Beyond typefaces designed with specific trends in mind like you mentioned, I don't know that any specific font would really say 1990... You could just pick a great typeface that was designed in the 90s. Perhaps a Zuzana Licko or Jonathan Barnbrook typeface.

I think the closest you're going to get is a typeface of the post modern movement or beginning of the digital era. It's hard to say since I don't know what the project is, but perhaps it'll be more about how you set the type than the actual typeface. If you want to pick an iconic 90s designer, it seemed like David Carson cared very little about typeface he was using and more about how it was arranged on a page.

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Myriad

Myriad

The questions wasn't "What's a font that would say Apple?"

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The questions wasn’t “What’s a font that would say Apple?”

Actually, Apple "switched" from Apple Garamond to Myriad in 2002.
To me Myriad still says more "Adobe" than "Apple". Especially since we're talking about the '90s.

Dutch 'modern' fonts? (Yes, I am prejudiced :-)

TheSans, TheSerif; Scala, Quadraat. Stuff like that.

> The questions wasn’t “What’s a font that would say Apple?”

I know. I learned to read some time ago.

I'd also go for TheSans.
More specifically for the first half of the nineties, that could also be Meta.

Ah, Meta -- I was racking my brain! Definitely a part of the package.

Nothing says 90's like misused FUSE fonts.

Simon, would that be Fudoni and their ilk? Personally never used one of those, in the 90s nor nowadays :-/

Nothing says 90’s like misused FUSE fonts.

Wasn’t using them at all already misuse?

Yea, I'd say Myriad became a face of the 00s moreso than the 90s.

I'd cast a vote for Officina. I know I absued that face during the 90s.

I know. I learned to read some time ago.

I guess jokes don't work so well in text form

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Yes Darrel, you're probably right.
Since sOmeOne asked for typefaces that "were good then and still hold up today", I would rule out FUSE and a half of the Emigre catalog.

> I guess jokes don’t work so well in text form

That's why they invented the smiley. Sarcasm and humor don't come across well in text only. Putting a :) in a humorous reply will tend to make the recipient smile, instead of loading the flamethrowers.

I like Martin Majoor's Scala.

That’s why they invented the smiley. Sarcasm and humor don’t come across well in text only. Putting a :) in a humorous reply will tend to make the recipient smile, instead of loading the flamethrowers.

True. Perhaps someone should design a punctuation character for such a purpose that doesn't carry the cheesy backage of the :). Anyway :)

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90s = Template Gothic

Fontesque (1994) is still going strong.
I'm working on an OpenType upgrade at the moment.

Peace.

I love Fontesque. OT Pro?

the Helvetica of the nineties

Fontesque OT Pro will have alternate figures and more language support (including Cyrillic), but the big feature will be contextual alternates, to avoid adjacent repetition of identical glyphs.
I'm also improving some of the drawing and spacing (it was my first digital creation, made in Fontographer, so I can do a more refined job now in FontLab -- and one's taste in spacing evolves anyway). The trick is not to make it too slick.

A massive one for me: Rotis (1988).

And Meta too.

>...what fonts would say 1990s...

t0 wh0m? 1'11 ask;)

Cheers!

Proforma.

i'd agree meta is a strong contender, and template gothic, whenever i see that all i think of is the 90's!

actually also include almost any monospaced fonts, but especially ocr-b, it got used *a lot* in the 90's.

Mrs Eaves

a font that was (over)used in the 90s and still is used by some of the stick in the mud corporate folks who insist on doing their own 'design' work is ...

copperplate *he shivers*

for me, nothing says 'unimaginative and stubborn' like this font.

optima and gill sans are on the fence as being faces i used a lot then, but sparingly now.

i think futura and rockwell survived overuse pretty well. the varieties and readability are hallmarks that will keep them in the forefront for me.

In the spirit of unbridled creativity,

Troy Vera
Kingdom Graphics
http://www.kingdomgraphics.biz
Yahoo IM: kingdom_graphics
Skype: kingdom_graphics

Rotis is amazing. I have been seeing that all the time this year. Brilliant face! Very innovative, unique, and original.

Thesis is brilliant indeed. TheSan, TheSerif, TheMix. Pretty innovative stuff.

http://www.lucasfonts.com/fonts/thesis-family/about/