Franko Luin, Odense's designer, on this typeface: "With Odense I entered the field where Optima reigns in royal majesty. The first question I received was, in fact, why I designed another Optima. Look closely: Odense has as much in common with Optima as Garamond with Baskerville. Am I right? Odense Neon is a special variant that can be used for logos or single words. I had the idea for it when I noticed that the neon tubes in a sign over a store only partially followed the characters. The name comes from the Danish town Odense, the town of the famous storyteller Hans Christian Andersen, author of, e.g., 'The Little Mermaid.' Odense is also the place where the first book in the Nordic countries was printed, the 'Breviarium Ottoniense', in 1482."