Lisbon

Lisbon is a geometric stencil typeface based on an original metal stencil that designer Anthony Burrill found in a sign makers shop in Lisbon, Portugal. The typeface was initially used in a series of posters commissioned by the British Council for Experimenta cultural biennale in Lisbon (2010).

“I wanted to use a local Portuguese saying which I could develop into a poster design. There were a number of suggestions, but her first was my favorite: ‘THINK ABOUT ALL YOU SAY – DO NOT SAY ALL YOU THINK ABOUT.’ I loved the phrase immediately, I liked the poetic way it turned round upon itself.

It also sounds quite official, like something you would see on a sign in a library.

When I got home, I had to decide how to make the work. The stencils were so beautiful I knew I had to use them. I tried to research the typeface, but found it hard to make any matches, so I decided it had to be specific to Lisbon, or at least to Portugal. I was hoping to use Adams as part of the project, but as I was using the Portuguese stencils there would be no need to use woodblock, so I used my alternative local printer – Steve, at Harvey Lloyd screens. I scanned in the stencil typeface and positioned the artwork in Photoshop. I made four designs in total, separating the phrase over two designs. and set it in English and Portuguese.” explains Anthony.

In collaboration with Anthony, Colophon developed missing lowercase letters and punctuation, alongside accented marks which referenced the original uppercase, attempting to keep the spirit of the original find and utilize the same strict geometric rules.

Lisbon is available in one style — Regular. It is available for licensing in both Standard (‘STD’) and Professional (‘PRO’) variants, the latter containing a range of additional OpenType features.