Start typing to search this publication.
Brandon Donnelly logo Brandon Donnelly
Open menu
Brandon Donnelly logo

Subscribe to Brandon Donnelly

Get new posts delivered straight to your inbox.

The Toronto font

Brandon Donnelly avatar Brandon Donnelly

Susan Kare was the screen graphics and font designer for the original Apple Macintosh computer in the 1980s. Being from Philadelphia’s affluent Main Line , she initially proposed that the various fonts be named after the railroad stops along it.

However, when Steve Jobs asked where the names had came from, he contested that, if the fonts were to be named after cities, they should be named after “world-class cities”, rather than small ones that nobody had ever heard of.

And since that’s what Jobs wanted, that’s what Jobs got. The fonts were renamed: Venice, London, Athens, Toronto, Chicago, New York and Geneva. Some of these font names you’ll probably still recognize but some, including Toronto, were eventually abandoned. 

The Toronto font was removed from System 6 onwards. So from 1988 onwards.

Subscribe to Brandon Donnelly

Daily insights for city builders. Published since 2013 by Toronto-based real estate developer Brandon Donnelly.