Archived entries for Gothic Condensed Octagon Shade
Oh, Oh, Oh, It’s Magic
10 line Gothic Condensed Octagon Shade
A friend once said of this type, “I have dreams about that font.” Yeah, me too. It’s pretty dreamy.
Wood type everyday: get used to it
10 line Gothic Condensed Octagon Shade
On page 125 of the 1977 Da Capo Press paperback edition of Rob Roy Kelly’s American Wood Type: 1828–1900, Kelly writes that this design appeared for the first time in wood (it’s based on a metal type face originating in Europe) in the Wells & Webb specimen of 1854.
Many of the manufacturers of wood type stamped an imprint on the capital A’s as an indentifier. Unfortunately, I haven’t found a manufacturer’s imprint on this font so the provenance is unknown.