Neue Haas Grotesk, the Other New ‘Helvetica’

Following Monotype’s marketing, yesterday I described Helvetica Now as “the first new version of Helvetica since Helvetica Neue 35 years ago”. As a few type-minded readers pointed out, this ignores Christian Schwartz’s 2010 Neue Haas Grotesk, which is a modernized Helvetica in everything but name:

The digital version of Helvetica that everyone knows and uses today is quite different from the typeface’s pre-digital design from 1957. Originally released as Neue Haas Grotesk, many of the features that made it a Modernist favorite have been lost in translation over the years from one typesetting technology to the next.

Type designer Christian Schwartz has newly restored the original Neue Haas Grotesk in digital form — bringing back features like optical size variations, properly corrected obliques, alternate glyphs, refined spacing, and more.

Many similarities to Helvetica Now, including separate text and display versions, and alternate glyphs such as a straight-legged ‘R’.

★ Friday, 12 April 2019