Typophile

Monotype Van Dijk

schickele

Looking for a classical Dutch typeface other than those by DTL and Teff (which I can’t afford), I hit upon Monotype’s Van Dijk. The regular shape looks clean and readable, and some alternative figures are simply delightful (look at the three!). Unfortunately, the italic is said to be so badly designed and so poorly spaced “that makes it a very uninteresting font to use in digital form”. (Norman Walsh)
My issue: does anyone know Van Dijk? Or have seen it somewhere applied? Is it worth to be bought regardless of the italic? Thank you!

ben_archer

You get what you pay for; the spacing and the overall cut of Monotype Van Dijck comes in for a hammering in Bringhurst's opinion too.

I like to tell myself I can't afford TEFF typefaces either, but you might like to look at the very reasonably priced work of the Storm Type Foundry or Font Bureau instead, both of whom do beautiful work (Regent, Farnham) inspired by Dutch baroque typefaces.

schickele

Thank you for your hints, I've never noticed Regent and Farnham. I've also realized that the spelling of Van Dij(c)k is a little bit messy all over the web. You're right, it's Van Dijck.

Nicolaas Em

You could have a look at Linotype Janson Text.

Action Hank

Gerard Unger's Hollander is somewhat based on Van Dijck's designs.

It's not very expensive, but also not very rich in features.

http://www.gerardunger.com/allmytypedesigns/allmytypedesigns06.html

http://www.linotype.com/96956/hollander-family.html

schickele

Thank you very much for your posts. I thought I knew practically every Dutch or Dutch-styled digital typeface, but I was wrong. Gerard Unger's Hollander is also new to me. Of course, Janson would be an interesting choice. I know one thing now: it won't be Monotype Van Dijck.

ben_archer

Paul, if you're still researching this you might like to check out what Dean Allen says about Elzevir (also based on van Dijck's work) – and some other text faces at

http://www.textism.com/textfaces/index.html?id=4

Just a thought.

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