While you’re not looking

Bewitched, an Amer­i­can com­edy series that broad­casted for eight sea­sons on ABC from 1964 to 1972

It is an ebul­lient moment when a new type­face from Under­ware emerges and Liza is no excep­tion. With its loose and play­ful look, it is clearly inspired by the ID of Bewitched TV series and its time. This var­ied width Open Type has an abun­dance of tweaks that are handy for design­ers who have strong pref­er­ences over not only the style of lig­a­tures and frac­tions but also par­tic­u­lar low­er­case and upper­case let­ter com­bi­na­tion. This exces­sive­ness does bor­der­line over to inde­ci­sive­ness of the designer where sim­plic­ity as a finesse is devoured into a mush of over unnec­es­sary com­plex­i­ties. My motto when it comes to design stems from Terre des Hommes by Antoine de Saint Exupéry: Per­fec­tion is attained not when no more can be added, but when no more can be removed.

La per­fec­tion soit atteinte non quand il n’y a plus rien à ajouter, mais quand il n’y a plus rien à retrancher.

The many faces of Liza

The var­i­ous lan­guage sup­port is good to see. The dis­tinc­tive­ness are defined by its accen­tu­ated strokes and the faux irreg­u­lar­ity in the Under­ware sig­na­ture style of Lig­a­ture and Con­tex­tual Alter­nates. There are small jar­ring details, as per pref­er­ence, of the dis­con­nec­tion in strokes (such as the low­er­case R) and the awk­ward over­lap­ping of the dot of the it and the cross­ing of the t in the Alter­nates. In the instance of the R it is clear that it fol­lows the open K but it inter­feres with its leg­i­bil­ity, and the cross­ing lig­a­tures can eas­ily be avoid by leav­ing out the dot to give it a cleaner appearance.

The dis­con­nected Rs

Dot­ting the Is and cross­ing the Ts

Another detail I was dis­ap­pointed with is the extended stroke option as per Bello. It was flaw­less in Bello but here, demon­strated in the image below, it clearly shows the joints of where the E ends and where the exten­sion starts. If this is delib­er­ate, it is a very unat­trac­tive fea­ture. Over­all, Liza will def­i­nitely take a promi­nent places in the design world but as com­pared with its pre­de­ces­sors, it is a font that has une gueule de bois grave.

The refine­ments of Liza: An error or a design fea­ture — that is for you to decide