Designed by Jim Ford from the Monotype Studio, the Masqualero typeface was conceived while listening to the Miles Davis jazz composition Masqualero from the album Sorcerer.

“With the Masqualero typeface, there’s never a hair out of place,” said Ford. “It’s the black tuxedo or stiletto heels – it dresses up words.”

Described by Ford as a tribute to Miles Davis he said the letterforms were as enigmatic and complex as the musician himself with characteristics that are “contradictory, still, restless, dark, flamboyant and illuminated by scintillating details and brilliant corners”.

The typeface is a dual-natured serif design with six weights and italics as well as stencil and groove display weights, according to Monotype, and will lend itself particularly well to applications such as product packaging, especially luxury packaging, publishing, mastheads, headlines, logos, signage, book covers and annual reports.

US-headquartered Monotype has more than 20,000 typefaces in its library. Its product range has expanded beyond the firm’s print origins to include fonts specifically created for websites, games, apps and car dashboards.