Morse Type
Morse Type is an independent foundry dedicated to retail and custom typeface design. Established in 2024 by Hugh Morse, the studio leverages his extensive background in typographic consulting and brand design for global clients at Morse Studio.
Trials and licenses for our retail collection are available through our foundry partners. Avec is available exclusively at Socio Type, while Apta and Velo are available exclusively at Weekend Type.
Trials and Shop
To test, trial or purchase Avec,
visit socio-type.com
To test, trial or purchase Apta or Velo,
visit weekendtype.com
Enquiries
To find out more about our custom typeface design and consulting services, email info@morsetype.com
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Stephen Bishop
Apta
Apta is a contemporary sans serif that celebrates the fascinating middle ground between humanist and geometric type design.
Born from a study of post-Johnston sign-makers’ alphabets, it explores the natural affinity between these seemingly opposing styles. The typeface is built on classical Roman proportions but employs a strict mono-linear construction with vertically cut terminals – where shoulders meet stems in crisp, engineered joins. This systematic approach creates a rhythm of recurring apertures that bring warmth and flow to an otherwise mechanical framework.
Apta comes in three families – Mix, Geometric and Humanist – and in six weights with corresponding italics, while its OpenType features include stylistic alternate sets that let you dial between the other families and hybrid characteristics. This allows the typeface to adapt to different contexts while maintaining its core identity.
Velo
Velo takes its name and spirit from the bold, uncompromising lettering of 60s and 70s editorial design and early cycling posters, where space was precious and impact was everything.
Compressed grotesques from the late 1800s solved a practical problem – fitting maximum message into minimum width – but their dense, geometric forms also possessed a graphic power that later generations would fully exploit. Most notably, Willy Fleckhaus transformed Schmalfette Grotesk (Walter Haettenschweiler, 1954) into a defining element of Twen magazine’s radical layouts from 1959 to 1971, setting bold type white-on-black against graphic photography that redefined editorial design.
Velo builds on this tradition with intentionally minimal optical correction at stroke intersections, creating a modular, mechanical quality that feels both engineered and expressive. The typeface is distinguished by its circular ‘O’ forms that exaggerate the compressed proportions, along with a set of delicate hairline symbols that provide textural contrast.
Available in ten weights with multiple OpenType alternates, Velo offers designers a versatile tool for bold editorial design, posters, and any application where presence is non-negotiable.
Avec
Avec is a serifless Roman family defined by high contrast, oblique modulation and flared strokes. Inspired by the humanist lettering of Enric Crous-Vidal – leader of the mid-century Graphie Latine movement – Avec revives the quest for a more expressive typographic form. The collection spans four distinct subfamilies: Curve offers a soft, uniform rhythm with wedge terminals; Sharp and Stencil introduce a staccato, high-impact texture; and Text is optically refined for effortless legibility at smaller scales.
Apta Kayo
Apta Kayo is a maximalist expansion of the Apta family and a contemporary celebration of Ultra-weights like Futura Black Agency, Gadget and Gill Kayo. At this ultra-heavy weight, the distinction between our standard Geometric, Humanist, and Mix sub-families begins to blur. Rather than offering these separate styles, we have curated a singular, definitive cut that selects the best traits from each – creating a unique hybrid that optimises impact while retaining Apta’s characteristic vertically cut terminals and crisp, engineered joins.
This blending creates a typeface of uncompromising graphic weight. Apta Kayo comes loaded with extensive OpenType alternates, allowing you to swap characters, adjust tone, and fine-tune layouts between humanist character and geometric structure.