Type the vote! Hoefler&Co upgrades Joe Biden's campaign with two typefaces

Rooted at the intersection between design, typography and politics, HoeflerCo’s latest collaboration with Joe Biden aims to amplify the candidate’s messages of his 2020 presidential campaign with typographic excellency.

“When I was approached by Robyn Kanner, Senior Creative Advisor to the Biden for President, she shared with me one of the campaign’s most interesting communications challenges: its reliance on sophisticated and irreducible messages, which would need the clarifying effects of typography” writes founder of type foundry Hoefler&Co and renowned typeface designer Jonathan Hoefler of his latest collaboration with presidential candidate Joe Biden.

“Kanner described this in musical terms, talking about the ways in which rhythms and harmonic resolutions can shape the contours of a long lyric. For me, this resonated with the typography of America’s revolutionary period, and its vogue for capitalizing significant words: ‘Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness,’ as these unalienable rights are famously styled in The Declaration of Independence” he adds of the final product aka the campaign’s two new typefaces, Decimal and Mercury, which premiered in Vice President Biden’s address on the Fourth of July. 

Helping “articulate thoughtful messages with attentive typography” Biden’s words are “set in Decimal’s declarative small capitals, while the supporting syntax would rely on Mercury Text Grade Four.”

The sans serif Decimal, and the seriffed Mercury Text are not Hoefler & Co’s only fonts in use during USA’s elections. 

The acclaimed type foundry has provided in the past both the Gotham typeface -the typeface that made Obama's branding so iconic in 2008 and in 2012- and Ringside, a typeface used in the visual language of The Office of Barack and Michelle Obama. 

“Decimal finds its roots in wristwatches — it’s true as time. Mercury, with its roots in the written word. Put simply, our typography is bound by the truth” Robyn Kanner posted on Twitter.  

Folks, it’s time to introduce you to our new typefaces: Decimal & Mercury.

Decimal finds its roots in wristwatches — it’s true as time. Mercury, with its roots in the written word.

Put simply, our typography is bound by the truth. https://t.co/1E406o2SYG

— Robyn Kanner (@robynkanner) July 4, 2020

May the best typeface win.