Since my last blog-post about overlapping of two fields I am interested in, I’ve been searching for pop art based typefaces. I thought it could be interesting, to have a look at some examples and maybe to try out some of them myself. So my research was heading in that direction.
I’ve found a lot of type designers who admired pop art as a movement or were fascinated with pop artists and their handwriting – or just needed to create a distinctive typeface for a project. So, it was relieving to see that there are a lot of creatives out there, taking inspiration from bright colors and irresistible forms of pop art – because like it usually happens, when you deal with the topic for a while, you start losing interest and ask yourself, if you are on a good path.
Furthermore, I was surprised by the number of divergent outcomes of the projects based on the same initial thought, though it is something that proves that creativity always finds contrasting ways to express itself.
I enjoyed this process of searching and I am sure I learned a lot along the way. As I found so many examples (not each of them was good, but it was definitely fun to explore), I had to narrow my selection for this blog-post, otherwise, this would be an “endless” gallery.
Alessandra Daniele
During her studies at Accademia delle Arti e Nuove Tecnologie in Rome, Alessandra Daniele designed the pop art typeface Shape in 2013.
Cahya Sofyan
In 2016, Cahya published typeface family Soda Popp. She says: “The new typeface called Soda Popp is inspired by pop-culture, vaporwave music, and seapunk that emerged in the early 2010s among Internet communities. It is characterized by a nostalgic fascination with retro cultural aesthetics, typically of the 1980s, 1990s, and early-mid 2000s”.
Creative Media Lab
Creative Media Lab published Popstick – an ultra-smooth pop art style rounded sans in 2019.
K-Type (Keith Bates)
Monterey Pop oozes 1960s freedom and optimism, and is based on Tom Wilkes’s poster lettering for the Monterey International Pop Festival in June 1967, the event which heralded the legendary Summer of Love.
