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2 June 2017updated 09 Sep 2021 4:57pm

From the Tories’ Bembo to Labour’s Avenir: Political parties and their favourite fonts

The kind of font that can make the slogan "bring back badger-baiting" seem wholly reasonable.

By Robin Bunce

Election campaigns, full of sound and fury, are quite the assault on the senses. The sloganeering, the memes, the gaffes, Jeremy Paxman, and louder than words: the typefaces. An election campaign is an occasion when graphic designers and political wonks, two natural enemies in the wild, unite in a common cause, to produce the posters, the manifestos, the broadcasts, stuff of the modern campaign. The most fundamental issue, at the heart of any design campaign, is the font. What’s the point of having a great slogan if it ends up in comic sans or papyrus? But four letters, all caps, in Gotham – that could make a political career.

In 2015 David Cameron went for Aktiv Groteskfor the Tory manifesto font. It was purposeful, upbeat, and above all modern. He coupled it with the uber-friendly party logo in Lucida Sans, a font that embodied David Cameron’s distinctive brand of light-weight disposable charm. Lucida Sans is the kind of font that can make the slogan “bring back badger-baiting” seem wholly reasonable, convivial, uncontroversial.

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