This font is everywhere, to be sure. In the secular realm it is used in coffee shops menus, yoga studios, camping supply stores and on Thai restaurant signage.
Papyrus runs rampant amongst church websites, bulletin handouts, and most particularly with women’s ministries. Papyrus font is to women’s ministries what grunge fonts are to youth ministries.
33 comments:
The best thing about Papyrus is that you know NEVER to use it!!!
Imagine a "my wife it hot" shirt with papyrus font? Mmmm...yes please.
Another one too many people use...Brush Script! That and Dwindle. I mean, come on! Really? Are those the only fonts you have installed?
or Eater service. Though I find it funny that Lamb of God, who are not a Christian band, use it. Almost as a smart graphic design joke...
I have not checked out the rest of your site, but comic sans is the default children s ministry typeface of choice as well.
It's funny you said that JRocka because I almost said something about Comic Sans in this post. :) Yes, it's a children's ministry staple.
I mentioned the use of Comic Sans in the comments on another post. For where I attend, it's not used so much for children's ministry; it's used for grown-up stuff, too. (Haaaaaate Comic Sans. Haaaaaaate!)
Papyrus is right up there in the "overused font" category (ditto for Brush Script). There are other, better fonts out there one may use for this stuff! *head desk*
As my lady-friend pointed out...any font that is so over-used that you can recognize it on sight should be avoided.
I had suggested it as one font for the emblem of my publishing company, and she more or less vetoed it on sight. Smart woman.
AAAAAHHHH!! I hate Papyrus. I used to like it but that was in the 90's when I first started seeing it around. I don't loathe it like I do Comic Sans, but it's right up there. It really is overused. I'm glad to see other people are with me on that!
Becca
What Becca said..
Used to sorta like Papyrus (it had that exotic, "Far East" vibe about it), but now I can't stand it.
I don't hate it as much as Comic Sans, but it's close.
Another font I'm sick of is "Rumpus." I work as a graphic designer, and my co-workers use that font like it's going out of style, even though it's clearly not meant to be an "all purpose" font.
I was chatting with our tech support/web design guy about fonts and he was telling me about some customer he had with an accounting firm who wanted to use Comic Sans! He had to talk her out if it because she didn't see the problem.
The thing I love/hate about Papyrus is the "See, this is important, like Scripture!" vibe it invokes. The seriousness. The intensity. The history.
I once met a girl who didn't go to a restarant someone in her party suggested because they used the Papyrus font. *heart*
Hello, my name is stanford, and I use cliched fonts.
I'll admit it, Comic Sans and Papyrus are amoung my favorites. Seriously, if you do a post on Comic Sans I'll probobly cry.
So, I was wondering if I could get a little font contexualization advice. What do you all use?
I absolutely love this blog.
I've also noticed that Christian Culture tends to like Ska for some odd reason.
Ewwww...ska! I know several people my age (20s) at my church who still love ska. I didn't even like it when it was popular with the mainstream (90s).
Stanford:
Suggestions? Well, my favorite fonts are Veljovic, Baskerville, Leawood, and, of course, good, old-fashioned Helvetica and Impact.
At my job, I seldom have to design ads where one of those five fonts won't work.
For the book I'm writing [which you can grab excerpts from at www.biblicalheresy.com, I'm using "Libertine," and I've fallen in love with it.
[Sorry for the double post...somehow I managed to screw up the link earlier.]
http://www.luredesigninc.com/pledge/
well, I really like Papyrus (didn't realize I wasn't supposed to!) and Tekton and I still adore Cooper Black, but attempt to choose fonts rather selectively and very carefully :p
According to flyers I've seen posted in most church bulletin boards, papyrus is not the only font of choice.
Brady Bunch font, used for children's activities, i.e. vacation Bible camp, Easter egg hunts, and kitschy craptastic kiddie art projects.
Jurassic Park font, used in headlines for mission trips to Zimbabwe.
Then there's my personal fave, the Grand Theft Auto font, reminding us of the youth group's bowling night!
Yeah, that Lamb of God "logo" at the top is for the very NOT christian death metal band. Not sure it is good evidence for your otherwise excellent theory/observation.
Yeah, Lamb of God doesn't call themselves Christian in the slightest but they changed their original name to that so they could book more gigs. Or that's what I've read a couple different places. (Everything on the internet is true! haha) I kinda thought it was poignant that that name would make them more accepted, and that font is just too good when it's spelling out Lamb of God. But a reach, definitely. :)
hey, that's mgm! whats up, fellow youth group rad dude for chrizzzzzzzzzzzzzle
great blog stephy
WE LIVED IT
OMG. If I could marry a font, it would totally be papyrus.
The overuse of Papyrus extends far beyond Christian culture; it's simply the favorite (or possibly #2 to Comic Sans) of people who do all of their graphic designing in Microsoft Word. What? the 20 or so fonts that came with the software aren't enough for everybody? Why would you ever need more than that!
This is similar to my comment on grunge fonts, I suppose. If you visit many graphic designers' blogs you'll see the same complaints. It's a common malady, but not an exclusively Christian one.
It's totally everywhere. :)
http://www.luredesigninc.com/pledge/
Papyrus is used by everyone. At least Christianity SORT of has SOME sort of reason - what with manuscripts once being written ON papyrus.
I was just about to suggest this topic, but... here it is! What's funny is, Lamb of God is a band that is not christian. They have the name and the font tho, so maybe they are "covert christians."
HAHAHAHA papyrus font is to women's ministry as grunge font is to youth ministry.
about time the church goes into a make over huh?
haha i am loving this blog more and more.
It astounded how folks can put such energy into "hating" something as innocuous as a typeface.
Amgm: Lamb of God is so not death metal. Groove metal, metalcore, post-thrash: maybe. Not death metal. And they suck, so I guess it doesn't really matter.
My pastor used the Lamb of God logo with papyrus font once. I thought it was funny. The logo has an up-turned cross in it.
Yeah, Lamb of God's name used to be Burn the Priest. They didn't change it as some subtle "we might be Christian" marketing ploy, so much as a "people don't like putting Burn the Priest on a marquee outside a theater" kind of thing.
Haha!! I went to a Bible College that clung to papyrus and palatino as the fonts of choice. After spending four years there, I can think of little I dislike more than papyrus font. Even when I started working in ministry, the bulletin was full of papyrus. That was the very first thing that changed when I came on staff :-)
mgm: Lamb of God are not death metal, they're New Wave of American Heavy Metal with a significant metalcore infusion- I mean, I would never listen to secular music like that.
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