I agree with you that humanist proportions--oval rather than circular--space better and work better for text. However, when there is a smaller x-height, as in Futura, it does seem to help the spacing of geometrics in text. I'm not sure why--maybe it allows looser spacing while still keeping the words together visually as a unit. I've been particularly impressed by how Vesta--oval and pretty narrow--works in text. Still, none are as good for extended text as good serifs, I think.

Hi William,

Thank you for your keen insights. I prefer serifs for extended texts as well. I have seen but have not had the opportunity to use Vesta yet... it is a well designed and quite legible at smaller text size.

You made a really interesting observation regarding geometric san serifs... I am wondering if you or other typophiles could expand on your thoughts about the smaller x-height geometric sans that allow looser color/spacing while keeping the words together and legible in textual settings.

I am also wondering what you think are the most legible and best color/spaced humanistic san serifs. I really admire Avenir which seems to have both traces of humanistic and geometric letter forms. When I am comparing potential humanistic san serifs are look at the fluidity of text flow in textual settings as well as how the individual letterforms flow from one letter to the other... I am curious to see which humanistic san serifs Typophiles might think are the best in color and spacing in textual settings.

Humanist, shmumanist.

Legato.
http://typographica.org/000969.php

hhp

Legato reminds me of Stone - and Lucida. They seem to belong to a distinct kind of sans-serif font that is becoming very popular with designers these days. I'm not sure that there's a name for this category as yet, at least not one that doesn't lump them together with, say, Gill Sans.

Stone and Lucida were made by chirographers.
Legato is liminographic. (There, I deployed it. :-)

hhp