Design Nomenclature / Type
Bowl
- Type
- 2D
This entry has not been translated yet and is shown in English.
The curved stroke that encloses a counter — the round of b, p, D and the upper and lower rounds of a double-storey g. In faces with inclined stress the bowl's thin points fall off-axis; in didones they sit dead level with the baseline, which is a fast way to read a face's period.
Not to be confused with
- CounterThe negative space a stroke encloses or partly encloses — fully closed in o, d and the eye of e, open in n, u and c. Counter size drives apparent weight and small-size performance: as weight increases, counters are the first thing to fill in, and a face survives bolding only as far as they hold.
- ShoulderThe curved stroke that springs from a stem and comes back down without closing — the arches of h, m, n and the underside of u inverted. Where the shoulder joins the stem is one of the darkest joins in a face, which is why it is a standard site for ink traps in faces cut for coarse printing.