Hello all,

I'm working on a long text about a school where the classes are named after the initials of the teachers. The text is full of references to old pupils of the school with the class initials and year in brackets after their names, e.g. Mickey Mouse (JEC'89).

Attempting to follow Bringhurst, my plan was to not set the initials in small caps on the grounds that they are initials. However, since there are so many of these in the text, it looks pretty ugly next to the old-style numbers I'm using.

Would it be wrong to set them in small caps?

And if I do, will the small-cap initials and old-style numbers be a bit overwhelmed by the brackets?

I guess I would still keep ordinary initials (e.g. M. Mouse) with an ordinary capital letter.

On a related note, capital or small-cap for something like "B Team"?

Text will be set in some form of Caslon (probably King's Caslon).

your expert help much appreciated. thanks!