What could be better proof of readability? Thanks to Interstate, millions of car drivers find their way along the highways of the USA every day – even at a speed of 55 miles per hour.


Full throttle down the typeway: With the the US highway typeface as a model, Tobias Frere-Jones developed the 40-member Interstate font family

The typeface was designed in the 1970s by the United States Federal Highway Administration. Type designer Tobias Frere-Jones digitised his interpretation for the first time in 1993, and expanded the font family in the years that followed for use in print design.



Most recently, Frere-Jones and Cyrus Highsmith enlarged the family to include 40 fonts, among which are italic, condensed und compressed versions. Interstate is among the most popular fonts in Germany, not least as a result of its use in TV and many magazines, and as Quelle-Karstadt’s corporate font. Many designers view it as a livelier alternative to the somewhat stiff DIN (#20 on this list).