who is Adrian Frutiger?

So... do to some confusion on my half, this is a little late.  But hey — better late than never, right?

Adrian Frutiger

     Adrian Frutiger is a well-known typeface designer born in Switzerland in 1928.  He was a prolific type designer with many typefaces to his name including: Frutiger, Univers, President, Apollo, Serifa, Avenir, OCR-B, Glyfia and Vectora.  At the age of 16 he started working as a printer’s apprentice.  From there he moved to Zurich and studied at the Zurich School of Arts and Crafts.

     In 1952 Frutiger began his working career at Deberny and Peignot in Paris after being persuaded by type-founder Charles Peignot.  Frutiger was always interested in embracing new technology and applying it during his design process.  Besides solely designing original fonts, he would also interpret other type including Didot and Courier.  He has also produced numerous books on type, font and design.  He is still alive and has been working on revising his typefaces with Linotype.

Grid from Graphic Design Referenced.

     One of his most famous typefaces, Univers, was the first family to use numbers as a naming system for its various weights (21 variations when first released).  The system was built around its Roman version — Univers 55.  In 1997 Frutiger reworked and expanded the typeface in conjunction with Linotype to include 63 fonts.  The numbering system is placed in a grid organized from thin to extra black in columns and from extended to condensed in rows.  Odd numbers are italic and even numbers are roman.

The Types of Adrian Frutiger:

President (1952)

Phoebus (1953)

Ondine (1954)

Méridien (1955)

Egyptienne (1956)

Univers (1956)

Apollo (1962)

Serifa (1967)

OCR-B (1968)

Iridium (1975)

Frutiger (1975)

Glypha (1979)

Icone (1980)

Breughel (1982)

Versailles (1982)

Avenir (1988)

Vectora (1990)

List of types found Here