Typekit Adds Hamilton Wood Type Collection

Erica Gamet

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Typekit—the font subscription service that is a part of Adobe’s Creative Cloud—recently added the entire Hamilton Wood Type Foundry collection of typefaces to its library. The Typekit library is constantly growing and this latest addition brings the artistry and craftsmanship of Hamilton into its ranks. The Hamilton collection consists of 37 typefaces, raising the total number in the Typekit library to nearly one-thousand.

The Hamilton Wood Type Foundry (HWT) is known for traditional wood type, and most of their library consists of digital re-creations of their traditional counterparts. P22 type foundry has been working with HWT to bring those classic typefaces into the digital age. In addition, HWT features two recently-created original typefaces: HWT Artz and HWT Van Lanen.

All of the Hamilton typefaces in Typekit can be used in your desktop projects, and most can be used as a part of your web creations. You’ll need a subscription above the free level—which Creative Cloud users already have—to gain access to the Hamilton collection. A good majority of the faces are for display and many just shout, “Americana,” especially the 8 font, layered HWT American Chromatic family. Using the individual fonts in a layered fashion gives you the flexibility of adding color to the individual components and mixing and matching for a variety of looks. I am partial to the HWT Catchwords and HWT American Outline, as they just have that old-fashioned vibe to them. But the collection isn’t stuck in the distant past, as Erik Spiekermann’s HWT Artz, HWT Gothic Round, and the groovy HWT Bulletin Script Two demonstrate.

Not only are these additions a win for users of Typekit, but also for the Hamilton Wood Type & Printing Museum. A portion of the proceeds from the digital version of the HWT typefaces goes to support the museum and its ongoing preservation of the history of the art and craft of wood type.