblique versions.

Note: The Decorative style is no longer available due its complexity and the resulting memory and performance issues.

The hand lettered title found on the sheet music for 1938’s "So Help Me (If I Don't Love You)" was the basis for Totally Deco JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions. A classic mix of widely rounded letters and condensed letters typifies the design style of the Art Deco era.

The hand lettered sans serif title on the1931 sheet music for “(Potatoes are Cheaper-Tomatoes are Cheaper) Now’s the Time to Fall in Love” presented another opportunity to create a typeface from the wealth of unusual alphabets found on the covers of vintage and antique song sheets. However, it seems that even as late as the 1930s, song writers had the urge to pen long-worded titles for their musical compositions. This thirteen word verbal excursion became the model for Casual Deco JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

This seriously styling family of typefaces is based on Dolmen and Zierdolmen, designed by Max Salzmann for the J. G. Schelter & Giesecke foundry of Leipzig in 1922 and 1923. Unlike previous revivals, these fonts remain true to Salzmann’s original designs. The plain version also features all of the standard German ligatures, accessible through the hlig feature, included in the original release. Both versions feature the complete Latin 1252, Central European 1250 and Turkish 1254 character sets, with localization for Lithuanian, Moldovan and Romanian.

The inspiration for Deco Eccentrique JNL was initially hand drawn contoured lettering from a mid-1920s piece of sheet music; the style of the letters showing influences of the upcoming Art Deco movement. This was made into a digital font entitled Poster Contoured JNL. Once all of the excess parts of the previous design were stripped away to only the inner letters, the pre-Art Deco influences remained along with characters of varying stroke widths and shapes. This non-conformist type face is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The 1939 French publication “Modèles de lettres modernes par Georges Léculier” ( “Models of Modern Letters by Léculier”) presented some unique and stylized type designs with Art Deco influence. One such example is an abstract modular alphabet constructed of rectangles and circles. This is now available as Modular Deco JNL, in both regular and oblique versions.

The hand lettered words “Pere Noel” under a vintage French magazine’s photo of Santa with two bikini-clad beauties inspired the digital version of this quirky, condensed type style. Unusually Deco JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions From Wikipedia: “Père Noël “Papi Christmas”, sometimes called ‘Papa Noël’ (“Daddy Christmas”), is a legendary gift-bringer at Christmas in France and other French-speaking areas, identified with the Father Christmas and/or Santa Claus of English-speaking territories. Though they were traditionally different, all of them are now the same character, with different names, and the shared characteristics of a red outfit, workshop at the North Pole/Lapland, and a team of reindeer.”

a art deco naive experimental typeface

Normally, a short paragraph or two on this page tells the backstory to a font design. In this particular case, that story has been lost to time. Whatever the original source – whether a vintage bit of typography or an original idea – the beginnings of this font lay unfinished for quite a while as it was perceived to duplicate another previous release. However, after recently checking a sample of the design against other Jeff Levine Fonts, it’s reasonably certain this type face may have similar characteristics, but can stand on its own merit. That said, Clean Deco JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The namesake for this type design was the dust jacket for the 1926 book “Revelry”. A classic Art Deco thick-and-thin design, Revelry Deco JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Geometa is based on Paul Renners Futura Classic, the one that he designed before he had to soften it to make it more appealing to the broad public. I thought the normal rounded fonts needed a decorative sister. Here they are! Your type-designer for decorative solutions, Gert Wiescher

The 1934 Dick Powell-Ruby Keeler-Joan Blondell movie musical "Dames" gave us the classic song "I Only Have Eyes for You", but the sheet music for the song had the movie title hand lettered in a multi-line Art Deco sans serif design that just begged to be turned into a type font. From these few letters now comes Deco Multiline JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The hand lettered title on the 1943 sheet music for "This Love of Mine" formed the basis for Deco Style JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Tall and narrow in stature, elegant by design and Art Deco in style, Deco Elongated JNL is a wonderful type design for setting long lines of copy in less space. The retro elements of this font conjure up images of fine fashions, fancy nightclubs and big band music…

Monoline Deco JNL is a thin, elegant typeface that is reminiscent of the Art Deco Streamline influence of the 1930s and 1940s, complete with angular and truncated characters.

This casual, carefree face is based on a showcard alphabet presented by Cecil Wade in his Manual of Lettering. Its extrabold weight, sketchy styling and playful letterforms make it perfect for attention-getting headlines. Both versions of this font contain the Unicode 1252 Latin and Unicode 1250 Central European character sets, with localization for Romanian and Moldovan.

Deco Template JNL is a font made from the inline portion of Stationer JNL, which itself was based on the hand lettered 1938 sheet music title for the official Coast Guard Marching Song "Semper Paratus" "(Always Ready)". Resembling a drafting template with a square, modular look, this type design is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Hand lettering used on the packaging of a space-themed rubber stamp toy set is the basis for Space Deco JNL. Blending the classic thick-and-thin line weights of the Art Deco style with sharply angled cross strokes evoked a sense of movement and "future" in this unique lettering design.

