In 2022 we were invited by AKU to design a custom display typeface for the new visual identity for the city of Tartu, Estonia. In total, we designed three styles: Tartu Kodanik, Semiootik, and Geneetik.
Kodanik
The main style, Tartu Kodanik, is based on old street signs that are still used abundantly around Tartu. Since the font was going to be used for headlines, it gave us an excuse to emphasize the flaws of the originally hand-made letterforms that would otherwise hinder readability in smaller text sizes.
Semiootik
As a university city, Tartu is closely linked to science and academics. Inspired by semiotics – the study of signs, symbols and their use or interpretation – Tartu Semiootik takes letters as symbols and changes their meaning by turning and flipping them around. Various alternate letterforms are included in the font as stylistic sets, allowing for playful variations.
Geneetik
With Tartu Geneetik we tried to imagine a streetsign-painter who was tasked to do elegant lettering for a special occasion but the paint kept running out during the process, thus ending up in bumpy stroke-continuations. The letterforms also reminded us of a parabola as formal reference to science, mathematics and genetics.
Client: City of Tartu
Graphic design: AKU Collective
Illustrations: Ingmar Järve