There are a few professions in which being left-handed confers an advantage-think of the great southpaw pitchers in major league baseball, like Sandy Koufax. Now, think of all the great left-handed calligraphers. Not so easy, right? Here's a hint: Luis Siquot. Far from being an advantage, Siquot's lefty orientation proved a hurdle to overcome. When I was young, I had serious problems writing," he recalls. "If there was a lot of text, I almost always soiled the paper with wet ink as my hand followed the pen." Then, a friend told Siquot about a special store in London that catered to left-handed people. It was there that he found an Osmiroid pen specially designed for left-handed calligraphers. ITC Cali is based on Siquot's use of this pen. "Electronic scans of my calligraphy were the foundation of the design," he says. "I was careful to leave in some imperfections to avoid an excessively mechanical look, and added the little notches in the strokes to imitate the texture of writing on a rough cotton paper." ITC Cali works equally well in text and display sizes, but it is a calligraphic script, Siquot warns, "and shouldn't be set in all capitals." That said, ITC Cali is a remarkably versatile design, well-suited to a variety of communication projects."

Australian typographer Harry Pears continues to explore ancient type forms while maintaining his consultancy business Typeface Research Pty. Ltd., of Lake Cathie, Australia. Born in Quirindi, Australia, Harry has had a long career in printing and graphic arts and has been the guiding force behind the creation of the Lindisfarne Nova family. Lindisfarne Nova Incised and Lindisfarne Runes are wonderful illustrative companions to the Lindisfarne Nova text fonts. In a unique partnership, Harry develops the concepts, and calligrapher Margaret Layson brings the designs to life. They both then work on the digital incarnation in a true collaboration.

ITC Studio Script was designed by Robert Evans, an informal script for applications in which a calligraphic look would be appropriate. The font includes a wide variety of alternate characters, which give a graphic designer's creativity no limits.

Some words from the designer... Like long legs walking a runway in stiletto heels, ITC Cherie is both sophisticated and feminine. West coast designer Teri Kahan developed this art nouveau-style font into two distinct all capital alphabets – one with a “high waist”, placed in the capital position, and the other a “low-waist,” placed in the lower case position. They work separately or together, and this dual nature gives a designer the ability to make subtle changes in a logo or line of text. Additional flourished letters round out this versatile headline font.

As if gliding in on the tide, ITC Kahana floats across the page with the pulse and sway of the sacred Hawaiian hula dance. The original drawings for this display typeface were created while designer Teri Kahan lived in the Aloha State, and its bold verticals symbolically convey the power and strength of the Polynesian people. Kahan has spent most of her life working with letters. She discovered Speedball lettering pens in her teens, opened a design studio that specialized in the lettering and calligraphic arts while in her early twenties, and grew her business in California and Hawaii. Today, she embraces new design challenges and digital technology, but letters are still at the core of her work. In ITC Kahana, Kahan created a design that is both distinctive and versatile. Menus, posters, display headlines, packaging and brochures fall easily within this typeface's range. And the word “kahana” is more than just a namesake: in Hawaiian, “kaha” means “to mark, draw, place, turn or surf,” and “na” means “belonging to.” ITC Kahana also includes an enchanting decorated alphabet in the lowercase position that expands this typeface's usefulness to the designer.

ITC Werkstatt is a result of the combined talents of Alphabet Soup's Paul Crome and Satwinder Sehmi, along with Ilene Strizver and Colin Brignall. It is inspired by the work of Rudolph Koch, the renowned German calligrapher, punchcutter, and type designer of the first third of this century, without being based directly on any of Koch's typefaces. Werkstatt has obvious affinities with the heavy, woodcut look of Koch's popular Neuland, but also with display faces like Wallau and even the light, delicate Koch Antiqua. Brignall began by drawing formal letters with a 55mm cap height, which Sehmi reinterpreted using a pen with a broad-edge nib. “Not an easy process,” says Brignall, “since one of the features of Koch's style is that while it was calligraphic in spirit, most of the time his counter shapes did not bear any resemblance to the external shapes, as they would in normal calligraphy. This meant that Sehmi could not complete a whole character in one go, but had to create the outside and inside shapes separately and then ink in the center of the letters.” The process was repeated, only without entirely filling in the outlines, for the Engraved version. Crome handled the scanning and digitization, maintaining the hand-made feel while creating usable digital outlines. “The collaboration of artisans with particular skills,” says Brignall, “in a modern-day, computer-aided studio environment, seems very much in step with the 'workshop' ethos that Rudolph Koch encouraged and promoted so much.”

