After nearly a century of producing Japanese, Korean, and Chinese typefaces, Tokyo-based font foundry Morisawa Inc. has released its first Latin alphabet superfamily called Role. Designed by a team led by legendary typographer Matthew Carter, who’s been called by The New Yorker “the most widely read man in the world” for his prolific career in type design, the font family includes 200 typefaces in four classes, Serif, Sans, Slab, and Soft, and is available on the Fontelier platform.
Definite Article was enlisted by Brooklyn-based design firm mgmt., who Morisawa commissioned to create the type specimen books for the Role family, to handle the editorial aspects of the project. Drawing on the designers’ attributes, a persona was developed for each class: “The Connoisseur’ for Serif, “The Scholar” for Sans, “The Hero” for Slab, and “The Prodigy” for Soft. Each booklet then demonstrated the range of the typefaces with curated texts, example ephemera, and original commissions from literary critic Francine Prose, author and radio host Kurt Andersen, classics scholar Emily Wilson, and author Kate Bolick.