Insight ∙ Original Font
Sandoll’s steady seller, the 『Sandoll Gothic Neo Series』, extends beyond 「Sandoll Gothic Neo 1, 2, 3」 and 「Sandoll Gothic Neo Unicode 1, 2, 3」 to include 「Sandoll Gothic Neo Condensed」 and 「Sandoll Gothic Neo Extended」, forming a font series with a large family of 7 to 9 styles. So familiar that one might forget it is even there, it can also be said to be a font that maintains the closest relationship with users as a typeface face with an immense presence.
The 『Sandoll Gothic Neo』 series can be summarized by four key characteristics: “a design created with user participation,” “the first Hangul font centered on Hangul while harmonizing with other scripts,” “an expanded range of choices through diverse families,” and “ease of use through design optimized for digital environments.”
So, shall we now take a closer look at the story behind the 『Sandoll Gothic Neo』 series, with such remarkable specifications?
『Sandoll Gothic Neo』 series
Developing a new text font had long been one of Sandoll’s aspirations. Fonts can broadly be divided into display fonts and text fonts, and a large proportion of newly released fonts are display fonts. Text fonts are difficult to produce and require substantial manpower, time, and cost. For this reason, there are not many font foundries that undertake the development of text fonts while bearing such resources.
At the time, Sandoll had been exclusively responsible for developing Samsung’s proprietary fonts for several years. In addition, as it also proceeded with proprietary font development for JoongAng Ilbo and Chosun Ilbo, it was difficult to focus on creating text fonts for general users. Although the proprietary fonts for JoongAng Ilbo and Chosun Ilbo were designed as text fonts since they were used in newspapers, their licenses were limited to the companies. It was at this point that the 『Gothic Neo』 series was planned. Reaffirming its sense of responsibility as Korea’s representative font foundry, Sandoll consolidated the text-font production know-how it had accumulated over the years to present a font suited to the new digital environment.
A balance between sensibility and neutrality
Sans-serif fonts are neutral. This makes them easy to use in a wide variety of ways. On the other hand, because they pursue simplicity and modernity, they can easily miss emotional qualities. The reason 「Helvetica」—the default font of the Apple Macintosh and also used in the New York subway—was able to gain such widespread global use is that it was designed as a neutral font, free from bias toward any one direction.
The 『Gothic Neo』 series sought to embrace this aspect as well. However, Hangul, composed largely of straight strokes, can become reduced to purely geometric forms of verticals and horizontals if it is overly simplified. In addition, 「Helvetica」 has the limitation of having been designed more than 50 years ago. Furthermore, in an increasingly digital world, the user demand for analog-era sensibility could not be ignored.
With this direction in mind, the 『Gothic Neo』 series was designed to preserve the beauty of curves by maintaining Hangul’s inherent angles as much as possible, while incorporating emotional elements to compensate for the weaknesses that sans-serif fonts can have.
Hangul-centered, user-centered
The most prominent characteristic of the 『Gothic Neo』 series is that it places “Hangul” at its center. One might wonder, “Isn’t it natural for a Hangul font to be centered on Hangul?” Yet it is difficult to find cases like the 『Gothic Neo』 series, where Hangul design is placed at the highest priority, Latin alphabets are selected and refined to match that concept, and Hanja are directly designed. In most cases, fonts proceed by selecting Latin alphabets and Hanja that best fit the Hangul design and fitting them in accordingly.
