Eero is an antithetical neo-grotesk. It is modern in veneer only: an irrational, clumsy and haphazardly organized impositor. Parts of it come down to the material source – Eero is derived from enamel street signs, where both the stencil, the brush application, and the firing of the glaze introduces imperfections. The production can’t be blamed for the odd proportions and awkwardly crowding curves: these are the jobbing letterforms of typographically untrained draftsmen.
As is often the case in my work, the source seeded a larger idea. With regular, bold, italic, a highly experimental rotalic, and the vivid outlined capitals, Eero forms an atypical family structure. The styles can occupy traditional typographic roles – body copy, emphasis and contrasting headlines – but also combine inline or layer to form striking visuals.
