During this Design Cuts Live session, we'll be chatting with Roch from ROHH foundry, an independent web design and type design studio based in Krakow, Poland. ROHH's priority is to deliver complete, professional and multi-language typefaces in diverse styles, both for print and digital use, with two of our personal favourites being Montreux Grotesk and Lütschine.

For typography lovers, this session is not one to miss! Roch will be demoing his latest Montreux fonts - Montreux Classic Lite - Modern Swiss Grotesk, Montreux Grotesk Lite – Modern Sans Serif, and Montreux Informal Lite – Playful Sans Serif - in a session about using fonts in brand design.

Light Font Families

Montreux Grotesk Lite is a light family font type that consists of 142 fonts. There are three families collectively, i.e. Montreux Grotesk, Montreux Classic Lite and Montreux Informal Lite. 

As you notice, all three share the same proportions but have different letter details. All these families have four essential styles - Light, Regular, Italic and Bold. They also share the same amount of glyphs and cover Latin extended language support. They’re completely functional and versatile families. 

Montreux Grotesk

Montreux Grotesk is the most modern, technical and sharp font amongst the others. As shown in the image below, you may notice that the M is playful and has a veterinary proportion of being more geometric than traditional grotesque fonts. The rounded forums are wider and it has details. For example, the endings of the letter are wider and modern. 

Montreux Classic

Montreux Classic pays homage to the classic, in general, like Helvetica. It has a blocky characteristic to it. The ‘T’ and other letters are narrower at the endings, straight and more blocky. It is a neutral font and just fits in the character of the design, rather than adding to the design. 

Montreux Informal

Montreux Informal is our friendly version of the organic Montreux. It has playful shapes with rounded bent endings, such as the ‘E’ shown in the image below. It has a different playful character to itself. 

Grid System

Grid systems help in designing as well as branding because branding extends to more than just a logotype.

This is best used on a daily basis in web design, especially because there is much content on a page in web designing. So, the more content you have, the more useful grids will be. See images below for reference. No matter how much content you put, it remains tidy. 

Use Grids for Branding

As you see in the image below, grids help with aligning text as well as designing. It connects different areas and makes it consistent, creating one cohesive design. For example, the background photo divides the design from the main content and the sidebar or footer has a different layout.

Grotesk in general is minimalistic and proportional. It has a proportional shape and element that makes it elegant. No graphical image is needed because the font itself represents imagery. 

Montreux Grotesk

Montreux Grotesk is the main font of the family with its own character and modern vibe. It is sharp and dramatic. It is a very versatile font, but the characteristics make it high-tech and futuristic, so it fits best on technical things.

For an example, see the image below for reference. This is not a creation of a logotype, but the font used in this micro-website is creating the atmosphere and the character of the brand itself. This is a high tech audio equipment brand with microphones, for audio files and recording studios. 

This font fits best here because of the sharp character of the font and the precise lines. It gives a sense of high quality and precision in the design of the audio equipment that this brand is going to sell. So every time you look for a font for a brand, ask yourself questions about the character and feel of the brand.

Roch also uses the same font for his branding, keeping it minimal and adding cutouts to the letters. This gives his brand a modern technological feel as well as a unique look.

Montreux Classic

This is a natural and elegant font type. It gives a traditional and classic look to the brand and fits best with traditional brands. 

Take the image below, for example. This particular chocolate branding is a simple font but an elegant one. It is a traditional brand and hence requires a traditional touch to the logotype. So a centred layout grid is used to keep it traditional and symmetrical. A small border is added along the edges, keeping the brand legible.

Montreux Informal

As the name suggests, Montreux Informal is a friendly font type. The texts are smaller in size and are rounded. This fits best into any restaurant and magazine branding. It has positive energy and friendliness in itself. 

With Montreux Informal you can bend the shape and sizes according to your comfort. The cursives are fun to play with while doing any logotype. It has more angles and bends compared to the Classic and Grotesk. This font gives a brand an energetic, fun, bold, and good vibe. 

Brockman’s Typographic Grid

This poster (see image below for reference) is a recreation of the great Swiss designer, Brockman. As you can see, he divided the content perfectly. He put all the events in the middle row. In the middle of the column, there are titles that are set in the same font, size and weight.

He used all the information in the poster, aligning it correctly and then dividing it by subject. This helped in the overall branding, making it easier to understand. 

Now, set the Typographic Grid

First, you need to know what you wish to achieve. Choose what kind of plugins you would like to use on your poster, then define the size of the poster.

Second, the markings define the division of your layout. Decide the number of columns and then place them accordingly. 

Lastly, use a baseline grid that sets your line-height. Then use the Guides Manager to design the grid.Â