︎FONT.
Jack Daniel’s font.
A CUSTOM SERIES OF FONTS VIA ARNOLD FOR JACK DANIEL’S DISTILLERY. FOR THE PROJECT, THE FOUR PROMINENT LETTERING STYLES FROM THE FAMOUS BLACK LABEL (C.1904) WERE DEVELOPED INTO COMPLETE FONTS VIA OUR T26 TYPE FOUNDRY.
The Jasper font, based on the familiar Jack Daniel’s logo lettering (and bearing Jack Daniel’s given first name). The real visual centerpiece, though, is the refined yet approachable Lynchburg Script, based on the Tennessee lettering in the label. Then there is the solid, industrious typeface named for Lem Motlow, the nephew of Jack Daniel who managed and later inherited the Distillery. Rounding out the set is a slightly distressed san-serif called Jack Daniels Condensed Bold.
For Jack Daniel’s, the leading brand of American whiskey worldwide, our design team was first hired to research the origins of the typography used in the early days of the company: Jack Daniel’s Distillery. This exploration, going back to 1875, took several weeks, during which we were able to compile historic data and visual references into a report which we then presented to the client. Following this research, we were tasked with creating a suite of typefaces, each selected from the most prominent wording in the iconic 1904 Jack Daniel’s “Black Label.” The four designs we created were specifically based on the condensed “Jack Daniel’s” wordmark; the dignified upright script used in the word “Tennessee”; and the robust, no-nonsense serif lettering used in “Whiskey.” We developed all three styles concurrently (as opposed to successively) in iterative phases so they could be tested together in advertising materials. As the most ornate and technically challenging of the four, the script style, named “Lynchburg Script” received extra attention during development in order ensure that it would function properly as a linking cursive script. Once completed, the four fonts were formally deployed as version 1.0; and in intervening years, the fonts have been expanded and updated to include language support for new territories around the world.
