I started drawing letters with a computer when I first got one of my own in 1997. I’d been studying sans serif type as a project on the Typography & Graphic Communication course that I was taking at Reading University, and learning about the different strands of development: ‘grotesques’ such as the delightful Monotype Series 215 were designed by type cutters or draftsmen, while geometric and humanist sans serifs like Futura and Gill Sans were constructed with compasses or quills by rationalist typographers and calligraphers. In the end, of course, they all needed a little wash and brush-up from the typefounder – to say nothing of the type designs. I was also in thrall of a typeface called Ehrhardt, a Monotype revival typeface that is based on a seventeenth century design by Miklos Kis. It too had endured a lot of cleaning, but though they were hard on the source material, those responsible created a very elegant condensed typeface. The result looks a bit like a house on an Amsterdam canal.

Puritan was my response to these influences; it was also a way (I thought) that I could get hold of an interesting typeface without unofficially borrowing from the Typography department. It might be flawed, but it was mine! Well, I learned a lot from the experience.

I wrote a short essay about Puritan as a project in my final year as an undergraduate. Rather than repeat it all here, I have converted the essay (presented as a booklet) into a PDF file of around 1200K which you can download.

In October 1999, I submitted Puritan to the 3rd International Type Design Contest, where it made absolutely no impact.

Puritan font contains 243 defined characters and 200 unique glyphs.

The font contains characters from the following unicode character ranges: Basic Latin (93), Latin-1 Supplement (87), Latin Extended-A (10), Latin Extended-B (1), Spacing Modifier Letters (8), Greek and Coptic (4), General Punctuation (17), Letterlike Symbols (2), Mathematical Operators (14), Geometric Shapes (1), Private Use Area (3).

• Font Name:Puritan Regular
• Subfamily:Regular
• Version:2.0a
• License:Copyright (c) 1999-2010 Ben Weiner (ben@readingtype.org.uk), with Reserved Font Name Puritan This Font Software is licensed under the SIL Open Font License, Version 1.1. This license is copied below, and is also available with a FAQ at: http://scripts.sil.org/OFL ----------------------------------------------------------- SIL OPEN FONT LICENSE Version 1.1 - 26 February 2007 ----------------------------------------------------------- PREAMBLE The goals of the Open Font License (OFL) are to stimulate worldwide development of collaborative font projects, to support the font creation efforts of academic and linguistic communities, and to provide a free and open framework in which fonts may be shared and improved in partnership with others. The OFL allows the licensed fonts to be used, studied, modified and redistributed freely as long as they are not sold by themselves. The fonts, including any derivative works, can be bundled, embedded, redistributed and/or sold with any software provided that any reserved names are not used by derivative works. The fonts and derivatives, however, cannot be released under any other type of license. The requirement for fonts to remain under this license does not apply to any document created using the fonts or their derivatives. DEFINITIONS "Font Software" refers to the set of files released by the Copyright Holder(s) under this license and clearly marked as such. This may include source files, build scripts and documentation. "Reserved Font Name" refers to any names specified as such after the copyright statement(s). "Original Version" refers to the collection of Font Software components as distributed by the Copyright Holder(s). "Modified Version" refers to any derivative made by adding to, deleting, or substituting -- in part or in whole -- any of the components of the Original Version, by changing formats or by porting the Font Software to a new environment. "Author" refers to any designer, engineer, programmer, technical writer or other person who contributed to the Font Software. PERMISSION & CONDITIONS Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of the Font Software, to use, study, copy, merge, embed, modify, redistribute, and sell modified and unmodified copies of the Font Software, subject to the following conditions: 1) Neither the Font Software nor any of its individual components, in Original or Modified Versions, may be sold by itself. 2) Original or Modified Versions of the Font Software may be bundled, redistributed and/or sold with any software, provided that each copy contains the above copyright notice and this license. These can be included either as stand-alone text files, human-readable headers or in the appropriate machine-readable metadata fields within text or binary files as long as those fields can be easily viewed by the user. 3) No Modified Version of the Font Software may use the Reserved Font Name(s) unless explicit written permission is granted by the corresponding Copyright Holder. This restriction only applies to the primary font name as presented to the users. 4) The name(s) of the Copyright Holder(s) or the Author(s) of the Font Software shall not be used to promote, endorse or advertise any Modified Version, except to acknowledge the contribution(s) of the Copyright Holder(s) and the Author(s) or with their explicit written permission. 5) The Font Software, modified or unmodified, in part or in whole, must be distributed entirely under this license, and must not be distributed under any other license. The requirement for fonts to remain under this license does not apply to any document created using the Font Software. TERMINATION This license becomes null and void if any of the above conditions are not met. DISCLAIMER THE FONT SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT OF COPYRIGHT, PATENT, TRADEMARK, OR OTHER RIGHT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT HOLDER BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, INCLUDING ANY GENERAL, SPECIAL, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE THE FONT SOFTWARE OR FROM OTHER DEALINGS IN THE FONT SOFTWARE.
• License URL:http://scripts.sil.org/OFL

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