La Gioconda

The style of the Renaissance lettering master Giovanni Francesco Cresci is classical and timeless. Among a number of Italian scribes and lettering instructors of the period, he was the first to combine the elegance and proportions of the Trajan Roman capitals, and interpret a humanistic solution for a lowercase - his 'Lettera antica tonda', as illustrated in two of his work books, 'Essemplare di piv sorti lettere' of 1560, and 'Il perfetto scrittore' of 1570. Cresci's exemplary letterforms were the direct influence for Richard Dawson and Dave Farey in the creation of La Gioconda, a type design which extends the usual Roman capitals with a lowercase, correctly structured small capitals and an additional set of non aligning numerals in two weights, Roman and Bold.