ITC Symbol font was designed by Aldo Novarese, a simple, straightforward design of understated elegance. It has just the hint of a serif to aid legibility. Book and medium weights have a light, even color and are perfectly complemented by the bold and black weights. The italics are clear and simple, a comfortable companion to the roman.

Designed by the highly regarded American designer George Ryan of the Galapagos Design Group. George is the veteran of a number of successful display fonts and there is no reason why ITC Eborg, with it's striking appearance, should not follow suit. Is it a bold casual sans serif or a disciplined brush script? Probably the former but only just. Whatever it's category though, ITC Eborg has the pedigree to become a highly successful and much sought after font. It has been carefully designed to maximize it's usage potential with conventional capitals combining well with a lowercase in which the x-height is just about right for both large display application whilst retaining good legibility at some of the smallish point sizes. ITC Eborg, with it's warm friendly qualities which are very much in evidence, and in a world where it has become so important to convey that casual approachable air," even in the most aggressive of advertising, be it product or service, it is definitely a style to fill the need."

ITC Grapefruit is the work of Hungarian designer Gyori Attila, an angular, mannered and geometric display face with a loud appearance. ITC Grapefruit combines strong display characteristics with legibility and is suitable for a wide variety of uses.

ITC Cyberkugel is the work of British designer Timothy Donaldson, who occasionally likes to write with an extra-fine ballpoint pen. I like the spindly scrawny forms that it gives me when I follow all the usual 'italic' writing conventions", he says. And there lie the origins of ITC Cyberkugel, although the creative process was moved from pen and paper to software and a Wacom tablet. "I like the fact that people will be buying it to give them a 'human', 'organic', 'non-digital' look, and yet no ink has soiled paper. Although the movements of the hand are still the essence, the whole thing was created in cyberspace." The name comes from combining cyberspace and Kugelschreiber, the German word for ballpoint pen. ITC Cyberkugel is a fresh interpretation of traditional calligraphy."

ITC Samuel is a delicate and lively calligraphy font designed by Phill Grimshaw. Every detail has been worked to create harmony. The stroke contrast, the light brush character, the graceful forms all give ITC Samuel the spontaneity and individuality typical of handwriting. The font includes several ligatures and is legible even in smaller point sizes. ITC Samuel is perfect for invitations, greeting cards and other personal correspondence.

ITC Snap is the work of American designer David Sagorski and represents both the creativity and humor of the native Kansan. It clealy displays the influence of cartoon graphics of the 1960s and 70s, but does not need to be limited to period or animated graphics. ITC Snap is ideal for headlines which demand attention.

Spirited, unaffected and buoyant, the ITC Oldrichium type family pays homage to the calligraphy and typeface designs of Czech designer Oldrich Menhart. “I came upon one of Menhart's typefaces over a decade ago,” says George Thompson, designer of ITC Oldrichium. “I've been collecting examples of his work ever since.” Thompson was born in Chicago and grew up in north-west Indiana. “While I've been an educator and general graphic designer for over 30 years, lettering and type design have always been an important part of my work,” he says. Thompson now spends much of his free time designing typefaces. ITC Oldrichium is a subtle melding of the shapes and proportions of Menhart's Manuscript typeface, the energetic strokes of his calligraphy, and Thompson's own design skills. The result is a distinctive, powerful, and exceptionally versatile typeface family. Available in light, regular, demi bold and bold weights, with corresponding italics for all but the bold, ITC Oldrichium is comfortable setting both text and display copy. In addition to the basic weights, Thompson has created an Engraved version for those times when an especially powerful statement is called for.

