New Old English was prompted by two Victorian coins, the mid nineteenth century gothic crown and gothic florin, which featured a gothic script lowercase with quite modern looking, short ascenders and descenders enabling it to fit snugly around the queen’s head or heraldic motif. With thicker hairline strokes than normal Old English, a less sharp, warmer feel than lettering scripted with a pen, and circular instead of rhombic punctuation, this font is an attempt to capture the round-cornered softness of the die-struck lowercase blackletter.

To increase harmony and homogeneity between the cases, the uppercase is narrower and simpler than is customary, without the excessive width or antiquated flamboyance of the traditional blackletter. It might even allow text set in capitals to look acceptable.