“Liebelei” – dalliance, flirtation, hanky-panky; kind of diminutive of “Liebe” (German for love)

The typeface Liebelei has its roots back in 1932, when Vienna-based painter Rudolf Vogl created the poster for a movie called Liebelei after the popular play by Arthur Schnitzler. Only the title letters existed of that typeface. I loved the letters from first sight and proceeded by adventurously interpreting the missing characters.

The goal was to create letterforms that fit to the original from the 1930s and represent a modern multi-purpose font. It should be an easy-to-use italic font with warm and friendly details and a huge variety of alternates and languages. The characteristic curled ends of most letters provide a script touch to the Liebelei. The first font entirely designed was the bold one which corresponds to the original poster lettering, although I tweaked the proportions a tiny bit to a more contemporary shape.

Liebelei covers Western, Central European, and Central Eastern European Languages and contains also a complete Greek character set. Liebelei is best for poster design as well as detailed usage, for example handsome tables, since it supports small caps, different kinds of numerals and fractions.


Font Family:

Tags: alternates, capital sharp s, cursive, greek, ligatures, love, retro, round, script, small caps, swash, turkish, versal eszett, vintage