Fraunces + Work Sans
Grumpy wizards make toxic brew
A standfirst set in Work Sans, one size up — where a pairing starts earning trust.
The five boxing wizards jump quickly over the lazy dog, mixing jugs of quiet vodka while the jury watches. Click anywhere in this preview and type your own text to try the pairing.
“Type is a beautiful group of letters, not a group of beautiful letters.”
— Matthew Carter
Fig. 1 — Fraunces over Work Sans, in the wild.
Fraunces 600 / Work Sans 400 — click any section and type your own copy.
Why it works
Fraunces revives the soft, slightly wonky 'Old Style' display serifs of the early 1900s — gooey terminals, generous bowls — and at semibold it gives headlines a warm, vintage editorial voice that never feels stiff. Work Sans is the quiet modern counterpart: a plainspoken grotesque tuned for on-screen text whose neutrality lets Fraunces's eccentricities register as intentional. Serif character above, sans clarity below is the standard editorial split; this version just runs warmer than the usual Playfair take.
Use this pairing
<link rel="preconnect" href="https://fonts.googleapis.com">
<link rel="preconnect" href="https://fonts.gstatic.com" crossorigin>
<link href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css2?family=Fraunces:wght@600&family=Work+Sans:wght@400;600&display=swap" rel="stylesheet">h1, h2, h3 {
font-family: 'Fraunces', Georgia, 'Times New Roman', serif;
font-weight: 600;
}
body {
font-family: 'Work Sans', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;
font-weight: 400;
}import { Fraunces, Work_Sans } from "next/font/google";
const heading = Fraunces({
subsets: ["latin"],
weight: "600",
variable: "--font-heading",
});
const body = Work_Sans({
subsets: ["latin"],
weight: "400",
variable: "--font-body",
});