What Font Does Supreme Use?

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Table Of Contents:

• What Is The Supreme Font?
• Futura Today
• Brands That Also Use Futura
• Readability
• Futura Heavy Oblique
• Futura Alternatives
• Didact Gothic
• Poppins
• ITC Avant Garde Gothic
• Renner *
• Is the Supreme Logo Trademarked?
• Was The Logo An Original Idea?

What Is The Supreme Font?

For a brand as big as Supreme, you might think that their font is an exclusive design, but it’s actually a pretty common typeface used by multiple companies. 

Supreme uses a variant of Futura, a geometric sans-serif typeface that was designed by Paul Renner in 1927.

Thanks to its thick build and simplicity, Futura is a popular choice for written titles and texts, especially with the rise of the internet as the font looks great on screen. 

Renner designed the font as a contribution to the New Frankfurt-project, basing the design off of geometric shapes. He was inspired by the artistic movement of Bauhaus, particularly focusing on the circle. 

For a long time the Renaissance and Gothic ideas of the 19th Century dominated design style.

Renner recognised that it was time for the global design to evolve, switching exaggeration for minimalism.

However, Renner wanted to keep a little bit of character, hence why he used geometric figures as the foundation of his design. 

Futura Today

It may be almost a century old, however, Futura is still a prominently used font today.

After finding success in the mid-twentieth century, Futura became a firm favorite for newspapers and magazines alike. 

Thanks to it’s timeless simplicity, Futura remains a highly popular typeface. 

Brands That Also Use Futura

To say Futura is exclusively associated with Supreme would be a mistake, as it’s a pretty common typeface. 

Here is a list of some of the companies/brands that also use Futura:

• Volkswagen 
• Crayola 
• Domino’s Pizza
• Red Bull
• FedEx
• PayPal
• Gofundme
• Louis Vuitton 

Readability

When you need to choose a clear and coherent font, Furtura is one of the best options to pick.

It has a simplistic design, consistent thickness throughout each letter and has no extra embellishments making it an easy to read font. 

Each letter has a wide surface area which doesn’t lose its quality when applied to different textures, or when it’s blown up.

Although it’s a uniform font, lowercase letter strokes can exceed the average height but that’s what gives the font character.

Futura Heavy Oblique

Supreme actually uses a heavy oblique variation of Futura. Unlike the original, the characters have been slightly modified to have thinner strokes and wider spacing.

However, this variation makes it an ideal typeface to use for product advertisement.

Futura Alternatives

There are a few fonts that have very similar appearances to Futura. 

Didact Gothic

This is a more minimalist version. Unlike Futura, it’s slimmer in appearance, which is great for printing as it doesn’t require much ink. 

The style of Didact Gothic has made it a popular choice displaying the Latin alphabet in classrooms. It’s also great to use for study guides. 

Poppins 

Poppins draws on the original idea of Futura, except it has an extremely thin thickness and is much smaller in width. 

What is an interesting touch about Poppins is that it also produces all of the characters needed for the Latin alphabet, along with some Nepali and Indian languages so it’s a great universal typeface!

ITC Avant Garde Gothic 

One of the biggest appeals of Futura is the width of lettering (which makes the Supreme logo look very appealing), but this font has an even greater width between each letter.

So, if you’re a fan of the wide spacing this could be the font for you!

Interestingly, this font was first designed in 1970 for Avant Garde magazine, and Adidas currently uses a variant of the typeface. 

Renner * 

Although Futura has seemingly stood the test of time, and continues to gain popularity, is there any harm in modernising it further?

Well, Renner * honors Paul Renner’s original design, which is almost identical except each character has been altered to adapt with the digital age. Renner * is perpetually modern. 

Is The Supreme Logo Trademarked?

The company underwent years of struggles to trademark their iconic red box logo.

The brand firstly struggled with their description, as it was impossible to trademark the word Supreme as it could be used to describe the quality of a product.

There was also controversy over the fact that the logo lacked distinctive character. 

However, the company argued that their logo was a well-known signifier of their brand, and after years of legal battles they were granted trademarks in North America, Europe and Asia.

Was The Logo An Original Idea?

Amidst their trademark complications, Supreme found themselves under fire as their logo was not considered an original concept.

Back in the 1970s, feminist artist Barbara Kruger worked in New York as a graphic artist, and it’s said that she was the original creator of the design. 

In 1981 she debuted a white Futura text in a red box design – sounds pretty similar, right? She used the concept again for one of her most famous prints “I Shop Therefore I Am.”

Also in their earlier days, the brand was known to reference several other companies (like Nike and Louis Vuitton) in their designs. 

The brand has come under fire for borrowing concepts from other artists, but Supreme creator James Jebbia defended their use.

He claimed that when he designed the Supreme logo he had no idea that the brand would become what it did. 

Today, however, the white Futura text and red box background are an international symbol of the brand.