Skip to content

Directional Quotations

directional quotations cover
Information

There are a number of different styles of quotations found within our font files, however the two most ambiguous are the straight quotation ' and directional quotation ’.

Straight quotation marks, otherwise known as primes, are straight forms that denote measurements. These characters are found on UK & US keyboards to the side of the backslash key, and are represented by unicodes u+0027 ’ and u+0022 ”.
primes example
directional quotes example
Directional quotation marks are used to indicate ownership, as well as surrounding quotations, and are sometimes known as “Typographers quotes”, “Smart Quotes” or “Curly Quotes”. There are two variants, an opening quotation ‘ and closing quotation ’ as well as corresponding double quotation marks — “ and ”. These quotation marks are often not used, as the directional shortcuts for them are not obvious.

Mac Access


“ — ⌥ Option + [
” — ⌥ Option + ⇧ Shift + [
‘ — ⌥ Option + ]
’ —⌥ Option + ⇧ Shift + ]

Windows Access


‘ — Alt + 0145
’ — Alt + 0146
“ — Alt + 0147
” — Alt + 0148

Note that numlock must be enabled, and the numbers are typed on the number pad.

Application Access


Adobe InDesign®

InDesign commonly has smart quotations enabled by default, however to access these go to Preferences > Type. And then tick “Use Typographers quotes”.

You can also navigate to Type > Insert Special Character > Quotation Marks.

Microsoft Word®


On the file tab, click Options. Click “Proofing” and then “AutoCorrect Options”. Within the AutoCorrect window, click the “AutoFormat As You Type” tab, and underneath “Replace as you type”, select the “Smart Quotes” check box.

Underneath “Replace” select “Smart Quotes” checkbox. Click Ok.
Guides
View All