You know, I think that when you start designing a typeface, it’s helpful to consider that you’re painting one corner of a big painting. That this typeface is just one instance in a theoretically limitless design space of variations. You can imagine the same typeface in wide or in narrow, in heavy or in light, in high contrast or low contrast. There are limitless alternates and you might end up drawing a lot of them or just drawing two or three more masters. But if you set out designing a typeface and consider the relatives of this typeface, you have a different vantage point.

It’s like the type setter that opens one drawer and goes «Oh! Helvetica semi-bold 12 point». That is a myopic view of a typeface. But thinking of an interpolation with several axis is the other extreme where you realize that every shape you draw is just the shape that this typeface takes under a certain constellation of design variables. So, I think for the intermediate designers, that is the big challenge — to get out of the project you work on and widen your view and see that you’re really just drawing one instance. If your client approaches you and says «I need a titling face of that font» or «I need a body text of that font» then you’re not drawing a new typeface. You’re just changing your typeface by changing the variables.

Hannes F. Famira.