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Thesis was released in December 1994.
Thesis comprises 3 distinct letterforms– TheSans^TM, TheSerif^TM and TheMix^TM, each in 8 weights (Extra Light, Light, Semi Light, Normal, Semi Bold, Bold, Extra Bold & Black) and each weight in 6 variants (Plain, Italic, Small Caps, Small Caps Italic, Expert and Expert Italic). That is (3 x 8 x 6), a total of 144 different fonts, each with all character positions filled, each fully kerned, none using Adobe standard encoding (so all symbol characters have been specially designed for each weight and form), and with true italics (drawn, not sloped roman).

There is no doubt that this is the most comprehensive family ever produced. The italic forms are one of the most distinctive aspects of this family. Study of other low-contrast typeface designs shows that the italics are often little more than cleaned-up sloped forms ­ not the case with Thesis: the italics stand on their own as unique letterforms, while perfectly complementing the Thesis roman forms.

Originally known as Parenthesis, Thesis was born in 1989, adapted in 1991 and released in december1994 with the first 144 weights. Thesis' thich-thin distribution within letterforms is based on writing with the broad-nib pen. This has resulted in the Thesis family not taking well to modification: even a 5% condensation has visually disturbing results. However, a real condensed variant should be available by now.

In addition, de Groot has developed and put into practice his own theory of typographic interpolation which he initially established about six years ago when he was producing an in-between weight of the Frutiger family for the Dutch PTT (post office).
The weights of Thesis are based on the interpolation theory. Read all about it.

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The designer, Luc(as) de Groot, studied at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in The Hague, Holland, under Gerrit Noordzij. He then worked for four years with the prominent Dutch design group BRS Premsela Vonk on large corporate identity projects.

Thesis has some of its roots in a project for the Dutch Ministry of Transport, Public Works and Water Management. The ministry didn't want a new typeface, just a series of illustration files that could be placed in documents. It says a lot about de Groot that they did indeed end up with a new typeface– and no eps's. The typeface was certainly novel: when you type ABCD you get the name of the ministry in Dutch; type EFGH to get the name of the first department and so on for five other departments. Then if you apply text-style bold, you will have the English translation. If you apply italic you get French and with bold-italic it's all German!

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