AM Assab

Assab is an all-caps geometric sans of elementary construction, based on circles, triangles and rectangles, with (almost) no contrast and no counters – only the open counters have been kept, such as in C, E and the like. Assab was produced as a wood type by Xilografia Ruggero Zuliani & C. (Verona) in the early 1930s, when the company changed its name to Xilografia di Verona. Ruggero Zuliani must have been an important character in the wood type industry of the time, as he is also recorded as a director of Xilografia Italiana (Badia Polesine, near Verona) in its early years. We are sure that Luca Lattuga’s research will shed some light on this important chapter of Italian vernacular typography. Assab interpreted the counterless sanserifs of the 1930s, a style of lettering popular in Italy in the growing field of advertising. It was a powerful expression of both Modernism and the Fascist regime, which used cutting-edge graphics of the time as corporate design. This kind of letterforms were incorporated into Fortunato Depero’s special variations of sanserifs and used in all kinds of graphic works. Baby Teeth, designed by Milton Glaser in 1964 for his famous Dylan record cover, can be considered the most famous heir of Assab and the counterless sans of the 1930s. [c-a-s-t.com]