Hand lettering isn’t a perfect art form, and this is why it often has an appeal over formal typesetting. Individual interpretation can lead to variations in style, character shape and overall design concept. Case in point: The hand-drawn title for the1933 sheet music “Why Can’t This Night Go on Forever” is a simple Art Deco sans, however it mixes character widths and even angles the letter ‘C’ in a nonconventional way. Deco Design JNL is the digital version of this alphabet, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Deco Edition JNL gets its inspiration from the hand lettered title of a 1943 anthology of musical compositions for schools entitled "Junior Laurel Songs - Teacher's Edition", and is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Inspired by a retro Art Deco poster as well as many of the true classic Art Deco type designs of the 1930s and 1940s, Deco Revisited JNL is a bold, black, stencil-influenced design with no counters. Although being a contemporary design, its use in any retro project will truly evoke a feeling for the “streamline” era. Deco Revisited JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Deco Banner JNL is composed of reverse lettering on a black background with Art Deco end caps. To create a banner, first type the plus sign for the left end cap, then your text. To add a space between words, use the bar on the shift position of the backslash key then continue on. To add the right end cap, type the equal sign.

On the sheet music cover of the 1931 song "When the Autumn Leaves of Life Begin to Fall", the title is hand-lettered using a round tipped nib pen. The combination of both an Art Deco lettering style and the rounded ends of the characters creates an exquisite, yet simple type design digitally preserved as Deco Roundpoint JNL; available in both regular and oblique versions.

The 1930s-era French alphabet collection entitled “La Lettre Dans le Decor & La Publicite Modernes” (which somewhat translates to “The Letter in Modern Decor and Advertising”) has page after page of attractive and unusual type interpretations. One particular Art Deco design puts an entirely different spin on the classic “rounded terminals and geometric design”. Unusual character shapes add a fresh new/old take to the “Streamline Movement”. The aptly-named Deco Francois JNL is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Toward the end of the 1920s, Art Deco influences were starting to creep into modern design. The hand lettered title on the cover of the1928 sheet music for “Fascinatin’ Vamp” not only embraced the new Deco movement, but sent it on a wild typographic ride. Letters of mixed thicknesses and stylings made up the two word title, and this unusual group of letter shapes became the inspiration for Free Form Deco JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

From the title on the sheet music for the 1935 composition "Along Tobacco Road" comes Deco Triline JNL in both regular and oblique versions. Reminiscent of Broadway if done as a neon sign, this typeface virtually shouts about the Manhattan nightlife of the 1930s. For maximum readability, space the letters a bit wider than normal.

In their book "Lettering of Today" by W. Ben and Ed C. Hunt, an Art Deco "thick and thin" alphabet with some stylized characters (which leaned a lot toward a calligraphic style) stood out from the rest. This is now available as Stylized Deco JNL, in both regular and oblique versions.

Although the Art Deco movement is generally attributed to the 1930s and 1940s, a number of design influences were showing up during the late 1920s in what is referred to as the Art Nouveau period. The Dutch illustrator Anton Kurvers’ hand lettering on the front cover of the (1927) magazine “Het Vlaamsche Volstooneel” clearly shows the clean lines and Avant Garde geometrics that foreshadow Art Deco. This attractive pre-Deco lettering has been recreated digitally as Dutch Deco JNL, and is available in both regular and oblique versions.

In an online edition of Modern Screen Magazine for March of 1936, many of the article headlines were set in a bold, slab serif inline font which (although possessing some Art Deco traits) could double as a sports font. This is now available as Team Deco JNL in both regular and oblique versions.

Stencil Deco JNL was an experimental modification of Jeff Levine's Cardboard Cutouts JNL font, originally designed from an authentic stencil source circa the 1950s. This version is a fusion of the Art-Deco style and a modern, trendy approach to the stroke weights.

Every face tells a story but this font is 77 stories high (1,046 feet with antenna included)! A lofty companion to Empire State Gothic , Empire State Deco is a tall, stately font containing four different styles, sometimes contradictory, united by the desire to be modern. Those familiar with the Exposition Internationale des Arts Décoratifs et Industriels Modernes will notice a post-postmodernism combined with the fine craftsmanship and rich materials for which those awfully nice chaps at Comicraft are known. During its Art Deco heyday, Comicraft represented luxury, glamour, exuberance, and faith in social and technological progress -- this new font recaptures those halcyon days in letter form.

a fifities style font

The model for Deco Moderne JNL was the hand lettered title on the sheet music cover of "Did You Ever See A Dream Walking" (from the 1933 Paramount musical "Sitting Pretty" starring Jack Oakie, Jack Haley and Ginger Rogers). The typeface is available in both regular and oblique versions.

The movie poster for the 1936 film “Dodsworth” had its title hand lettered in a thin Art Deco sans serif with a mix of both stylized and squared characters. Expanding on this unusual lettering combination, the final results became Drama Deco JNL, which is available in both regular and oblique versions.

Deco Neue Wilde is a filter font based on Deco, an original Open Window classic. It sort of speaks for itself but it reminds me of a lava lamp and the countless shapes that you could waste time watching appear.

a naive typeface from Art Deco ages

A hand lettered Art Deco ‘stencil’ design used in various ads for “Holiday” and other Pathé films was found in the July 22, 1930 issue of “The Film Daily”. Similar in style to Futura Black and other like designs, it is now available as Deco Holiday JNL in both regular and oblique versions.

A quirky and unusual Art Deco monoline typeface can be found within the pages of the Esterbrook Drawlet Pen instruction book [circa the 1940s]. Drawlet was the direct competitor to Speedball Lettering pen nibs. This unusual type design of varying width and character shapes is now available digitally as Oddly Deco JNL, in both regular and oblique versions.