This month’s single new casting is rather modest, but here for your printing pleasure is Border No. U-25 in 12 point. It’s a classic Byzantine design and the last (for now) of our production from that fabulous trove of old foundry matrices from India.
We’re still pushing hard to get more of our numerous soldouts back into stock. In April that was accomplished with Della Robbia in 24 point (despite an undetected mold micro-failure that necessitated hand-dressing the foot of all 540 lbs of type in this casting). Also back on the shelf are Border No. U-15, and—brace yourself— Freak!
This is one of the coolest antique faces ever, originating in 1889 with the Great Western Type Foundry. That firm evolved into Barnhart Bros. & Spindler, which renamed the face Bamboo and continued to offer it well into the 20th century. The face was ditched when American Type Founders absorbed BB&S, but it was revived in the 1960s by our patron saint Chas. Broad, whose matrices we are fortunate to have in the Skyline vault. Our first casting of 50 fonts in 2012 sold briskly. A second casting ended in disaster when one of the matrices failed, and this shot the project down, since there was no source to have a new one made. That changed recently when Swamp Press (bless ’em) came to the rescue and cut a replacement for us, and another 100 fonts were successfully cast. So get one while they’re hot, and let your Freak font fly!