Now
This site is built on the Ghost platform using the Tuuli theme from Biron themes. I mostly inherit typographic choices from the theme, although I do make some changes uninformed by any very well-developed design knowledge.
However, I have certainly enjoyed swapping fonts in and out and I have become more interested in fonts and font choices – in a very non-initiate way – since moving to Ghost. Of course, I am not doing anything very elaborate with them, as I am staying within the reasonably simple blog structure.
The main font used here is NaN Holo from the NaN foundry, although I don't have all its features. I have the body text 'monospace' variable axis set to 30% which makes it very slightly serifed. I began using the static fonts, and then switched some of it to variable. I should spend some time switching it all. I was very lucky to receive this as a 'prize' when I supported the always interesting Pimp My Type on Patreon.
Some accents are in Euclid Mono Vanguard, from the labs at Swiss Type. I have replaced this for the moment with Nan Holo Mono(space).
Then
This blog began in 2004 on Typepad. It was eventually moved to an internal instance of WordPress at OCLC where I worked, and then to a hosted WordPress at Libchalk. It now has over 1900 entries together with associated material. With the heroic assistance of Brian Pichman of Libchalk, I moved it to Ghost in 2021. There are occasional glitches in older entries, and unfortunately we lost the comments.
When I first transitioned to this platform, I used the well-known and elegant Adelle through Adobe Fonts. It is created by TypeTogether.
Later I did quite a bit of experimenting with different options. I settled on Piazzolla available from its creator, Huerta Tipográfica, and from Google Fonts. I occasionally also used a combination of Rowan and Plein, available from Fontshare by the Indian Type Foundry (both designed by Inga Plönnigs). I loved how Piazzolla and Rowan both work so well for text, and then display a stronger personality in bigger sizes. Several other typefaces from Huerta Tipográfica have this characteristic and I really like how Messer by Plönnigs looks. Although Nan Holo has quite a different feel, I also like how well it performs in text and then distinctive features show more clearly at larger sizes.
I also experimented with Recursive the intriguing multi-dimensional variable font, and with the various styles of Plus Jakarta.
I have found I prefer using one font whose character changes in bigger (or smaller) sizes. It saves me from pairing anxiety, but it seems more aesthetically pleasing also. Of course, the approaches above display very different personalities: it is difficult settling for one!
