The traditional tattooing trend has been around for a century, and it has given birth to the popularity of the traditional tattoo font. This particular typeface gains its fame due to its capability of beautifully eternalizing the tattoo elements—self-expression, cultural identity, or meaningful names, dates, and quotes—on the skin.
Not solely rich in history and cultural significance, traditional tattoos are also classic and timeless in design. Accordingly, delivering the desirable message through tattoo design and perfect lettering font selection is essential.
This article will dive deeper into the world of traditional tattoo styles and discuss the so-called traditional font and the best fonts for traditional tattooing.
Traditional or classic fonts are still at the top of the list thanks to their simplicity, professional flair, versatility, and readability.
The general opinion considers Serif fonts the most traditional type of font. Their prominent distinguishing feature is small strokes, then known as serifs, extending outward from the main stroke of each character. They are otherwise highly readable.
Communicating elegance and confidence, serif fonts grant a more classic and established world-class brand logo. Giorgio Armani, Harper’s Bazaar, and Elle Magazine use Didot font. Big names like Vogue and the New York Times also use Didot font.
We can refer to the classic, old-school tattooing style dating back to the early 20th century, especially the early 1900s when it was initially popular in the United States.
Most traditional tattoos take inspiration from iconic American imagery like anchors (associated with sailors), eagles, or pin-up girls. The design has the characteristics of bold lines and is simple, frequently outlined in black with the filling of strong, solid blocks of color.
Meanwhile, in other cultures, we can trace the origins of traditional tattoos even to Ancient Egypt. They are usually symbols of tribal or cultural identity and kinship, a way for people to attach to their roots and heritage or pay tribute to their ancestors.
In addition to American traditional tattooing, there are more styles we can find. Japanese (irezumi), Polynesian (tatau), and other styles include Mexican, Celtic, Native American, and South American traditional tattoo designs.
So, what is the best traditional tattoo font for getting traditional inked? Traditional tattooing has used several popular fonts like classic serif fonts (Times New Romand and Garamond) and modern sans serif fonts (Arial and Helvetica).
What else? Here are some more recommendations to pick from.
Wolfsburg is a vintage and classic serif font. It is the newest Roman font with a classic 18th-century touch. The philosophy behind this font is to portray past times in all of its luxury and elegance. Supporting beautiful ligatures, Wolfsburg offers a charming look to your creative work.
It is a slab vintage serif font with a unique classic feel in a great combo. This font is perfect as a traditional tattoo font and embellishes cultural heritage and crafts. You can also use this typeface for other creative design projects in retro themes.
You will instantly fall in love with this distinctive and lovely serif typeface. It combines elegance and classiness, radiating both nostalgic and contemporary effects. Likewise, it works well for designing magazines, logos, tattoos, social media, etc.
Developed with OpenType features, this pack comprises ligatures, numerals and punctuation, and multi-language support.
Marko is an elegant and unique serif display font. Classy and modern in style, this font falls into several categories, such as ligatures, vintage, minimalist font, display type, and the like.
Apart from a traditional tattoo font, you can use it for other varied creative projects, such as logos, branding, labels, wedding designs, invitations, photography, and others.
If you are looking for an elegant and appealing traditional tattoo font, Gyeoul can be one the best candidates. This serif typeface is also highly suitable for logos and branding designs, not to mention quotes, watermarks, social media posts, and more.
Ethnic is a modern logotype sans serif font typeface. As the name implies, this font immediately gives the aura of a typically unique “ethnic” feel, combining retro and masculine typography. You can apply this font to design sophisticated crafting, videos, logos, brochures, invitations, etc.
A sans-serif display font, Wonderful Wostered offers a charming and highly readable typeface for any creative design. It can also serve well as a traditional tattoo font or a web font, for example.
This pack features standard glyphs (character standards), international accents (accented characters of Western Europe), numbers, and punctuation. It is also available in OTF and TTF file formats with simple installation.
Broken is a condensed modern sans serif font. It falls under the categories of bold, masculine, modern to retro or vintage, branding, headline, and more. Minimalist in design, this font is surprisingly highly readable and engaging. Available in PUA Encoded Characters, this font allows full access with no additional design software. The pack also features multilingual support.
Looking for something revolutionary to replace your traditional tattoo font? Try Genflox, a futuristic sans-serif display font. This typeface is perfect for pursuing iconic outcomes like sharp, neutral, progressive, or industrial. Any glyph works well for any creative design application, such as creating templates, advertising branding, beauty design, brochures, logos, videos, etc.
Glamer is an attractive calligraphy sans serif font – a product of a brand-new elegant combo of serif and sans serif fonts. You will find it very appealing even from the very first glance. The font maintains its classiness and boldness at the same time. You can use it for any creative design, from logos and branding to photography and social media posts.
Which one is your favorite? Of course, picking the right traditional tattoo font will play a crucial role in enhancing the complete look of your tattoo or communicating the desirable meaning or message. You need to take several factors into account, such as tattooing style, size, and placement.
