Font Friday #167

Pitanga

Pitanga brings music to geometric shapes. The geometric sans-serif typeface Pitanga on a mobile phone in the headline, body text and a big Portuguese pull quote: “Chega de saudade. A realidade é que sem ela não há paz. Não há beleza, é só tristeza.” — from “Chega De Saudade” by Tom Jobim, 
 a beautiful Basilian tune submitted by Pablo

Sans-serif typeface

from Fabio Haag Type
designed by Sofia Mohr

Variable Font

2 axes: Weight, Italic

16 Styles

8 Weights: Thin to ExtraBold
with matching italics

Best for

  • Headings (display text)
  • Long reading text (body text)
  • User Interfaces (functional text)

License starting

below $150 (bundle)

Specialty

A friendly sans-serif typeface that brings joy to clean and sturdy letters, best for branding and larger text.

Get Pitanga
Win Pitanga

Join Pimp my Type on Patreon until July 2nd, and you might win the entire family consisting of 16 styles in 1 variable font. Many thanks to Fabio Haag Type for the generous support!

My Pitanga Font Review

Soft, playful and with shapes so cool that sway so gentle – meet Pitanga, a special geometric sans-serif typeface. It is music to my eyes, particularly in lager and bold! But what gives this typeface its unusual, approachable vibe? Let’s find out!

Tall and Tan and young and lovely. This font from Brasília goes walking and when it passes, each one it passes goes “Aaaaaah”. When Pitanga shows, it’s like a samba, that swings So cool and sways so gentle that, when it passes, each one it passes goes “Ooooh”! Okay, maybe I listened too much Tom Jobim as I was creating these samples, but I had a good time. Hopefully you as well, looking at them.
Experience Pitanga’s clear characters with a gentle touch

Pitanga is based on a geometric construction. But compared to many fonts of this genre, it is not taking it into a sober and clean direction. The typeface seems sturdy, but in a friendly and playful way, mainly because of two things. Firstly, the fairly wide proportions. And secondly, a few eccentric characters, like the lower case “t” or uppercase “J”, that emphasize on the wide shapes.

The lower case “t” shows a wide bar and playful, extended terminals. The lower case “k” very wide proportions. The lower case “e” a circular construction, the upper case “J” an eccentric, wide bar and all letters angled terminals.
Wide proportions and occasional playful terminals make Pitanga so attractive

Pitanga is confident, but it does not take itself very seriously. What I really like is how you can change its voice by activating different stylistic alternates. Make it even gentler with soft, wavy terminals, or go for a cleaner design with a simpler “a” and “t”.

making it … gentler by activating different terminals or more geometric by activating geometric shapes that show a single story “a” and a shorter, simpler “t”.
The different stylistic sets of Pitanga

In my opinion, the typeface works best in headings, maybe a logotype. However, it would also work for a little body text or even UI text. But I would not use it extensively there, since Pitange is very space consuming. In these cases, I recommend pairing it with one of my suggestions.

How Pitanga compares to other geometric sans-serif typefaces, on Patreon

Font Pairings with Pitanga

Pitanga is a geometric, linear sans-serif typeface, ideal for larger text. Looking for something classic for long reading text? I recommend the very different, dynamic, contrasting serif typeface Rasa.

Pitanga
Pitanga
  • Headings
  • Copy
  • UI Text
Rasa (free)
Rasa (free)
  • Headings
  • Copy
Gabarito (free)
Gabarito (free)
  • Headings
  • Copy
  • UI Text

Learn more about pairing typefaces using the Font Matrix.

What do you think? Do you see music when looking at Pitanga? Tell me in the comments!

Typographic power to your inbox

  • Font Friday: I recommend one typeface per week, free fonts included.
  • Type Tuesdays: articles & videos that up your design game.
  • Join 2500+ typography enthusiasts, unsubscribe anytime.
Edition #167, published

One Comment

  1. Not my cup of t… of type Oliver! But I see more and more fonts of this style, around the web.

    Looking at “and” a seems smaller than n and d who eat a for breakfast.
    The word “young” – again problematic. It might be my not-so-metrical mind. But then t and J are gorgeous… 🤔

    Anyway, I could spend another 2 hours staring at fonts but I have to run from the screens.

    3/10 imho

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *