Alas is a new take on blackletter, a thousand-year old genre that can still prove refreshing. It mixes calligraphic elegance with psychedelic twists, like bottom-heavy letterforms and seemingly liquid swashes.

Alas has not one, not two, but three sets of uppercase, all very different. By default, swashy fraktur caps. Because these can be tough to read all-caps, a secondary set of simplified capitals jumps in the second you type out two consecutive capitals.
Finally, just for the hell of it, there is an alternate set of Lombardic capitals — a style of letter primarily used for ornate dropcaps in Medieval manuscripts. These pioneered some incredibly innovative forms, divergent from the blackletter lowercase they were usually paired with.

The vibe of Alas is not easily summarized. It is elegant but whimsical. It feels historical, but also strangely unfamiliar. There’s the real power: because Alas walks new territory, connotations can be bent to your will.

It may not be the most practical typeface. Alas. It is a cool typeface.