Poetica font was designed by Robert Slimbach in 1992 with particularly generous characters. The typeface family consists of 21 weights to allow for an unusual variety of design possibilities within one typeface family. Numerous swash letters, ornaments and ligatures remind one of the early Renaissance and its unforgettable masters, for example, Giambattista Palatino, who later gave his name to Hermann Zapf's creation. Slimbach used the Lettera Cancellaresca as a model for his typeface, the cultivated humanistic italic which later served as a point of departure for the development of italics of the Renaissance and thereafter. Lettera Cancellaresca is very legible, extremely harmonic and impressively beautiful.
The early forms display two different compositional tendencies, namely the static of the simple vertical capitals and the italic dynamic of the slanted lower case alphabet, as shown in the weight Chancery 4. The capitals later conform to the slant of the lower case, as shown in the weights Chancery 1-3. Poetica font should be set according to the included suggestion in order to see the full benefit of its grace and beauty.
