What is the Empirical™ font?

When I first approached this design back in 2003 I wrote myself a design brief that called for a simple sans serif “avec serifs” (with serifs). Its emphasis needed to be on text usage but to be at home in display sizes. A range of weights with a controlled step from one weight to the next, uniform character sets, spacing and kerning throughout the range. Attention to openness of counter spaces would be paramount to work in text sizes. Matching italics should be true italics not merely slanted - with a cursive feel. More… During extensive testing I decided to include a suite of ligatures to eliminate the hairline gaps that occur between slab serifs at display sizes. The user needs only to activate “standard ligatures” which is on by default in most apps. Six years in the making, I think it was worth the wait.

Empirical™ Font families

The Empirical™ includes the following font families:

• Empirical One
• Empirical One Italic
• Empirical Two
• Empirical Two Italic
• Empirical Three
• Empirical Three Italic
• Empirical Four
• Empirical Four Italic
• Empirical Five
• Empirical Five Italic
• Empirical Six
• Empirical Six Italic

Empirical™ Preview

Here is a preview of how Empirical™ will look. For more previews using your own text as an example, click here.