AM Majella

Majella was a lowercase-only, joined-up script typeface with a strong geometric design, a big x-height and no thick-thin contrast – an ‘outrageous’ fusion of handwriting and geometrical sans. The proportions, strictly based on a circle, and the entry and exit strokes at almost 45°, give the face an unmistakably rationalist design and a general sense of movement and dynamism. Majella, which takes its name from a massif in the central Apennines (Italy), was a wood type released by Xilografia di Verona in three sizes (3, 4 and 5 lines or 36, 48 and 60 points) probably between 1937 and 1939. The same design, named Volturno, appears in a 1941 catalogue of Xilografia Italiana. Evidence of the popularity of letterforms such as these in the 1930s can be seen in the Vibram logo on the Carrarmato (‘tank’ in English), the first rubber mountaineering sole designed and launched in 1937 by Vitale Bramanti, a successful Italian alpinist and entrepreneur. [c-a-s-t.com]