Domino Mono is an experimental monospaced variable typeface that allows users to adjust weight and angle to achieve the desired look. Inspired by toppling dominoes, its oblique letter shapes are designed by tilting or dismantling fragments instead of shearing or reforming.
Type Specimens Manifesto
We’re always thrilled to receive new type specimens, and today we’re excited to share something special with you: character#04, the fourth edition of the specimag by Character Type. This unique blend of a type magazine and typeface specimen showcases Character Type’s latest creations, Early Sans and Late Serif.
In this issue, you’ll find The Alphabetical Room, an intriguing exploration into writing within a 3D grid by the talented Liad Shadmi. This thought-provoking piece pushes the envelope on what we can achieve with type in a spatial context.
The magazine itself is a tactile delight. It is printed with three spot colors on rough, natural paper. As a result, it’s not just a visual feast but a sensory experience. You can purchase it in our shop and easily add this gem to your collection!
A Spotlight on Independent Type: Our Latest Projects and Curated Selections
We’re also working on the new edition of Support Independent Type. We have carefully curated an impressive selection of typefaces and are excited to feature them.
Support Independent Type is a book about the evolving culture of type specimens. It explores the impact of type specimens on design and the typographic culture. This book acts as a manifesto for independent type foundries. Moreover, this book acts as a manifesto for independent type foundries. It showcases their work to promote freshly designed fonts and highlights why we should support them. Featuring over 400 of today’s most adventurous typography labels and designers, the book displays both physical and digital type specimens. This collection provides a glimpse into the adventurous shift within this creative industry.
Stay tuned for more details as we continue to celebrate and support the vibrant world of independent type design.
Happy typing!
kali billi dhiskyaon
“Kali billi dhiskyaon” (काली बिल्ली धिस्क्याओं) in Hindi translates to “black cat boom.” In India, black cats are often associated with superstitions and considered omens of bad luck. The word “dhiskyaon” is an onomatopoeic expression mimicking the sound of a bullet, often used in old action movies when technology wasn’t very advanced.
This is a zine that explores various cat idioms commonly used in northern India. This particular page focuses solely on the black cat and the phrase “Kali billi.
Whatnot
Whatnot is an exploration of the peculiarities of human language. This project explores how an idiom may suggest a geographic region while the term’s meaning may remain ambiguous.
INKBLOT
Justine created INKBLOT to visually mirror the sounds from the radio station WESTREX on Stegi Radio, which features trance, drum and bass, and electronic music. The genres combine fluid sounds with rigid beats, which she translated visually by combining organic liquid shapes with geometric rules. Her method was an experiment in shapes and form, tweaking each letter within its grid until it was right, ultimately resulting in a mesmerizing typeface that combines organic with orderly.
Emotional Complextity
This was created to explore how graphic design can communicate the nuances of emotions. It shows how our emotions are complex and uncertain. I intended to create each letter negatively, yet some of the words I randomly created do not look negative. I realised that emotion is quite similar to this phenomenon. This work tells emotion is just how we observe ourselves.
ADHD Font
This alphabet was created for an ADHD play poster to depict the inner experience of ADHD. The font’s shallow, loopy strokes symbolize how ideas interconnect and multiply, mirroring the rapid flow of thoughts and tasks in an ADHD brain.
A qué horas?
“A qué horas?” is a colloquial expression that denotes surprise at the speed of time and its passage. This poster was made to mark a friend/collaborator’s studio’s 15’s year anniversary. The lettering was made of equal rectangles as a strategy to fill up the page minimizing the negative space and each letter shape stems from quick impulsive ideas. The circle from the studio’s logo appears as the dot on the question mark and it’s used as a punch hole to create the counters inside the letters.
Sympoiesis: original-copies
Sympoiesis means ‘to make together,’ highlighting collaboration. This exhibition critiques ecological harm, promoting interdependence inspired by Thoreau and Morris. Artists explore serendipity, randomness, and the balance between copying and originality, emphasizing nothing exists in isolation. These graphic pieces are part of the exhibition’s identity. We explored repetition as a form of copy, where organic or human errors emerged, attempting to create industrial shapes.
