Botanical Scribe is modeled after the elegant hand-inscribed legends on the antique floral prints of Belgian artist Pierre-Joseph Redouté, perhaps the most famous painter of flowers. Redoute’s engravings used the stipple method—innovative for the early 1800s—and have survived in large numbers. The legends were clearly written by more than one person, but they have a similar neat, rounded, organic, legible character.
The name I chose for the font recognizes not only the subject of Redoute’s works but also the distinguished career of distinguished 19th century American botanist Asa Gray, a contemporary (and collaborator) of Darwin whose contributions to natural science I also admire.
Botanical Scribe has a fancy, formal quality while retaining the warmth and accessibility of fine yet imperfect handwriting. OpenType features include scores of ligatures, standard and contextual alternates, lining and old-style figures, and complete Central/Eastern European alphabets.
