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2016

Dublin City Nib

Company Atelier David Smith
Client Dublin City Council
  • Commended
    7 Design: Craft - Typography
Designer
Tom Foley
Typographer
Oran Day
Creative Director
David Smith
Typographer
Tom Foley
Designer
Tom Foley
Typographer
Oran Day
Creative Director
David Smith
Typographer
Tom Foley

As part of the review of the Heritage Plaque scheme for Dublin City Council we proposed that a singular and authentic Irish typeface should be the basis of the plaques “identity”. Mindful of the limited number of authentic contemporary Irish typefaces in use we engaged type designer Tom Foley to create a custom derivation of his Nib type.

Dublin City Nib is a complete redesign of Nib that has been modified for the lo-fidelity production techniques of carving, sand blasting, casting and etching of hard substrates used in the production of heritage plaques across Dublin City. This can be seen specifically in the shaping of the terminals, serifs, straight stems and the moderated contrast.

Dublin City Nib can be classified as a transitional serif, characterised by its moderate contrast, symmetrical bracketed serifs, straight diagonals and bulbous terminals.

Aesthetically, the features of Dublin City Nib are designed to bring a slightly sober feel to the typeface, which gives the design more longevity and allow it to carry the varied nature of content it may encounter during use.

Dublin City Nib comes in Regular and Bold, and supports a Western European character set.