Signal
Specimen
Signal In Use
Since the French Percent-for-art program has been extended to the Ministry of Transport in 1980, the country saw more and more rest areas along its highways embellished with public art sculptures. Some are truly exquisite, others less so – beauty is in the eye of the beholder. What most of them have in common is the colossal size. Astoundingly, this quality didn’t save them from being overlooked by general public and art historians. There was no comprehensive register or database covering France’s “Highway Art” until graphic designer Julien Lelièvre took the initiative. From 2009 to 2015 he travelled thousands of kilometers, photographing and documenting 71 of these pieces of art. In 2019 Lelièvre’s research was translated into the richly illustrated book Art d’autoroute, designed by Building Paris. It was the first title of their new publishing branch Building Books, dedicated to landscape, urbanism, and architecture. For the typography of the book, Lelièvre teamed up with Emmanuel Besse who, in 2018, had released Signal Compressed in Production Type’s LAB section. Besse’s Signal Compressed draws its inspiration from the lettering painted on streets to inform drivers. In this book, the typeface is used in small quantities but prominent spots. The second typeface used, Signal, was actually developed around this publication. It has its roots in Caractères, the lettering style for French road signage, legally defined since 1948. The designers complemented it with lowercase letters and carried it to a fully functional typeface suitable for setting reading text. Emmanuel Besse and Production Type meanwhile developed Signal into an extensive family.
Signal Regular + Signal Compressed Regular
Art d’autoroute by Julien Lelièvre (Building Books)A visual research on what the life of long-haul truckers looks like, what they talk about and what they look at – a student project by Arzamas’ designer Masha Kasatkina. The book consists of four parts: “Trucks, From Outside and Within”, “Road, and on the Road”, “Brotherhood”, “Echo in the Culture”. Signal, based on a typeface from French road signs, reminds of the constant moving, while Archaism resembles wild typography of print ads and naïve design of the roadside restaurants. The serif typeface used for body text is Newton. Shelley Script Cyrillic is used for decoration, drop caps and selected elements. Read the entire article on our website.
Signal Bold
Long-Haul Truck Drivers
Information
Design
Release Date
2019-06-11Team
Version
1.004About this font
Until now, Caractères had existed only in its standardized form: four incomplete styles named L1, L2, L4 (an italic variant with both upper- and lowercase characters), and L5. The bootleg digital versions available were similarly incomplete and poorly executed.
Specifically developed with urban signage, interfaces, and exhibition design in mind, Production Type’s new Signal series completes and extends the pre-existing set of styles. The palette is an extrapolation of previously unexisting roman lowercases in four weights and their matching italics, a complete set of accents for multilingual typesetting, numerous arrows and pictograms, and characters for mathematical typesetting. An extra Compressed style, skewed and excessive, wittily rounds out the family. As a new ensemble, Signal boosts Caractères’ potential, making it particularly well-suited for interface design.
An epitome of late-modernist thinking, Signal’s aesthetic is inextricably bound up with administrative design. The letters conform to the rigor that suffused most sans serifs of the second half of the twentieth century. Signal has a bespoke appearance and a distinctive typographic color (see especially the unconventional spacing of the italic cuts). Production Type has a long-standing relationship with signage typefaces, making them a focus of research from as early as 2003. This new Signal, revisited and harmonized, continues our reflexion and opens up new possibilities for dialogue.
Formats
Static (OTF, TTF, WOFF, WOFF2)Language support