ITC Bookman font was designed by Edward Benguiat, whose goal was to design a typeface that had a clear resemblance to previous Bookman faces but was different and more versatile. This typeface retains all the traits of the original and adds a large x-height and moderate stroke contrast for optimal legibility. ITC Bookman font also has italics which are true cursive forms, as opposed to oblique roman characters. Featured in: Best Fonts for Tattoos

The ITC Pino™ typeface family is Slobodan Jelesijevic’s second suite of commercial fonts. Although a small family of three weights, it is remarkably versatile. Like many typefaces, Pino grew out of a desire for a particular kind of design. Jelesijevic was creating a series of illustrations for a children’s magazine and needed a typeface that was lighthearted, legible and would complement his illustrative style. Unable to find exactly what he needed, he decided to make his own font. “I spent the better part of a day looking for just the right typeface,” he recalls. “Of course, the hard part was finding something that would harmonize perfectly with my drawings. A custom font was not part of the project brief or budget, but I thought that perhaps I could use it again.” The regular weight of Pino became the solution to Jelesijevic’s problem. Jelesijevic did use the font again, but quickly realized that the single weight needed companion designs. Pino Bold and Black followed in quick succession. Before licensing the designs to ITC, the three-weight family provided headlines, book cover titles and even short blocks of text copy in several of Jelesijevic’s design projects. Born in Gornji Milanovac, Serbia, in 1951, Jelesijevic graduated with a degree in graphic communication and lettering from the Faculty of Applied Arts in the University of Arts in Belgrade. Currently, in addition to typeface design, he is sought out as a graphic designer and illustrator. When not working on design projects, he teaches graphic communications at the Faculty of Art in the University of Niš, Serbia. Pino is a stressed sans of slightly condensed proportions. Pino’s generous x-height, clearly defined counters and distinctive character shapes enable it to fulfill a wide variety of typographic applications. Friendly without being sanguine, the Pino type family will communicate with charm and vitality.

ITC Kumquat is the work of American designer Eric Stevens. He started with the logo for his company, Tower of Babel Design, and expanded upon the Mesopotamian look to create a typeface to match. Stevens imagined drawing figures in the sand with a stick and how this method would change the way one usually draws characters, usually with lines replacing curves. Most characters are slim but a few, like the uppercase A and L, were made to contrast with the rest. ITC Kumquat is a great display typeface for anything which should have an antiquated feel.""

Although inspired by the engraved lettering on eighteenth-century English trade-cards, ITC Vineyard has unusual characteristics of its own. The type retains some quality of copperplate scripts, but the differentiation between thicks and hairlines is not very sharp. There are a few cursive forms, but most of the letters are romanized: they are almost upright and not joining. Occasional flourishes are casually interpreted from various sources such as the lettering on trade-cards and writing masters' copybooks. “I think it is a new kind of 'copperplate script' which is not too formal and easier to read,” claims designer Akira Kobayshi. Irregularities are apparent in the angle of caps and numerals, but the face's quirkiness gives a type page some friendliness rather than cold brilliancy. ITC Vineyard is designed in two weights: regular and bold. Each variation includes several extra characters such as an alternative lowercase 'd' with a long arm, a T-h ligature, swelled rules, and a pair of flourishes. Swash caps are available for both weights. The swash caps variation also includes oldstyle figures. Kobayashi notes: “There are a few swash-cap lowercase combinations that collide or look awkward. In that case, I recommend using the plain caps. Setting all swash cap copy should also be discouraged.” Featured in: Best Fonts for Tattoos

