Our corporate typeface is British Council Sans. It has been designed to our unique specifications and is modern, clean cut and easy to read. The typeface plays an important role in expressing the coherence and values of our brand. Please ensure that it is always applied correctly and unmodified.

The British Council Sans font is available in both Macintosh and PC formats in eight weights in Roman, Central European and Turkish. It is also available in four weights in Greek, Khazak and Cyrillic and a version of the font has been produced in Arabic for use in headlines only.

Click here to download the font

WHICH TYPEFACES CAN I USE?

Generally speaking, all text should be set in British Council Sans. However, there are exceptions to this rule depending on the material and who it is aimed at.

TECHNICAL EXCEPTION

For the most part, we do not use British Council Sans for documents produced on office PCs, since these will usually have only Arial and the standard range of Microsoft fonts installed on them. Plus, were we to e-mail documents set in the non-standard British Council Sans face, font substitution may occur on the recipients’ computers and the type may ‘reflow’.

INFORMATION SHEETS AND FLYERS

Where information sheets and flyers are being created on office PCs for laser printing and local distribution to the public, British Council Sans should be used. Please identify a PC and printer for this work and ask your IT co-ordinator to install British Council Sans.

TEACHING MATERIALS

Teaching is an area where additional flexibility may be needed when it comes to using typefaces especially with young learners. Typefaces other than British Council Sans or Arial should be used sparingly and their use should be restricted to main headings. For these, you can choose typefaces that complement the subject matter. But remember, British Council Sans has been designed for maximum clarity and ease of reading so please use it, or Arial, for any supporting text.

EVENTS POSTERS

If you are promoting a book reading, film show or theatre production, you can make use of promotional materials that use other organisations' typefaces – providing these do not infringe copyright. However, the introductory line and informative text – date, time, location – should all be in British Council Sans, with the British Council logo displayed in the correct size and position.

British Council corporate events normally use British Council Sans only. Arts publications and displays that specifically deal with the subjects of graphic design and typography may use other typefaces where necessary, but they should still use British Council Sans as the standard typeface. Please agree the exact use with Design Department in advance.

ILLUSTRATIONS

Illustrations that include hand-written text elements are acceptable in some circumstances – again, please check with Design Department in advance – but these should not be commissioned simply as a means of circumventing the use of British Council Sans for headings.

PERMANENT SIGNS AND DISPLAYS

All permanent signs and displays must be produced in British Council Sans. The only exceptions are for ‘off-the-shelf’ health and safety signs and some arts-based displays – see above.

GRAPHIC WEB BANNERS AND FLASH BANNERS

All text elements included instatic, animated and Flash banners should be rendered using British Council Sans.

USING BRITISH COUNCIL SANS

British Council Sans is available for use by external suppliers on printed materials and may be downloaded from the Identity standards intranet and extranet sites. All suppliers are required to observe the legal restrictions on copyright.

British Council Sans should be used on all printed applications except for the following:

online (i.e. HTML text): use Arial or Verdana; all static text graphics and text in Flash should be rendered in British Council Sans as illustrated below

desktop applications (i.e. Microsoft Word and PowerPoint): use Arial

joint partner documents: if possible, try to negotiate maintaining the profile of the British Council corporate identity; however, it is acceptable to use the partner’s identity and corporate font where the partner’s investment in terms of finance or organisation in the publication or activity is greater than ours.