Inspired by some late 19th- and early 20th-century ‘Elzevir’ typefaces notable for their editorial use and a certain ‘formal naivity’, Ipazia flaunts unconventional proportions and a striking irregularity in the distribution of white space and letter design. The designer pushed these peculiarities to their limits, making them stand out and add vitality to the text – but without compromising the overall visual effect of the page.

‘Up until now, I had designed very regular typefaces for functional purposes where irregularity was controlled and kept to a minimum. I aimed for letterform simplicity. With Ipazia, however, I wanted to go beyond these boundaries and enrich the design with details and curves – even unnecessary ones’ explains Perondi. ‘I also designed an Ipazia ExtraBold with such diminutive serifs that this weight almost became a contrasted sans serif. I applied the same approach to the italic, which was inspired by a similar combination featured in an early 20th-century roman released by the legendary Dresden foundry, later known as Schriftguss AG. Most of the italic forms were also inspired by that typeface, while the regular roman drew more heavily on a late 19th-century newspaper face from the Italian Negroni foundry. Rather than focusing on a single model, I was interested in translating the concepts of typographic style and page colour onto a contemporary typeface design for use in both large and small sizes.’ 

The design of Ipazia is highly refined and intended to create a significantly more expressive visual style. Offering sizes suitable for publishing (books, newspapers and magazines, including online), Ipazia is decorative and sophisticated, rather than loud and assertive. It gives texts a distinctive and original character, yet without excess but, above all, with efficiency.