ITC Don't Panic 's distressed shapes and craggy outlines evoke the feeling you get when you're just barely in control of a situation. This is type design on the edge. ITC Panic is further down the emotional track, when you've actually lost control and there is no hope in sight. Thompson says the inspiration for these faces arrived one day in the mail. I received an envelope that looked like it had a rough trip; the type that was stamped on it had a tired, ragged appearance. Ironically, the haggard envelope woke me up. I got excited and wanted to replicate the look as a font of type." Thompson designed ITC Don't Panic, then stood back and looked at it and decided it cried out for a more agitated companion. ITC Don't Panic gave birth to the positively psychotic offspring, ITC Panic. Both are all-cap designs with alternate characters in the unshift position. Creating an authentically disturbed appearance proved to be a challenge for Thompson. "I tried to design agitated characters, but they looked staged. So I tried multiple photocopies, but that didn't work. Eventually, I laser-printed the basic characters, wadded up the lasers, then flattened them out and stomped on them with heavy boots. The end result was scanned and used as the basis for the rest of the design." Thompson's work on web sites and multimedia has influenced his interest in type and typography that transcends the cool, unemotional nature of the computer."

ITC Schizoid, from designer Frank Marciuliano, displays a stroke contrast which could not be larger, abrupt and uncompromising. Fine strokes turn into thick bars and create angular, consciously awkward forms. Nervous, unbalanced and amusing, Schizoid is an appropriate name for this font. The experimental ITC Schizoid is best used for headlines in print.

Manhattan was designed in 1970 for ITC by Tom Carnase, who also created Avant Garde Gothic. The distinguishing characteristic of this designer's work is found in the emphasis on the thick-thin constrast. In this case, Carnase approached the border of the impossible. The heavy vertical strokes stand opposite the finest of lines and the thick columns dominate the overall look. The basic forms are strictly constructed, as are those of Morris F. Benton's Broadway of 1925, to which many parallels can be found. Manhattan is best used for applications which will not be placed too far from the viewer, as at too great a distance the fine lines can no longer be seen. It should be used exclusively for headlines in medium point sizes.

ITC Blaze was designed by Patty King in 1995. It is a typeface which looks as though it were written by hand with a broad tipped pen on rough paper. The pointed ends of the characters and the leaning to the right give the font a dynamic, energetic feel. Blaze shows the influence of the late 1940s and is best suited for headlines and short to middle length texts.

The Weidemann typeface's original name was Biblica, which was designed for the collaborative publication of a Bible by the German Catholic and Protestant Churches. The mass of text which the face was intended to set required that the design allow many characters to fit onto one line without rendering the words illegible. Thus, narrow spacing does not compromise the legibility or the elegance of Weidemann.

ITC Eastwood is the work of British designer Martin Archer and is named for Clint Eastwood. Archer was looking for a plain oldstyle typeface with open lower case forms and used Stempel Garamond as his starting point, although the result ended up well beyond its origins. In small point sizes the typeface looks interestingly rough while at display sizes it looks like a 16th century French typeface and its unique details come forward.

ITC Fenice font (pronounced fe-nee-chay) is the work of designer Aldo Novarese and was influenced by the traditional designs of Didot, Bodoni, and Ibarra. It displays the fine serifs of a Bodoni but blends such characteristics with a contemporary structural style. ITC Fenice font is perfect for applications requiring the economical use of space.

Some words from the designer... West coast artist Teri Kahan developed a "design font" of 68 pictographs capturing the sentiments of relationship, connection and synchronicity. Many of the characters were created with phrases in mind like, "handing you the world on a platter", "howling at the moon", and "message in a bottle". Others represent life experiences. The clean, simple illustration style originates from the look of hand-carved rubber stamps, and lends itself beautifully to logos and graphics.

ITC Tiffany font was designed by Edward Benguiat, a highly contemporary blend of two fonts, Ronaldson and Caxton. The best characteristics of both were combined to produce a refined and refreshing font, ITC Tiffany.

Zipper is a striking font designed in 1970 by Phillip Kelly for the Letraset dry transfer sheets and it shows itself as a true child of the 1970s. The most distinguishing characteristic is the markedly robust horizontal stroke, heavier by far than the verticals. In a line of text, the figures present a close, stripe-like line, strongly dominated by the horizontal. Zipper is meant exclusively as a headline font and should be used in larger point sizes to highlight its unique, eye-catching characteristics.

