Sorella is a seriffed roman and italic with a big x-height suitable for headlines, bodies of text and brand identities. It comes in the regular weight with matching italic, and in three optical sizes. 

Its soft and slightly compact letters are carefully crafted and together with the sharp serifs and the bulbous terminals evoke an 18th-century atmosphere – a perception enhanced by some mannerist touches that reveal its engraved calligraphic origins, such as the unconnected parts of E, F, e and g. Other unconnected strokes are scattered throughout the alphabet and P, B and R also have open counters which contribute to a notable feeling of openness and lightness. 

The lowercase of Sorella Italic is an autonomous design though it follows the same design parameters as the roman and works very well with it. The extreme 20-degree slope of this italic adds even more dynamism to its already dynamic characters.  

Sorella and Sorella Italic include small caps, four styles of numerals (proportional and tabular, lining and old-style), fractions, superior and inferior numbers, and all the elements of a typeface needed to handle complex typography. As with all respectable families featuring optical sizing, the Display size has a higher thick/thin contrast and narrower general proportions compared to Text and Caption. 

Sorella is based on the texts written and engraved by Angela Baroni for an exquisite book of hours of 400 pages, Beatae Mariae Virginis officium (Venice, 1740). In this rare volume, printed from engraved copper plates, Baroni opted for Fleischmann-like forms of serif in the capitals (such as E, F, T, etc) some years before Fleischman himself.

Luis Castellón’s research on Baroni’s hand and the initial designs of Sorella were awarded the highest honours by Frank E. Blokland at the Experts Type Design Course in Antwerp in 2022. 

Sorella Bold and other weights will soon be available from CAST foundry.