About this typeface: No informative notes about this font from the designer exist, aside from his obvious comment that it’s based on block-style license plate fonts. However, Jeff Levine’s portfolio of typeface designs is based largely on traditional or “found objects” close at hand. Given that he has lived in Florida for many years, and that Vehicle closely resembles Florida’s auto plate font, it seems clear that’s where the primary inspiration lies.

Closely inspired, but not a direct replica. Vehicle isn’t a direct imitation, however. As with many fonts created by those in the type design trade, it carries out the underlying design motif more consistently than the “real thing.” Based on squared corners that are sheared at an angle, and more condensed than almost any other states’ embossed fonts, just two other states share these two combined traits, Michigan and New Jersey. Each of the three states’ implementations is a bit different but largely the same. While nearly identical to them in major respects, Vehicle’s interpretation differs in the following characters:

• B, D, I: The auto plate versions of all three states include serifs on B, D, and capital I (to distinguish them from 8, capital O, and numeral 1, respectively) to aid in legibility at a distance, while Vehicle plays it consistent with no added serifs.
• Numeral 7: The only exception to this consistency in Vehicle is the addition of a downward serif on the horizontal top stroke of numeral 7, which isn’t present on the actual state license plates.
• E and F: Central arms of E and F on the auto plates are close to full-length in Florida’s version, but shortened in Michigan and New Jersey’s as is more traditional, as well as on Vehicle.
• Letter Q: The short angled hash stroke on Q crosses into the interior of the character on the license plates, as is customary with embossed tags, since there isn’t room for it to hang down outside the character matrix with traditionally made steel dies. On Vehicle the tail hangs down below.
• Numeral 4: One other interesting difference is that Florida’s numeral 4 contains a double vertex at the lower left corner to open up interior space for improved legibility (due to the extra-condensed font design), while Vehicle and the other two states don’t.

Added weight: A final note is that Levine has beefed up Vehicle’s weight, as is often seen with “inspired by” versions of license plate fonts, which gives more “oomph” for mainstream design work.

For further specimens or to buy this font:

Bitstream / Myfonts.com

We do not sell fonts ourselves or field questions about them.

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