ITC Riptide is a work of British designer Timothy Donaldson. Abrupt changes in stroke, pointed stroke ends and changing slant direction characterize this very experimental alphabet. The temperamental figures are irrepressible and aggressive, the forms seem to have been chosen randomly, and these traits lend the font its informality and spontaneity. ITC Riptide is legible in point sizes of 14 and its fresh character is perfect for comics and cartoons.

ITC Syndor is the work of Swiss designer Hans Eduard Meier, a font which is almost, but not quite, a sans serif. The beginnings and endings of strokes display a hint of the calligrapher's hand and these tiny serifs optimize legibility. This legibility and the typeface's simple forms make ITC Syndor an excellent choice for business and presentation graphics.

ITC Leawood was begun by designer Les Usherwood and finished by his talented staff at Typsettra in Toronto, Canada, after his untimely death. A similar calligraphic series to ITC Usherwood, following alternative options, the typeface features small, well-defined serifs which aid legibility and allow for close spacing.

From the fluid brushstrokes of Teri Kahan's lettering comes a tropical treasure: ITC Puamana, graceful as a palm tree in the ocean breeze. “Puamana” is a Hawaiian word with several meanings; among them are “the blossoming of miraculous power” and “sea breeze.” ITC Puamana captures the essence of the tropics, suggesting the sway of palm trees in the ocean air. With its ragged edges and italic slant, this brush-written alphabet has a unique visual texture that graces the page with spirited movement. Sketched on the beach in Maui by west coast designer Teri Kahan, ITC Puamana first saw life as apparel art for a Hawaiian clothing company. Now this versatile typeface is a complete alphabet that's useful for both text and titles. ITC Puamana can be put to use in everything from book jackets to in-store signage.

ITC Dinitials is the work of German designer Helga Joergensen. When I started drawing the first of them, I was very much inspired by dinosaurs, but during the work my fantasy guided me more and more and then became rather fabulous creatures." ITC Dinitials is a capital letter alphabet available in both black on white and white on black weights."

Bob Alonso’s Aftershock was designed to resemble woodcut or linocut lettering; its irregular shapes make it stand out from its background. Dominant features of this typeface are its generally square forms and its emphasized horizontal strokes. The strong, heavy alphabet makes an overall regular impression in spite of the idiosyncracies of its individual characters. To emphasize the unique contours of the forms, it is best to use Aftershock in larger point sizes and exclusively in headlines.

ITC Buckeroo was designed by Rick Mueller in 1997, and as the name suggests, it is reminiscent of the Wild West in the US. It is a small caps alphabet with extremely heavy characters, which makes it particularly good for headlines. This ornamental font should be used in point sizes of 12 or larger.

Jana Nikolic was finishing her degree program at the Faculty of Applied Arts, in Belgrade, with a final project that would combine her two majors: type and book design. Three stories from William Saroyan's My Name Is Aram would provide the text for the book, to be set in a typeface that Nikolic would design. Nikolic knew something special was happening the moment she put pen to paper. The letters just emerged," she recalls. "I started to explore a few new pens and found one I loved. I was able to make its tip bend with pressure." Like the family Saroyan writes about, the design flowing from Nikolic's pen would be simple but a little quirky. "When there were a whole bunch of little black letters around me," continues Nikolic, "I saw that this was going to be a very interesting typeface family." Nikolic drew Latin and Cyrillic letters, lowercase and capital letters, wide letters and narrow letters. She was surprised at how quickly and easily the design came. "There were no badly written letters," she says. "I hardly had to rework them and they fit together remarkably well." ITC Aram's standard character complement consists of one set of lowercase letters and two sets of capitals: one narrow and the other wide. The wide caps can be used with the standard lowercase, or mixed with the narrow caps for a variation on "cap and small cap" copy. The ITC Aram create the opportunity to mix and combine the letters into playful typographic expressions. Words and sentences that twinkle; text that seems light and alive - one runs the risk of creating work that is both delightful and charming when setting copy in ITC Aram."