Abaza, Acheron, Achinese, Acholi, Adyghe, Afar, Afrikaans, Aghul, Alekano, Aleut, Amahuaca, Amarakaeri, Amis, Anaang, Andaandi, Dongolawi, Andi, Anuta, Ao Naga, Aragonese, Arbëreshë Albanian, Arvanitika Albanian, Asháninka, Ashéninka Perené, Asu (Tanzania), Atayal, Avaric, Balinese, Bari, Bashkir, Basque, Batak Dairi, Batak Karo, Batak Mandailing, Batak Simalungun, Batak Toba, Belarusian, Bemba (Zambia), Bena (Tanzania), Bikol, Bislama, Borana-Arsi-Guji Oromo, Bosnian, Breton, Budukh, Buginese, Candoshi-Shapra, Caquinte, Cashibo-Cacataibo, Catalan, Cebuano, Central Aymara, Central Kurdish, Chamalal, Chamorro, Chavacano, Chechen, Chiga, Chiltepec Chinantec, Chinese Buriat, Chokwe, Chuukese, Chuvash, Cimbrian, Cofán, Congo Swahili, Cook Islands Māori, Cornish, Corsican, Creek, Crimean Tatar, Crimean Tatar, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dargwa, Dehu, Dungan, Dutch, Eastern Arrernte, Eastern Oromo, Embu, English, Erzya, Ese Ejja, Faroese, Fijian, Filipino, Finnish, French, Friulian, Galician, Ganda, Ga’anda, German, Gheg Albanian, Gilbertese, Gooniyandi, Gourmanchéma, Guadeloupean Creole French, Gusii, Haitian, Halh Mongolian, Hani, Hiligaynon, Ho-Chunk, Hopi, Huastec, Hungarian, Icelandic, Iloko, Inari Sami, Indonesian, Ingush, Irish, Istro Romanian, Italian, Ixcatlán Mazatec, Jamaican Creole English, Japanese, Javanese, Jola-Fonyi, Judeo-Tat, K'iche', Kabardian, Kabuverdianu, Kala Lagaw Ya, Kalaallisut, Kalenjin, Kalmyk, Kamba (Kenya), Kaonde, Karachay-Balkar, Karelian, Kashubian, Kazakh, Kekchí, Kenzi, Mattokki, Khasi, Kikuyu, Kimbundu, Kinyarwanda, Kirghiz, Kituba (DRC), Komi-Permyak, Komi-Zyrian, Kongo, Konzo, Kuanyama, Kumyk, Kven Finnish, Kölsch, Ladin, Ladino, Lak, Latgalian, Lezghian, Ligurian, Lithuanian, Lombard, Low German, Lower Sorbian, Luba-Lulua, Lule Sami, Luo (Kenya and Tanzania), Luxembourgish, Macedo-Romanian, Macedonian, Makhuwa, Makhuwa-Meetto, Makonde, Makwe, Malagasy, Malaysian, Maltese, Mandinka, Manx, Maore Comorian, Maori, Mapudungun, Matsés, Mauritian Creole, Meriam Mir, Meru, Minangkabau, Mirandese, Mohawk, Moksha, Mongolian Buriat, Montenegrin, Munsee, Murrinh-Patha, Muslim Tat, Mwani, Mískito, Naga Pidgin, Ndonga, Neapolitan, Ngazidja Comorian, Niuean, Nobiin, Nogai, Nomatsiguenga, North Ndebele, Northern Kurdish, Northern Qiandong Miao, Northern Sami, Northern Uzbek, Norwegian, Nyanja, Nyankole, Occitan, Orma, Oroqen, Palauan, Paluan, Pampanga, Papiamento, Pedi, Picard, Pichis Ashéninka, Piemontese, Pijin, Pintupi-Luritja, Pohnpeian, Polish, Portuguese, Potawatomi, Quechua, Romanian, Romansh, Rotokas, Rundi, Russian, Russian Buriat, Rusyn, Rutul, Rwa, Samburu, Samoan, Sango, Sangu (Tanzania), Saramaccan, Sardinian, Scottish Gaelic, Sena, Seri, Seselwa Creole French, Shambala, Shawnee, Shipibo-Conibo, Shona, Sicilian, Silesian, Slovak, Slovenian, Soga, Somali, Soninke, South Ndebele, Southern Aymara, Southern Qiandong Miao, Southern Sami, Southern Sotho, Spanish, Sranan Tongo, Standard Estonian, Standard Latvian, Standard Malay, Sundanese, Swahili, Swati, Swedish, Swiss German, Tabassaran, Tagalog, Tahitian, Taita, Tajik, Tatar, Tedim Chin, Tetum, Tetun Dili, Tiv, Tok Pisin, Tokelau, Tonga (Tonga Islands), Tosk Albanian, Tsakhur, Tsonga, Tswana, Tumbuka, Turkish, Turkmen, Tuvinian, Tzeltal, Tzotzil, Uab Meto, Udi, Ukrainian, Ume Sami, Upper Guinea Crioulo, Upper Sorbian, Venetian, Veps, Võro, Walloon, Walser, Wangaaybuwan-Ngiyambaa, Waray (Philippines), Warlpiri, Wayuu, Welsh, West Central Oromo, Western Abnaki, Western Frisian, Wik-Mungkan, Wiradjuri, Wolof, Xhosa, Yanesha', Yao, Yapese, Yindjibarndi, Yucateco, Zulu, Záparo
About the designers
Emmanuel Besse
Designer
Emmanuel Besse is an art director and a type designer with a focus to open-ended and inclusive approach to communication.
Glyphs
OpenType Features
Case-Sensitive Forms
[CASE-SENSITIVE] !¡?¿-–—()[]{}‹›«»·
offStandard Ligatures
fichier flicker affliger
offSlashed Zero
0123456789
offProportional Figures
H0123456789
offTabular Figures
H0123456789
offSuperscript
H012345679
offScientific Inferiors
H012345679
offNumerators
H012345679
offDenominators
H012345679
offFractions
1/4 1/2 3/4
offOrdinals
2a 2o No.
offOrnaments
+ − ± × ÷ = < >
offStylistic Set 1
012345678910
offStylistic Set 2
012345678910
offStylistic Set 3
<>+−×÷=±
offStylistic Set 4
abcdef
offStylistic Set 5
ДЛЖКвгджзийклптцчшщъью
offStylistic Set 6
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offPair well with Signal
Signal Bold Kessler Text RegularNew generations of traffic signs are based on electronic displays.
There are install more than 4,000 signs in one stretch between Los Angeles and Kansas City alone
Signal Light Sainte Colombe BoldNew generations of traffic signs are based on electronic displays.
There are install more than 4,000 signs in one stretch between Los Angeles and Kansas City alone
Signal Regular Tesseract ItalicNew generations of traffic signs are based on electronic displays.
There are install more than 4,000 signs in one stretch between Los Angeles and Kansas City alone