One of the things I love about Nick Shinn’s Scotch Modern is its ability to capture the best characteristics of the great old moderns, and yet keep a crisp feel. You may then wonder why I choose to pair it with an obscure ’90s digitization of Kabel, Garrett Boge’s Koch. I think what I see in each, and the pair together is a real, substantive attempt to get at the beauty underlying the many years of wear put on by the passage of time.
Scotch Modern comes in three optical sizes: the robust and generously fit Micro for classifieds, captions, etc., above left; its normal cut for text, center; and the finer Display, right. Choosing to limit myself this week to a sans without a range of weights was a welcome change. Koch’s medium weight with tall ascenders and caps isn’t very versatile, so you have to plan around it.
If I could name a couple of the more updated sanses in this vein, I’d include Sindre Bremnes’s Telefon and Nick Shinn’s Figgins Sans, initially released with Scotch Modern as part of The Modern Suite. Great Pairs continues here Wednesday.
