A few weeks after graduating from TypeMedia in The Hague, Nina Stössinger did what many type designers do after finishing a complex thesis: she reset. It was September 2014, on a trip through Norway, and she started drawing a new sans serif—something simpler, fresher, and more instinctive than the uncommon text serif she’d just completed. That sketch became Cassis, a geometric sans with a rare quality in its category: personality.
From the beginning, Stössinger envisioned a face that was geometric but not cold—open, crisp, dense, and cheerful, with curves that feel dynamic rather than engineered. Its key signature is in the details: vertically cut curve terminals, which add sharpness and forward motion, and proportions that are generously wide yet compact enough to stay practical in slightly larger sizes.
The roots of Cassis trace back to an earlier trip to Antwerp, where Stössinger was captivated not by museum relics but by the city’s blue enameled street signs. Their geometric capitals weren’t precious or typographically “correct”—they were engineered shapes with literal geometry, rough execution, and quirky optical decisions that created unexpected charm. The signs also featured those vertically sliced terminals, a small move with big energy.
Over years of development, Cassis’ character coalesced around ideas of gesturality and density, rather than charming historical forms.
Cassis draws from that same tension: geometry meeting grit. It also sneaks in gesture. Alongside European signage memories are American influences—commercial lettering, sign painting, even echoes of Antique Olive in its slightly unconventional contrast, pushing just far enough beyond neutral to feel animated.
Now released through Frere-Jones Type, Cassis is designed to project affable confidence and offer compelling density at larger sizes; it presents swelling curves, reaching terminals, and a teetering balance of stroke weights, which infuse its geometric underpinnings with plenty of flavor. A powerful voice for branding, identity, and titling work, Cassis is presented in seven weights from a spare Thin through a forceful Black.
Cassis is designed to project affable confidence and offer compelling density at larger sizes; it presents swelling curves, reaching terminals, and a teetering balance of stroke weights, which infuse its geometric underpinnings with plenty of flavor. Cassis reads like a geometric sans serif that stopped trying to be perfect—and became much more interesting because of it.