Reader is a neo–grotesque typeface initially created in a medium weight, and now re-cut into a base family of six weights with an additional seventh in the form of Reader Black. The typeface itself has been referenced from an RSPB letter dating 1972. The original typeface, which is unknown, was a monospaced, rounded face. It had geometric proportions which felt like they wanted to break free of the restrictions of a monospaced grid. The construction and geometric properties from this type were taken into the sketching process of Reader but without the monospaced grid. The proportions of the typeface were rebalanced to give it a neo-grotesque, 1960’s swiss style feel, but also referencing the symmetry and geometry of the bauhaus. Weight has also been added to the face, giving a subtle stress to the characters and allowing easy readability. The ends of every stem, originally rounded, have been cut off, replaced with horizontal and angled edges to allow for evenly spaced typesetting. The name takes itself from the original reference of whom the letter is addressed to – Reader.

Initiated as a project at Werkplaats Typographie, Dries Wiewauters. began exploring a stencil based system originally designed by Joseph A. David. In 1876 David acquired the patent for a system that he had invented for sign-writers. With a universal stencil, all UPPERCASE, lowercase, numbers, punctuation, accents etc could be sourced from the grid of the stencil. Dries used this stencil or Plaque Decoupee Universelle (PDU) and began an exploration into the liberties and restrictions of a unified grid. We are happy to now present this new release. The font itself has 2 cuts, regular (a filled version of the stencil), and outline (this cut staying true to the hand rendering via the stencil). Alongside these cuts are corresponding pattern cuts in outline and regular. Boasting a glyph count of 1578 for each cut of PDU, alongside 229 glyphs included in the patterns. The corresponding pattern is provided free with the purchased with the regular and outline cuts of PDU. PDU comes in OpenType format, with the following OpenType features: Ligatures, Discretionary Ligatures, Contextual Alternatives, Stylistic Sets, Contextual Swash, Case Sensitive Alternatives, Tabular & Proportional figures, Tabular & Proportional old-style figures, automatic fractions and extended Small-Caps support.