ITC Berkeley Old Style Font

ITC Berkeley Old Style connects Tony Stan’s 1983 adaptation with Frederic W. Goudy’s University of California Old Style of 1938. The original was a private press type for the university’s publishing house. Monotype later issued it as Californian in 1958. Stan’s ITC version takes its Berkeley name from the city of the University of California Press, making the academic publishing connection part of the design’s history.

Read the publisher’s family page for the source account and the edition currently offered. Keep a family name distinct from its particular release, width or optical branch.

The publisher describes Stan’s redraw as eight styles including italics, preserving the original design’s emphasis on legibility rather than the more exuberant features associated with some Goudy faces. The intended uses include books, magazines and advertising display. The relationship to Californian explains the lineage, but it does not make differently named digital versions automatically interchangeable. Compare the actual cuts and their proportions when planning a text layout or replacing an existing document font.

Use the original publisher specimen to inspect those features. An alternative can share a broad role without having the same letter shapes, metrics or character coverage.

Set a book-opening sample with a chapter title, running paragraph and a short italic quotation. Compare the paragraph at two comfortable sizes before settling on a line length. Use the italic for a limited change of voice instead of making the entire introduction decorative. Examine punctuation, capitalized names and footnote numbers in the chosen cut, then adjust the heading size to create hierarchy without crowding the first paragraph.

For independent comparisons, try EB Garamond and Source Serif 4. Use the same wording and approximate output size. The related style guide provides broader design context.

Use ITC to try the original and investigate the files, styles and terms for your intended workflow. This site does not distribute or serve ITC Berkeley Old Style font software.

The editable alternatives here have their own source profiles and included licenses. For the difference between a font file and copied characters, read Unicode text versus fonts.