For the Latin component of the 『Gothic Neo』 series, candidate fonts whose structures and skeletons best matched Hangul were selected from existing Latin alphabets and subjected to careful testing. As a result, 「Guardian Sans Headline」 was chosen. The selection criteria were as follows:
– It should be a contemporary, well-designed sans-serif font
– It should have a narrow character width
– It should have a large x-height (since Hangul characters are placed within two baseline standards like Latin capital letters, a large x-height is necessary to harmonize with both uppercase and lowercase)
– It should inherit the geometric feel of Univers while possessing the freshness of a digital font
Of course, without joint development, it is difficult to find a font that achieves perfect harmony. Although the selected 「Guardian Sans Headline」 was harmonious in overall tone, there were details—such as stroke endings—that did not align with the specific requirements of Hangul composition. Accordingly, licensing issues were formally resolved with the original designer, and the shapes were refined to suit the Hangul design concept. All modifications were finalized after final review by the original designer, Christian Schwartz. This revised version was given the name 「Sandoll Guardian Sans」.
Comparison of specification changes
Numerals changed from variable width to fixed width
The 『Gothic Neo』 series did not stop there, but was further expanded and released as the 『Sandoll Gothic Neo Unicode Series』. 『Gothic Neo Unicode』 can be seen as a kind of pro version developed after the release of the 『Gothic Neo』 series by gathering feedback while listening closely to users’ needs. Expanded from 2,350 characters to 11,172 characters covering “all Hangul syllables,” 『Gothic Neo Unicode』 made it possible to freely express all modern syllables that were previously unavailable. Rather than simply adding characters, it was upgraded to achieve more complete forms through delicate adjustments to inner spaces and visual center lines. In addition, numerals that had been set to variable width for spatial balance were adjusted to fixed width in consideration of usability.
Comparison between variable-width numerals (top) and fixed-width numerals (bottom)
Designing with full commitment
Unlike the existing 「Sandoll Gothic」, the 『Gothic Neo Series』 aimed to create a more modern Gothic font that reflects user demands and trends. While pursuing a modern and concise design, unjustified minimalism was avoided, and efforts were made to preserve stroke texture and enhance formal completeness. In addition, since 「Gothic Neo 1」 was produced with a width set to 92% based on prior survey results, its first impression may feel slim and sharp. However, ample inner space was secured so that it remains clearly legible even when used at small sizes in body text. User demands and research data were integrated into the fundamental framework of a text font.
Although Sandoll had extensive experience developing proprietary fonts at corporate request, the 『Gothic Neo Series』 was its first case of planning and designing a text font for general users with full commitment. From planning to release, the period was by no means short. The primary goal of the 『Gothic Neo Series』 project was to produce a font suited to DTP (Digital Textile Printing) environments with professional designers as the main target. However, with shifts in the multimedia paradigm, there was a strong conviction that demand for text fonts in the multimedia market would increase. As a result, even before its official release, the font was installed in products by Apple, LG, and Pantech, and was also used first in the e-book <Steve Jobs>.
Expanding the range of choice
「Gothic Neo 1」 is equipped with a total of nine weights, based on a database created by comparatively analyzing font families of currently used third-party Gothic and Ming fonts. These finely segmented weights focus not on dramatic expressiveness but on precise control. Even with the same text, using Regular as the base yields a calmer, brighter, and lighter color tone, while using Semi Bold as the base produces a stronger and more solid tone. The same applies when using composite fonts with Latin alphabets other than 「Sandoll Guardian Sans」. Through careful weight selection, a more balanced color tone across the page can be achieved.
Explanation of weights divided by purpose and usage
Furthermore, through 「Gothic Neo 2」 and 「Gothic Neo 3」, structural variations were introduced to diversify the expression of the base font. This configuration is not only convenient for using body text, captions, and titles in editorial design, but also supports a wide range of typographic applications extending to graphic work using text. As it progresses from 「Gothic Neo 1」 to 「Gothic Neo 3」, the design moves away from a square framework, with initial, medial, and final components conveying a 탈네모 impression. By evenly balancing black letterforms and white space within modules, a brighter and more modern image emerges, and the structural forms bring a sense of rhythm to the lower parts of the characters.
We hope that the 『Gothic Neo』 series—completed through an exploratory spirit grounded in Sandoll’s accumulated know-how and unprecedented challenges—will broaden designers’ range of choice.
