

Blackletter 101: A Primerįirst off, let’s get our vocabulary straight.

And that’s what you’re reading right now. As a result, I decided to compile all of those posts into this single big one. Upon revisiting those posts, I realized the content was lacking in regards to what I’m now able to offer instructionally. I’ve also published a series of workbooks dedicated to learning each style of the four styles of blackletter. Since then, I’ve written many posts on blackletter technique. Years back, I posted a series of posts that dove into learning Blackletter (specifically in Textura and Fraktur styles). But believe it or not, it’s incredibly popular and its rich history predates scripts like Copperplate or Spencerian by centuries. You might not think of this classic script style when you think of calligraphy or hand-lettering. No matter what style I would pursue, I would always find myself coming back to the “gothic” school of letterforms. It was actually blackletter script that got me into hand-lettering years back. All rights reserved.Learning Blackletter Alphabets (Free Downloadable Guides) Data © of The Monotype Corporation plc/Type Solutions Inc. Typeface © of The Monotype Corporation plc. It looks remarkably like the famous Cloister Black designed by Morris Fuller Benton in 1904. Little is known about the history of Old English Text, provided here by Monotype Typography, but it has been beautifully made. The Frakturs have an x that looks like an r with a mysterious disease, and the Blackletters have fiddly bits in the middle like those you see in this Old English Text. There are two main kinds of what people tend to call Gothic letters: the German Frakturs and the English Blackletter.
