# Salsa font

> A heavy brush-stroke display face built on an upright italic, inspired by 1970s LP covers.

Salsa is a display typeface by John Vargas Beltrán, inspired by LP album covers of the 1970s and named after the Latin American music genre. Its letters follow an italic structure drawn with a flat round brush. Salsa has one Regular style with 331 glyphs for basic Latin and is released under the SIL Open Font License 1.1.

## Facts

- Classification: [Display](https://trendhub.net/fonts/category/display)
- Designed by: John Vargas Beltrán
- License: SIL Open Font License 1.1 (https://openfontlicense.org/open-font-license-official-text/)
- Styles: 1 (Regular 400)
- Variable font: No
- Glyphs: 331
- Character sets: latin
- Last updated: 2025-09-16
- Official source: https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Salsa
- Page: https://trendhub.net/fonts/salsa
- Tagged for: Headlines, Logos, Packaging, Retro, Casual

## About Salsa

Salsa is a display typeface whose lowercase follows the structure of an italic while standing almost upright. The strokes are thick with rounded ends and swelling curves, the mark of the flat round brush on which the design is based, and letters such as a, e and k end in upturned exit strokes. John Vargas Beltrán took the idea from album covers of the 1970s and named the face after the main musical genre of Latin America; the official notes add that he wanted to avoid grunge, vernacular and decorated clichés. Salsa was his final project in a postgraduate typography course at the University of Buenos Aires and includes swash capitals. The family has one Regular style with 331 glyphs covering basic Latin, under the SIL Open Font License 1.1.

## License

SIL Open Font License 1.1. Copyright (c) 2011 by John Vargas Beltrán (john.vargasbeltran@gmail.com), with Reserved Font Name Salsa.

Allowed:
- Use the fonts in personal and commercial work, in print, on the web and in apps.
- Modify the fonts and build new versions from them.
- Redistribute the fonts, on their own or bundled with software, as long as the license text and copyright notice go with them.

Conditions:
- The fonts cannot be sold by themselves.
- A modified version must stay under the same license and cannot use a Reserved Font Name without the copyright holder's permission.
- The authors' names cannot be used to promote a modified version without permission.

Summary only, not legal advice. Full text: https://openfontlicense.org/open-font-license-official-text/

## Where it works

- **Record sleeves and gig posters**: The design starts from 1970s LP covers, so a band name or an album title is its home ground.
- **Food and drink packaging**: Thick brush strokes with rounded ends give a product name a hand-painted warmth on a label.
- **Restaurant and bar menus**: Section titles in the single Regular style stand out above a plainer text face.
- **Short headings on the web**: The official notes recommend Salsa for titles and short texts, where the italic rhythm stays easy to read.
- **Wordmarks**: Swash capitals are part of the font and give the first letter of a name extra movement.

## Things to know

- **One style**: Salsa has a single Regular style and is not a variable font. There is no lighter cut or separate upright.
- **No percent sign**: The character set skips U+0025, so the specimen shows a gap where the percent sign would be.
- **Basic Latin only**: Latin Extended is not included, so the alphabets of Polish, Czech and Turkish are incomplete.
- **Reserved name**: The copyright notice reserves the font name Salsa for the original; modified versions need another name unless permission is given.

## FAQs

### Is Salsa free for commercial use?

Yes. Salsa is under the SIL Open Font License 1.1: it can be used in personal and commercial work, modified and redistributed. It cannot be sold on its own, and modified versions stay under the same license and may not use the reserved name without permission.

### Who designed the Salsa font?

Salsa was designed by John Vargas Beltrán as the final project of a postgraduate typography course at the University of Buenos Aires.

### Why is the font called Salsa?

Salsa takes its name from the main musical genre of Latin America. The design was inspired by LP album covers from the 1970s.

### How many weights does Salsa have?

Salsa has one weight, Regular 400. There is no italic file because the design itself is based on an italic.

### Which languages does Salsa support?

Salsa includes the letters needed for English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, Italian and other Western European languages. Latin Extended is not covered.

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Source: https://trendhub.net/fonts/salsa (trendhub)