Insight ∙ Original Font
Sandoll’s steady seller, the 『Sandoll Gothic Neo Series』, extends beyond 「Sandoll Gothic Neo 1, 2, 3」 and 「Sandoll Gothic Neo Unicode 1, 2, 3」 to include 「Sandoll Gothic Neo Condensed」 and 「Sandoll Gothic Neo Extended」, forming a font series with a large family of 7 to 9 styles. So familiar that one might forget it is even there, it can also be said to be a font that maintains the closest relationship with users as a typeface face with an immense presence.
The 『Sandoll Gothic Neo』 series can be summarized by four key characteristics: “a design created with user participation,” “the first Hangul font centered on Hangul while harmonizing with other scripts,” “an expanded range of choices through diverse families,” and “ease of use through design optimized for digital environments.”
So, shall we now take a closer look at the story behind the 『Sandoll Gothic Neo』 series, with such remarkable specifications?
『Sandoll Gothic Neo』 series
Developing a new text font had long been one of Sandoll’s aspirations. Fonts can broadly be divided into display fonts and text fonts, and a large proportion of newly released fonts are display fonts. Text fonts are difficult to produce and require substantial manpower, time, and cost. For this reason, there are not many font foundries that undertake the development of text fonts while bearing such resources.
At the time, Sandoll had been exclusively responsible for developing Samsung’s proprietary fonts for several years. In addition, as it also proceeded with proprietary font development for JoongAng Ilbo and Chosun Ilbo, it was difficult to focus on creating text fonts for general users. Although the proprietary fonts for JoongAng Ilbo and Chosun Ilbo were designed as text fonts since they were used in newspapers, their licenses were limited to the companies. It was at this point that the 『Gothic Neo』 series was planned. Reaffirming its sense of responsibility as Korea’s representative font foundry, Sandoll consolidated the text-font production know-how it had accumulated over the years to present a font suited to the new digital environment.
A balance between sensibility and neutrality
Sans-serif fonts are neutral. This makes them easy to use in a wide variety of ways. On the other hand, because they pursue simplicity and modernity, they can easily miss emotional qualities. The reason 「Helvetica」—the default font of the Apple Macintosh and also used in the New York subway—was able to gain such widespread global use is that it was designed as a neutral font, free from bias toward any one direction.
The 『Gothic Neo』 series sought to embrace this aspect as well. However, Hangul, composed largely of straight strokes, can become reduced to purely geometric forms of verticals and horizontals if it is overly simplified. In addition, 「Helvetica」 has the limitation of having been designed more than 50 years ago. Furthermore, in an increasingly digital world, the user demand for analog-era sensibility could not be ignored.
With this direction in mind, the 『Gothic Neo』 series was designed to preserve the beauty of curves by maintaining Hangul’s inherent angles as much as possible, while incorporating emotional elements to compensate for the weaknesses that sans-serif fonts can have.
Hangul-centered, user-centered
The most prominent characteristic of the 『Gothic Neo』 series is that it places “Hangul” at its center. One might wonder, “Isn’t it natural for a Hangul font to be centered on Hangul?” Yet it is difficult to find cases like the 『Gothic Neo』 series, where Hangul design is placed at the highest priority, Latin alphabets are selected and refined to match that concept, and Hanja are directly designed. In most cases, fonts proceed by selecting Latin alphabets and Hanja that best fit the Hangul design and fitting them in accordingly.
