How can I select a good font to contrast with my body text?

Question

I'm not a graphic designer, but I'd like to make my site look nice. I've read the primers on picking fonts that match and contrast well. Once I've chosen the font I want for the body of the site, how can I pick a good contrast font for headers etc?

I'm using Sorts Mill Goudy for the body, so how can I find a font with similar letter spacing, but perhaps a thicker, chunkier style, for headers etc?

I can't find any automated tools for doing this, nor can I seem to find font width information etc from Identifont etc.

Any recommendations - either for tools, or for suitable fonts - gratefully received.

Answer 1

If I'm understanding the question, I'd say you're looking for a bold sans-serif font to pair with your serif body font. There's no automatic way to pair them up, but if you take a look here, it might give you some better visual guidance:

FontFuse Gallery:
http://fontfuse.webink.com/gallery

To let you know you're not alone, though, there's even a giant book dedicated to nothing but options for your very question:

The Big Book of Font Combinations:
http://bonfx.com/the-big-book-of-font-combinations/

Hope that helps get you in the right direction!

Answer 2

You can't substitute software for taste, I'm afraid, but there is an excellent and rather unique font manager called TypeDNA that will help get you in the ballpark. It can suggest contrasting or harmonizing heading faces for a given body face (and vice versa), find type harmonies, etc., using the fonts you have installed or from type suppliers, based on its own very large font database. I believe there's a free trial period, but it's also quite inexpensive.