To the untrained eye, H is the definition of remarkably unremarkable.

Human eyes tend to perceive horizontals as thicker than verticals. Low contrast designs worth their salt compensate for this by making horizontals slightly thinner.

But the real beauty of H, is how it defines spacing for the entire typeface.

If you want to figure out how much space to add before your next stem, you simply repeat the space inside of H.

I call this the ”counterspace equals letterspace” rule, and it’s powerful. You find it all of the place. Script, blackletter, sans, serif, narrow, wide—this rule doesn’t discriminate!

H is a control character, meaning that its characteristics define a lot of the design and spacing. Other control characters are O (for rounds), n (for straights in the lowercase), and o (for lowercase rounds).

h is just an n with an ascender, and we haven’t gotten to n, so I won’t ruin the dramatic conclusion! ✌