For the Latin component of the 『Gothic Neo』 series, candidate fonts whose structures and skeletons best matched Hangul were selected from existing Latin alphabets and subjected to careful testing. As a result, 「Guardian Sans Headline」 was chosen. The selection criteria were as follows:
– It should be a contemporary, well-designed sans-serif font
– It should have a narrow character width
– It should have a large x-height (since Hangul characters are placed within two baseline standards like Latin capital letters, a large x-height is necessary to harmonize with both uppercase and lowercase)
– It should inherit the geometric feel of Univers while possessing the freshness of a digital font
Of course, without joint development, it is difficult to find a font that achieves perfect harmony. Although the selected 「Guardian Sans Headline」 was harmonious in overall tone, there were details—such as stroke endings—that did not align with the specific requirements of Hangul composition. Accordingly, licensing issues were formally resolved with the original designer, and the shapes were refined to suit the Hangul design concept. All modifications were finalized after final review by the original designer, Christian Schwartz. This revised version was given the name 「Sandoll Guardian Sans」.
Comparison of specification changes
Numerals changed from variable width to fixed width
The 『Gothic Neo』 series did not stop there, but was further expanded and released as the 『Sandoll Gothic Neo Unicode Series』. 『Gothic Neo Unicode』 can be seen as a kind of pro version developed after the release of the 『Gothic Neo』 series by gathering feedback while listening closely to users’ needs. Expanded from 2,350 characters to 11,172 characters covering “all Hangul syllables,” 『Gothic Neo Unicode』 made it possible to freely express all modern syllables that were previously unavailable. Rather than simply adding characters, it was upgraded to achieve more complete forms through delicate adjustments to inner spaces and visual center lines. In addition, numerals that had been set to variable width for spatial balance were adjusted to fixed width in consideration of usability.
Comparison between variable-width numerals (top) and fixed-width numerals (bottom)
Designing with full commitment
Unlike the existing 「Sandoll Gothic」, the 『Gothic Neo Series』 aimed to create a more modern Gothic font that reflects user demands and trends. While pursuing a modern and concise design, unjustified minimalism was avoided, and efforts were made to preserve stroke texture and enhance formal completeness. In addition, since 「Gothic Neo 1」 was produced with a width set to 92% based on prior survey results, its first impression may feel slim and sharp. However, ample inner space was secured so that it remains clearly legible even when used at small sizes in body text. User demands and research data were integrated into the fundamental framework of a text font.
Although Sandoll had extensive experience developing proprietary fonts at corporate request, the 『Gothic Neo Series』 was its first case of planning and designing a text font for general users with full commitment. From planning to release, the period was by no means short. The primary goal of the 『Gothic Neo Series』 project was to produce a font suited to DTP (Digital Textile Printing) environments with professional designers as the main target. However, with shifts in the multimedia paradigm, there was a strong conviction that demand for text fonts in the multimedia market would increase. As a result, even before its official release, the font was installed in products by Apple, LG, and Pantech, and was also used first in the e-book <Steve Jobs>.
Expanding the range of choice
「Gothic Neo 1」 is equipped with a total of nine weights, based on a database created by comparatively analyzing font families of currently used third-party Gothic and Ming fonts. These finely segmented weights focus not on dramatic expressiveness but on precise control. Even with the same text, using Regular as the base yields a calmer, brighter, and lighter color tone, while using Semi Bold as the base produces a stronger and more solid tone. The same applies when using composite fonts with Latin alphabets other than 「Sandoll Guardian Sans」. Through careful weight selection, a more balanced color tone across the page can be achieved.
Explanation of weights divided by purpose and usage
Furthermore, through 「Gothic Neo 2」 and 「Gothic Neo 3」, structural variations were introduced to diversify the expression of the base font. This configuration is not only convenient for using body text, captions, and titles in editorial design, but also supports a wide range of typographic applications extending to graphic work using text. As it progresses from 「Gothic Neo 1」 to 「Gothic Neo 3」, the design moves away from a square framework, with initial, medial, and final components conveying a 탈네모 impression. By evenly balancing black letterforms and white space within modules, a brighter and more modern image emerges, and the structural forms bring a sense of rhythm to the lower parts of the characters.
We hope that the 『Gothic Neo』 series—completed through an exploratory spirit grounded in Sandoll’s accumulated know-how and unprecedented challenges—will broaden designers’ range of choice.