I formed to myself ideas of greater accuracy than had yet appeared, and had endeavoured to produce a Set of Types according to what I conceived to be their true proportion.It is not my desire to print many books, but such only as are books of Consequence, of intrinsic merit or established Reputation, and which the public may be pleased to see in an elegant dress, and to purchase at such a price as will repay the extraordinary care and expense that must necessarily be bestowed upon them. Having been an early admirer of the beauty of Letters, I became insensibly desirous of contributing to the perfection of them.
At a time when books in England were generally printed to a low standard, using typefaces of conservative design, Baskerville sought to offer books created to higher-quality methods of printing than any before, using carefully made, level presses, a high quality of ink and very smooth paper pressed after printing to a glazed, gleaming finish. Baskerville was a wealthy industrialist, who had started his career as a writing-master (teacher of calligraphy) and carver of gravestones, before making a fortune as a manufacturer of varnished lacquer goods. The design shows the smooth, gleaming finish of his paper and minimal title pages.īaskerville's typeface was part of an ambitious project to create books of the greatest possible quality. Baskerville's first publication, an edition of Virgil. History The Folio Bible printed by Baskerville in 1763. Marketed in the twentieth century as "Fry's Baskerville" or "Baskerville Old Face", a digitisation based on the more delicate larger sizes is included with some Microsoft software. The Fry Foundry of Bristol created a version, probably cut by their typefounder Isaac Moore. Īs Baskerville's typefaces were proprietary to him and sold to a French publisher after his death, some designs influenced by him were made by British punchcutters. Baskerville's typefaces remain very popular in book design and there are many modern revivals, which often add features such as bold type which did not exist in Baskerville's time. These changes created a greater consistency in size and form, influenced by the calligraphy Baskerville had learned and taught as a young man. The curved strokes are more circular in shape, and the characters became more regular. Ĭompared to earlier designs popular in Britain, Baskerville increased the contrast between thick and thin strokes, making the serifs sharper and more tapered, and shifted the axis of rounded letters to a more vertical position. Baskerville is classified as a transitional typeface, intended as a refinement of what are now called old-style typefaces of the period, especially those of his most eminent contemporary, William Caslon. Baskerville is a serif typeface designed in the 1750s by John Baskerville (1706–1775) in Birmingham, England, and cut into metal by punchcutter John Handy.
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