Agipo
— Designed by Radim Peško

Agipo belongs to a genre of typefaces that I’d categorize as “familiar with a twist.” If it’s set one particular way, Agipo can feel like a cousin of Franklin Gothic—a workmanlike, slightly rigid grotesque with a vertical stress. But Agipo’s more expressive sensibilities make themselves known rather quickly, and by the time you see the tongue-depressor-esque serif on the “G” it becomes clear that you’ve stumbled upon something more than a homage to the more orderly half of the grotesque canon.

Agipo follows a growing trend I’ve seen from type designers, which involves taking a familiar genre, picking a handful of characters, and making those characters blindingly distinct. Designers are drawn to this approach like moths to the flame. It allows them to assume how they can use a typeface very comfortably—due it its familiar heritage—while giving them something special to show off. “This ain’t your mother’s Helvetica!” shouts the designer who proudly uses Favorit in their portfolio, and so it is with Agipo and its relationship to Franklin Gothic.

Agipo brings more to the table than its unique handful of characters, however. It’s an odd mix of grotesque and geometric sensibilities. The 90° terminals play nicely with the emphasis the typeface has on straight lines but clash against the flared strokes you’ll find on the “G,” “r,” and “a.” This tension has the overall effect of making the typeface feel much less workman-like than its historic counterparts while still being simple enough to plug and play in a design (barring you aren’t expecting to use the italics. Hoo-boy, the italics.) It’s ample x-height and short descenders allow designers to densely pack the composition with the typeface and let it soak up ink and attention.

On the other hand, if you use the condensed width and toss a little meat on Agipo’s bones, the Franklin comes out. Above, you can see Franklin Gothic alongside Topol, another modern design that feels familial to both typefaces, and finally Agipo. Franklin is more compressed than many grotesques, and has high contrast for something that’s also utilitarian. The elements that make Agipo feel so familiar to Franklin are pieces like the thick vertical strokes and the “c” and “e,” which seem to be squished inside an invisible oval. The “y” also jumps out—the gentle curl off the baseline is an old grotesque stylization that has been snuffed out in many designs, and Agipo remixes that detail by scooping out part of the tail and making the tail and the “v” shape it clings to feel spliced together. Toss in the similarity in the construction of the “f” and the top-hatted “t” and you’ve got plenty of evidence for the relationship between the two typefaces.

These design touches are one of the many things that make Agipo unique in-use—the end effect is something that feels form-based and makes the typeface a vehicle for graphic expression in addition to a means for representing language. By sliding these odd details into a framework that’s familiar, we can more easily accept these oddities as part of the framework of the typeface, and not as distractions that pull the design too far into the arena of abstraction, as we might interpret a heavily-stylized or “othered” genres like reverse-sans or Blackletter.

We will dig into this a little more in the in-use section, but I want to address what I think is one of the core factors in Agipo’s popularity amongst Brutalist/punk/otherwise-aggressive-and-expressive genres of design—its 90° terminals. Why is this detail significant? Because in these design subcultures, typefaces themselves are just a starting point, an ingredient in the wash of elements on the page, and are not treated as sacred. Designers are not nearly as precious about avoiding distorting or modifying typefaces in service of a composition or aesthetic, and Agipo’s commitment to 90° angles allows it to withstand a great deal more abuse than most typefaces.

This family is a bit more complicated to discuss than many because of the wide variance between the styles, which were developed over the course of a few years, and feel a bit pastiche as a collection. Some details carry through: the forward pitch of the “g’s” ear, the shoulder on the “n” which feels like it’s being tugged up and to the right, and the subtle flare-out above the crossbar of the “t”. I would say that these weights feel more self-referential to the “core” weights of Agipo, rather than pulling from the outside influences that the meatier weights derive from. As Agipo gets thinner, the design strains against its flat terminals to a more serious degree. The perpendicular angles feel overly rigid against the frail line-work, and as a result I’m not sure these extensions to the family are as successful as the beefier siblings.

When you compare the metallic colorways against uses that rely on neon colors, you can see the difference in Agipo’s presence. Elizabeth Goodspeed used Agipo in an issue of No Man’s Land^[17], and my favorite spread has it laid on top of a bright orange flood. The inline images and playful illustrations jive with Agipo’s quirkiness really well, but the typeface almost feels like it’s clashing against the paper. Reversed out of softer colors, Agipo feels integrated into the surface, but laid against bright tones it vibrates and creates a really interesting tension.

The typeface’s clean lines have also enticed designers to do horrifying things to it, like stretching, skewing, and *gasp* outlining^[18]. Agipo actually handles these deformations quite well, and it’s still relatively easy to identify even in its mutated state due to the unique details like the “G” and the prominently flagged “1.” Not all grotesques can handle being outlined as well as Agipo does, but its no-fuss capitals and their clean lines allow for outlining with low risk of awkward interactions where its thinner strokes could get swallowed up, or the curves ballooning and becoming clumsy if you outset the stroke. It’s the combination of the typeface’s meaty but not bulky construction, perpendicular terminals and idiosyncratic details that make this a great prospect for distortion.

