Organic Letters - Lignomorphic

"I call this style "Organic Letters" and consider them a subcategory of what I call "Lignomorphic Letters" (wood or tree-like) of which I have several examples in my FB postings. This category has literally hundreds of style variations. From the 1850s up till about 1900, freeform organic letters as this were so much in vogue they were nearly as common as Helvetica is today. Between Lignomorphic and Organic I have an intermediate third category I call "Wood-like" which doesn't have the defined look of Lignomorphic but looks more wood-like than amorphous styles like this. Historically, all these categories were usually referred to as "Rustic Letters."

"I don't now any one place for this sort of thing. I've always found it in places like old sheet music, post-civil war advertisments (such as carriage catalogs), theater posters and old certificates, like bonds. It was even used on schoolbook covers and frontispieces."

~2010, Don Marsh~
©Don Marsh