Galattica Lettering Process
This project showcases the process of creating lettering proposals used as logos for the electronic music event Galattica. The client requested a design with cosmic and dreamlike qualities, featuring intentionally rough shapes with dusty textures. The designs are based on either grid and module systems (including derivations) or purely organic shapes.
Lanage
Lanage, a made-up word made up of latex and drainage, comes from the creation process of this experimental typeface. In plexiglass plates, screws with long nuts were turned according to a certain grid and a balloon as you know it from circus clowns was braced and inflated in the shape of the letters. The font is a tribute to the contrast of man-made and nature, soft and hard, cold and warm, artificial bone and flesh…
Rhizome
The project explored an irregular, randomly spreading rhizome form, analyzed through graphic experiments and implemented in typography. The goal was to represent type abstractly and explore the boundaries between type and graphics. The investigation focused on whether type retains its identity when it loses readability. The type evolves from an indistinct point to a complex form, where poor readability allows glyphs to overlap and interfere.
Bubble Bath
Bubble Bath is a variable font that ranges from bold, round shapes to their star-like reversal. With the aim to combine type design and creative coding, the grid on which the typeface is based, as well as the individual design of each letter, was created using JavaScript.
Phonetic Writing
Inspired by the work of Alexander Melville Bell in phonetics and visual speech, a novel system has been devised to visually represent the phonetic elements of Farsi Dari. Each symbol is designed to convey the unique sounds and nu- ances of the language, drawing from both its historical roots and contemporary usage. This constellation not only serves as a representation of the Farsi Dari language but also as a testament to the intricate inter- play between sound, sight, and meaning.
NLAFU
“Never leave any font untouched” defies the classic design rule against altering fonts. By fluidly sketching the outlines of abstract letters, it challenges convention, turning text into a dynamic visual statement that redefines the boundaries of graphic design.
Hoarders
Hey, thank you for reading this. You must be curious what I am about to say. Let me tell you we have mich more in common than you might think. I am a creation out of what we collect on this earth and these ideas resonate in what I am; a typeface. You, on the other hand are also a collection but sometimes even much more. A collection of mental strength and physical emotions of all the people who were here before you. Do you know what I mean?
PDB Reynolds x Scanographe
A Hand-drawn typography in ballpoint pen against iridescent multicolored objects scanned in high definition. The scanned material dresses the lettering and gives body to an image. The first three letters of the alphabet appear and disappear with layers.
AGRESOR
This Typeface is the visualization of aggression and brutality. The pointed, sharp edges warn against the use of each individual letter. Only the brave dare to tame this Font and allow peace and harmony to return
into font family
Into is a geometric typeface that investigates the relationships between positive and negative spaces in letterforms, analyzing the different ways in which form and counterform can be manipulated in relation to each other to construct ambiguous letters, single codes.
there is a typo in my name
The poster interprets the word ‘fact’ as a pile of randomly stacked letters, one of which precariously supports the entire structure. Visually, this represents the instability and susceptibility to manipulation inherent in everyday reality. The poster was created in response to the exhibition ‘There Is a Typo in My Name,’ accompanying the typographic conference typo.id, held at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw.
nessun dorma
The poster and visual identity of the exhibition is based on typographic solutions and refers to urban-biological structures and city plan motifs central to Pavlo Makov’s work. It reflects the process of manipulating these elements by combining small fragments into larger wholes, capturing the complexity of his artistic vision. Simultaneously, it visualizes a theme of unease and instability, reflecting the daily reality in the artist’s country of origin.
playpen
The poster and visual identity based on experimenting with the analog distortion of letterpress print, references the objects presented in Mateusz Dąbrowski’s exhibition. These objects, through their movement and sound following the motion, physically determine the space around them.
typo scratch
The typographic installation explores different meanings of the word ‘scratch’ through seven large-scale works, each interpreting the letter graphically and typographically. Rhythmic, analogue structures allude to musical sources and emphasize the literal sense of ‘scratch,’ creating ruptures in space. Layers of words and X-black forms intermingle, giving the impression of scraping out space. Metaphorically, it reflects on loss and absence, altering our perception.
Experimental Numbers
Experimental numbers inspired by the year 1958. The design features a continuous and alternating grid of bricks that transforms dynamically.