Steve Mehallo is a graphic designer, illustrator and educator based in Sacramento, Calif. His favorite subject is graphic design history. “It’s all there. Everything one could possibly draw from to create something totally new. All my fonts are small history projects. The research is my favorite part — it’s why I end up spending a year or two on each design.”
We are proud to showcase the fonts of Steve Mehallo, and happy to announce this
special offer:
25 percent off each of Steve Mehallo’s fonts now through March 5, 2011.
The
Jeanne Moderno™ type family has nine fonts in total. It is a synthesis of Bodoni Italic and 19th century ultra-bold “fat faces”.
In Steve's own words: “Jeanne Moderno – named after my wife – had its roots in a hand drawn title I saw back in 1996. It was on a monograph of the work of Adolph Loos. It was very German, with roots in 19th century fat faces. Over the years I kept finding elements of this approach – including (much later) Paul Renner’s drawings of a Bodoni Poster-like version of Futura™ Black face. Another inspiration was the film MAX (2002), written and directed by one of Emigre magazine’s founders, Menno Meyjes.”
“I decided Jeanne would be a fictional typeface that was released in 1918, the timeframe from the movie. I had many starts and stops in development – including an eventually rejected mess of letters created in 1999. Finally in 2008, I started drawing my idea and it all came together. Today, I’m working on a matching text version.”
Jeanne Moderno can be used for magazines, advertising, posters, flyers, fashion reports, letterpress experiments, silkscreen endeavors, exhibitions, signage, paper money, revolutionary political statements as well as formal declarations of peace or war. Jeanne Moderno is about the future, the past. The avant-garde. Humanist geometry + vintage footwear. Form, function, style, art and life.
The
Martini at Joe's™ retro style font allows you to loosen your tie and enjoy the happy hour feel. Steve Mehallo created this entertaining font as a modern redrafting of a vernacular style of boomerang and amoeba-shaped lettering style. Martini at Joe’s has a sturdy and cool look that is perfect for party invitations and decorations.
The
Chandler 42™ face is a one of the first typewriter fonts of its kind — capturing the typographic eccentricities of a 1940s portable typewriter. Chandler 42 was designed by Steve Mehallo and compiled with forensic care.
Each of the characters in Chandler 42 features edges meticulously redrafted by hand, including uneven baselines and a few broken letters. It is an extremely versatile font and can be used to express a variety of themes: from vintage to modern, grunge to organic and business to pleasure.
The
TwentyFourNinetyOne™ [2491] typeface is a reinterpretation of the alphabet of 1919 by Theo van Doesburg. It is the original a true rendering of the thinking of the Dutch-based art movement ‘de Stijl.’ 2491 has horizontals and verticals that inspired and synced with the work of artists of the period, planting the seed that would become the modernist “look” of the 20th century. TwentyFourNinetyOne is a futuristic rethinking of letterforms by Steve Mehallo, making its use in headlines and display sizes fun and bold to read.
