ITC Anna was little more than a gleam in the eye of designer Daniel Pelavin in the mid-1980s, when he drew a few letters for an Aramis Cologne holiday promotion. Pelavin continued to use these letters for various projects, always adding new characters.
The design became a family matter when Pelavin's wife, graphic designer Lorraine Louie, used the alphabet on their wedding invitation in 1988. “Then,” says Pelavin, “we used it again — for the birth announcement of our daughter, Anna, a year later.”
It was alphabet Anna's appearance on Louie's business stationery that first brought the design to ITC's attention. In 1990, ITC asked Pelavin to develop a typeface based on the letterforms, and ITC Anna was released as a single design in 1991.
A couple of years later, Pelavin created a suite of swash and alternate characters for the design. Eventually, ITC asked Pelavin to draw a bold weight to complement the original release. ITC Anna Extended is the result. This new weight adds versatility to this distinctive, Art Deco-flavored yet contemporary typeface. ITC Anna has left the «family» and taken its place among ITC's most useful display designs.
ITC Anna Standard Typeface Specimen
ITC Anna Small Caps Typeface Specimen
ITC Anna Extended Typeface Specimen
| Category | Art Deco |
| Designer | Daniel Pelavin |
| Design Year | 1991 |
| Foundry | ITC |
Information from fonts.com and Linotype.
Page last modified September 15, 2017.
