When it comes to combining typefaces, my own process is to keep trying until something really works, keeping in mind that it’s the chemistry between the two that holds the thing together. “Design is relationships,” Paul Rand says. I started this series because we get a lot of questions about pairing typefaces, and because explaining how relationships work (especially in the abstract) is hard.

Not just any serif face is up to the task of pairing well with a dazzling show-stopper like Sascha Timplan’s Prism. It requires a certain contemporary strength, difficult stuff to quantify, I know. Mike Abbink’s Brando seems to mix in naturally.

Today let’s look at some of the possible relationships when setting Pedro Leal’s Mafra with Pieter van Rosmalen’s Nitti Grotesk.