How To Use Monogram Fonts In Silhouette

The best monogram fonts of 2020

The best monogram fonts feature in some stunning monograms. From Full general Electrical to Yves Saint Laurent and NASA's iconic worm, in that location are enough of intelligently fatigued monogram logos around, often with an iconic and memorable typeface.

When you inquire graphic designers which font they'd apply to create a monogram logo, the practiced ones will tell you that, "Y'all've got to draw those bad boys". Nevertheless, designers rarely depict monograms from scratch, and while an identity project is getting off the basis and the artistic approach is being finalised with the client, designers will be playing around with a variety of dissimilar concepts. Off-the-shelf fonts are mighty handy in the initial design stage, and sometimes end up beingness used with very few tweaks even in what may look like highly crafted monogram logos (see our favourite monogram logos ever in our roundup).

By chatting with a range of designers and looking for lovely monogram logos out in the wild, we've put together a list of unique, interesting and even outrageous fonts that could provide inspiration for your next monogram venture. And if you lot're afterwards more font inspiration, don't miss our list of the all-time free fonts available, the best italic fonts or our favourite handwriting fonts.

01. Fidelio

best monogram fonts — Fidelio: Alterative characters with extravagant swashes make Fidelio a playground for the logo designer (Image credit: Bauer Types)

Toll: From £31.99
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Drawn by the French graphic designer and typographer José Mendoza y Almieda in 1980, Fidelio was named later Beethoven's but opera. Despite this Germanic influence, it's a chancery script with a Romanesque look and feel. Its loops and flourishes are attractive, but not overdone, and pulling the initials of a brand name together in diverse ways will result in some fascinating permutations equally the extensions of the letters interact. The beauty brand Armand Dupree uses Fidelio almost unchanged in its monogram logo.

02. Baskerville

Price: From £35
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Designed in the 1750s, Baskerville is a classic typeface that you probably already have in your armory – it's part of the Adobe Fonts collection later all. Inspired by Didot and Bodoni, it'south the contrast between the thick and thin strokes that you will play with when using Baskerville as the basis for a monogram logo. Plow upwardly that contrast until the thin strokes have disappeared and with a touch of artistic magic you'll create a monogram that is an abstract form while remaining readable every bit lettering to the viewer. The V&A and Roger Federer logos are examples where a Baskerville-style font was the outset of something special.

03. Caslon Graphique

Price: From £23.20
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Caslon is another classic English typeface that is hard to trounce. The original font family was developed by Caslon in the 1720s, and Caslon Graphique takes those bones proportions and pumps up the dissimilarity. As with Baskerville, the coaction between the lite and heavy strokes is what makes Caslon Graphique a joy to piece of work with in logo development.

04. Bellissima Script

Cost: From $79
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In days of yore, monograms were formed from the initials of important people and sewn into their habiliment in lavish calligraphic lettering. Bellissima Script gives yous all the delicious swoops and swashes you could ever need when designing a monogram logo with an elegant, sophisticated Baroque feel. Non only does Bellissima Script ooze with class, it'southward an honour-winning typeface by Alejandro Paul, which helped his foundry Sudtipos make its name in the early 2000s.

05. American Typewriter

Price: From £35
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Although inspired by typewriter fonts, American Typewriter was never really used in the machines and now enjoys life in the digital realm as a MacOS and iOS system font. As such, it is likely to exist right under your nose, ready to be deployed in your monogram logo designs. The lightest versions of this typeface, with its soft curves and delicate slab serifs, are crying out to be continued with cleverly fatigued swashes. Well linked, 2- and iii-letter of the alphabet monograms in this typeface work well equally white out of a colour in a roundel.

06. Maelstrom Sans

Cost: From $fifty
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Ever since the late '90s, New Zealander Kris Sowersby has been absolutely killing it typographically via his Klim Type Foundry. Maelstrom and Maelstrom Sans are typefaces that radically reverse typographic norms when it comes to contrast. Where a typeface similar Didot would have a thin stroke, Maelstrom goes thick… and then some. It's non the only typeface to practice this – also see the Negative variation of Typotheque's Karloff – but it is perhaps the most farthermost. Playing with Maelstrom volition result in a monogram logo the likes of which the earth has never seen, so why not requite it a shot?

07. History

Price: From $eighty
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Experimentation with letters and finding new means to connect them is at the eye of designing an appealing monogram logo, and History from Peter Bil'ak'due south Netherlands foundry Typotheque is a typeface that offers plenty to experiment with. The standard Roman letter forms are there, and you can build on them in layers, adding serifs, swashes, outlines, patterns and more. In that location's aplenty telescopic with this font to create numerous utterly unique monogram logos, and History has been applied in fascinating ways already in the world of identity design.

08. Bisect

Price: From £45
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Like History, Bisect is a type arrangement that uses layers to interesting result. Nonetheless, where History celebrates the by, Bisect effuses about the future. These geometric, monospaced fonts build each letter from bones forms, plumbing equipment them into squares on a grid. Different fonts within the typeface are designed to piece of work in layers and using them in that style could result in a monogram logo with two slices of hereafter and i slice of retro in its expect and feel.

Also read: The best monospaced fonts

09. Founders Grotesk

Price: From $50
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A modern geometric typeface may not seem like your go-to when thinking almost a monogram logo, but if the customer yous're branding is a modern organisation then why not use one and instead of just thinking exterior the box, cut the box upwardly completely? The great affair well-nigh geometric typefaces where the 'O' forms a perfect circle is that often the letters tin can be quartered and used to create new typographic structures – and that'south where possibilities come to the fore in terms of monogram logo design. Founders Grotesk is a great case, but you could besides try Avant Garde, DIN, Futura and many others.

x. Digestive

Price: From $129
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Co-ordinate to its designers, Digestive is the offspring of Art Nouveau and Gothic architecture influences. However, looking at type set in this face you lot'd be forgiven for thinking that it is actually a clever endeavor to form letters from the digestive tract of a higher mammal. Never run from a font like this: unusual and fifty-fifty quite ugly typefaces can result in the most interesting and experimental monogram logos and they should never be written off. Digestive is a heed bough – utilize it and look for others like it.

eleven. Vance Serif

Price: From €49
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Much like Fidelio, the font we started off with, Vance Serif has a Romanesque wait to it and wonderful swashes that lend themselves so well to monogram logo pattern. Indeed, information technology was inspired by Roman compages and like any swell classical typeface has a very solid underlying construction to it. Originally designed for the architecture house Clayton Vance every bit a bespoke typeface by Kevin Cantrell and Andrei Robu, it'due south now available for your logo design pleasure.

Read more:

How to add fonts in Photoshop
The all-time multilingual fonts
A complete guide to font licensing for designers

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Garrick Webster is a freelance copywriter and branding specialist. He'due south worked with major renewable energy companies such every bit Ecotricity and the Greenish Britain Grouping, and has helped develop laurels-winning branding and packaging for several distilleries in the UK, the U.s.a. and Australia. He's a former editor of Computer Arts magazine and has been writing about design, inventiveness and technology since 1995.