Typophile

Help me choose a Scotch (Miller, Chronicle, Ingeborg)?

pluvius

I've been looking for a Scotch for some time to be my all-around workhouse face, but I haven't been able to choose between Miller, Chronicle, and Ingeborg. I need something that would look good at 11 or 12 pt.

Here are my thoughts: Miller is absolutely lovely to me, great numerals, great italic, great punctuation, but had the ill fortune of being born too soon (pre-Opentype era), so it has certain lacks. Chronicle is executed amazingly, but comes off--to my eyes, anyway--almost over-refined (and bland in comparison with Miller). Ingeborg is intriguing, but I haven't seen it in print anywhere (and it's the most expensive).

Advice?

Scotch Modern is a close revival of a 12 pt Scotch Modern of c.1870, extended to include a wide array of present-day OpenType features.

I use it as my browser face (Safari, Mac). Here is a screen grab.
The default vertical metrics set solid, which may not be to everyone's taste, but it struck me as the right thing to do.

A 160-page specimen book is available.

Ingeborg. For all contingencies.

Hercules also has an intriguing quirkiness to it, though is missing small caps and other such features.

Miller does come in open type, and small caps are shown on the web site. I suspect that there is a lot more, so if you actually prefer that one, you should call Font Bureau to find out what is in the font.

Ingeborg is not a Scotch Roman. It is, however, an absolutely splendid typeface, and I'd buy it anyway if I were you.

If you are absolutely set on having a Scotch Roman, then Nick's Scotch Modern is one of the most authentic. I think of Miller and Chronicle more as ‘inspired-by’ than true Scotches (H&FJ describe Chronicle, amusingly, as a ‘blendid Scotch’): they update the style for contemporary tastes, notably in reducing the stroke contrast. They're both very nice types, and Miller is largely responsible for reviving interest in the genre, but whether it is appropriate depends on how much you want to evoke the full on spiky look of a page of Victorian typesetting.

[Nick, I think you should market Scotch Modern as ‘The single malt of Scotch Romans’.]

Thanks John!

Although strictly speaking Scotch Modern, being a didone, is not a subset of Scotch Roman, which is transitional.

Yes, it's confusing, but as people traditionally referred to such faces as "Modern", and today as "Scotch", I thought the name would be appropriate. (And cite James Mosley for precedent, in A Tally of Types).

John — As Nick hints at, you’re conflating the Scotch Roman style with the Scotch branch of Victorian moderns, which came to be known as Scotch (without the Roman qualifier).

Matthew once chastised me for the same mistake: “I would not refer to the types cut by Austin for Miller as "Moderns." Scotch Roman was really a warmer reaction against the more rigorous Moderns.”

Ironically, the appellation “Scotch Roman” doesn’t actually attach to this style until it is imported to America by the foundry of A. D. Farmer & Sons in 1903.

Later adaptations blended with other modern strains and dropped the "Roman." Another branch fed into designs like Century and Caledonia.

The nomenclature and taxonomy are a bit confusing.

Take a look at our Consul. A little Scotch, with some Bourbon and Cognac mixed in. And it comes in four optical sizes.

Thanks, Kent. Well, that's embarrassing. I guess my associations with the term 'Scotch Roman' are a bit out of whack, perhaps from having squinted my way through so many Victorian editions set in Scotch romans.

I was also a bit confused by the whole Scotch Roman / Modern thing and started this thread on it a while back where Nick and other go in to a bit more detail.

Having said all that, I probably would qualify Ingeborg as being a Scotch (at least as far as my understanding of the topic goes).

no mention of Dwiggins? Caledonia? or modern version New Caledonia being better from Linotype.

I mentioned Caledonia. New Caledonia sucks. Sorry.

I think my views on the subject are pretty well known.

Linotype Caledonia sucks worse.

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