Udine was produced as a wood type by the Nebiolo company in Turin. It first appeared in a 1933 catalogue in five sizes, from 8 to 40 lines (roughly from 100 to 500 points). Letters H and O are the basic modular shapes used to construct the entire alphabet. Almost every letter has the same width, with counters that create a predictable, regular pattern. A few letters such as A, B, E, G, H, K, P and R display horizontal strokes that extend leftwards. This feature, along with the low barycentre of all letters with central strokes, is part of the Art Deco vocabulary.

Courtesy Archivio Enrico Tallone

The resemblance to Neon is so striking that it is likely that Udine was the first attempt at a modular typeface which, after further development, became the Neon family. Giulio Da Milano and Alessandro Butti, the former as an art director and the latter as a draftsman, are no doubt the designers of this type (though reducing Butti’s contribution to preparing the pattern drawing for production probably does little justice to him). After the Second World War, the production of wood-type Neon made Udine redundant, and it disappeared from Nebiolo’s catalogues.

AM Udine digital revival reflects the original with great accuracy. ‘Some details – says the designer Michele Patanè – have been revised for optimal performance in the digital environment. Firstly, the distinctive monolinear strokes of the original model have been fine-tuned by reducing the horizontal strokes by a few units. Secondly, slight adjustments were made to the curves and the transitions between curves and straight lines, and the typeface’s modular appearance was also carefully crafted to avoid the impression of basic geometric shapes glued together. All of this compensates for the unevenness perceived when looking at the letters on screen, while retaining a sense of analog stiffness that is part of the personality of the original typeface.’

The original Udine was offered along with a negative version, in which each character is set in a black rectangle, and with decorative pieces to be placed at the beginning and end of titles of one or a few words. These features are available in AM Udine digital revival through OpenType features.