I don’t have facts to back this up, but I have to think Agipo gets stretched and deformed more than any other typeface as a total percentage of its in-use. Designer Clayton Ciolac uses Agipo often in his work for the party collective Brighter Days, and he’s almost always skewing it (or using the italics, which feel as forced as the vice-gripe he’s imposing on the condensed weight). In one poster series^[20], he uses it along with another skewed, lower contrast sans. This emphasizes the stroke variations in Agipo and give it a messier appearance while remaining controlled and legible.

Agipo shines chaotic compositions for the same reasons as it holds its own in transformations. Its geometry and slightly odd design details made it a great pairing for the bright colors and trapezoidal shapes in the branding work Collins executed for the 2017 PopTech conference^[22]. A typeface with more contrast in its line-work would likely feel messy here, or it would feel imposed or separated from the shattered appearance of the colors. Agipo’s sharp lines and joints let it feel right at home in the fractures without getting swallowed up by all the colors competing for your eye.

Agipo lives in the space between messy and sharp, and that encourages play and rule-breaking—which is why I think it’s become so popular with the current explosion of punk-adjacent design. Weird or unique details in typefaces encourage designers to experiment with those details. In a way I think it might help them understand what it is that draws them to those special characteristics. I would suspect if you asked a designer why they used Franklin Gothic in a design, followed by why they chose Agipo in another, you’d get a more specific answer about Agipo. For instance, it is difficult to overstate the drama the flag in Agipo’s “1” brings to a design—how could you blame someone for seeking out an opportunity to use it?

This mindset can be dangerous to both designer and typeface—if the only reason you are choosing a typeface is one glyph, it’s certain that others have had the same thought and will use it in the same way. It’s smart marketing for the typeface designer and provides an invitation for play to the designer, but can lead to monotony in the legacy of the typeface and can fail to teach the designer to push for their own point of view in how to use it.

Agipo’s bolder weights are its most popular, perhaps because the lighter weights lose the contrast that gives the typeface many of its unique characteristics. Several of the details that make the family special are diluted in these weights, and it relies even more on its handful of unique characters to have an impact. Daniel Seemayer makes good use of Agipo’s “hero characters” like the “G” in his King Britt vinyl concept^[25], and the lack of contrast in the Regular weight serves the repeated, abutted phrases well. There’s enough tension in the dramatic angles of the “G,” “R.” “B,” and “K” to spice up each edge without needing the heft or contrast of the bold weight.

My favorite use of Agipo’s lighter weights has to be the identity for Genet Gernay^[26], an architecture firm. Designer Jérémy Glâtre smartly uses the “square” alternate for the second “G,” which gives it a lower spur and creates a subtle contrast between the two names. The spindly letterforms and blend of triangles and ovals feel like scaffolding, and the flaring of the letters gives just a little bit of warmth to the simple execution.

Quirks & Eccentricities

I’m going to start with the italics. The italics are… aggressive. The slant is extreme—a trend seen in other recent releases like Ostia Antica. The letterforms are sheared forward to the point of discomfort, and the bowls pitch downward (look at the “R” in “FIRE” in the example below^[35]) and create an inconsistent linear trajectory along the cap line. It dramatically reduces the types of situations you can use the italics without them feeling like a parody. Out of the box, they feel right in line with the punk-ish distortions designers often put the Romans through, but one might have wanted something a little less specific as a default.

There are tiny details in the way Agipo is drawn that cause some concern. There’s subtle flaring on some of the rigid terminals, and bits of rounding or filling in joints that muddy the otherwise crisp design. These details soften the letterforms, but they will prevent you from using the letterforms at monumental scale. There is such a thing as setting Agipo too large^[28]. I also have to point out the crotch of the “M,” which dips below the baseline for reasons I don’t understand and can muddy up crisp all-caps typesetting.

You’ll see less of the Light, Extended, and Mono in use, and I think it’s because without the heft of the bolder weights, the line-work doesn’t always hold up (they feels a bit unsure of themselves, don’t they?^[27]), which I’d attribute to all those little bits of flaring and “just off” curves in the design (take a look at the mono “e” as an example—the curve isn’t symmetrical across the vertical axis^[32]). Many of the details like the scooped “y” diminish or vanish, so unless you are seeing one of the tell-tale glyphs like the “G,” you’re likely to have a difficult time identifying it or finding a strong reason to use it.

Agipo is an interesting example of a combination of design decisions and historic ties that resulted in an easy to learn yet wholly unique typeface that’s found a welcoming home amongst large swaths of the design community. It’s both tolerant of expressive disfiguring and, in the right weights, capable of calm confidence with little supportive fanfare.

In general, I’d argue that typefaces that become notable due to a few distinct glyphs ultimately have a shorter shelf life—everyone is playing the same 3 songs, rather than enjoying the entire album. But with Agipo I’m less certain this is the case, because foundational formal details like the flat terminals give it a set of capabilities that are useful regardless of the character of the typeface. I do think that some of the overworked and inconsistent details in the way it is drawn prevent it from reaching the heights it could, but there’s still a lot to enjoy here. Writing about typefaces like Agipo, which are so closely associated with certain techniques, is always a great learning experience for me. I hope the review provides some context and ideas for new avenues to explore for future designers (of typefaces and of everything else).