7 Graphic Designers Share What They Think Is the Worst Font Ever
We interviewed seven graphic designers about ugly, useless typefaces.
Image via Complex Original
When it comes to fonts, just as things can go so right, they can go so wrong. The choice of font in any form of design determines how something will be received and understood before viewers even comprehend what the words mean.
Some designers have a go-to set of fonts, and others experiment more often. However, every designer has a font (or a few) that they can't stand for whatever reason. We compiled a list where 7 Graphic Designers Share What They Think Is the Worst Font Ever. If you use any of them, thank us later for the heads up.
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Papyrus
Designer: Chris Lyons (@HeDrawsThings)
Why it's the worst: I know it's almost a cliche to loathe this face, but mix in a crappy movie with lazy typography, and there you have it.
Brandon Grotesque
Designer: Roxanne Daner (@yoursroxanne)
Why it's the worst: Brandon Grotesque is a really beautiful font, if set nicely. Because it's very popular at the moment, there are lots of opportunities for misuse. We cringe over here when we see it set in black all caps with zero tracking, but it's so nice when you let it really breathe!
Curlz
Designer: Hisham Baroocha (@HishamBharoocha)
Why it's the worst: There are so many fonts that totally blow, but Curlz MT is pretty darn ugly. It looks like a type that would be used on a hippie restaurant menu in some pukey colors...possibly with a tapestry background taken from the Internet so it would be super low resolution. My worst nightmare.
Times New Roman
Designer: Allan Yu (@allanyu_)
Why it's the worst: Like an ex-girlfriend, just hearing the name "Times New Roman" itself can conjure up memories that one wishes they could quickly forget. Numerous nights of formatting papers by shrinking the margin 1/8 of an inch, expanding the double space to 2.5, and slightly enlarging the font to 12.2pt; any which way to meet an arbitrary page quota on a paper about the fairness of Hester Prynne's punishment. It's the worst typeface based on stigma alone and fuck the Scarlet Letter.
Myriad
Designer: Liz Meyer (@liz__meyer)
Why it's the worst: After much consideration, my least favorite typeface is one that might not even come to mind as particularly offensive, but that as a designer you see often: Myriad. I can't tell you how many times I have been working on a piece and had the font revert to the default—everything immediately gets a million times worse when Myriad's around. It's not that the structure is ugly, it's just that in its blandness and absence of style, it is so boring that it turns the viewer off immediately. Myriad is the stale saltine cracker of the typeface world.
Birth of A Hero
Designer: Chuck Anderson (@NoPattern)
Why it's the worst: Ahh, being asked to contribute to a "hater" article. Count me in. I hate this font so much. Now, I discovered in my, uhh, "research" about this font that it was designed by the same guy who designed the infamous Bleeding Cowboy font, which is also terrible, but a little easier to poke fun of, so I decided to stay away from that. This font is so insufferably "white metalcore band with melodic vocals," I just can't handle it. Obviously based on Avant Garde then mixed up with a little distress, it screams, "I'm clean cut, yet edgy!" It's the "tone it down for Grandma at Thanksgiving, Aiden" of fonts. Think I'm picking on some random little free font? Breeze through an issue of AP Magazine sometime (not recommended in general, but, for argument's sake) and try to make it two pages without spotting it. Blegh.
Curlz
Designer: Josh Smith (@joshsmithnyc)
Why it's the worst:
It is annoying.
Without seeing it, the name alone is annoying: At least Comic Sans isn’t Comic Sanz.
It has so many signals of bad design:
It’s obvious: “Curly is fun!” “Let’s put so many curls on everything!” “and then let’s call it CURLZ”
It’s stupid: People are smarter than this. Whimsey/quirkiness don’t need dumbing down this much.
It’s not functional: Someone forgot the part about being able to read the words.
It’s overused: One of the great mysteries in life.