When he was doing the lettering for the tasks of classmates in boarding faculty in Rajasthan, Satya Rajpurohit had no inkling that this ability would lead him to go a design agency that has developed 450 font households for 20 writing techniques on this planet.
“I loved the inventive course of however didn’t but perceive that this was a elementary facet of sort design. Later, I turned fascinated with radium quantity plates for automobiles and bikes, which led me to experiment with customized letter shapes. I’d provide this service to my family and friends totally free simply so I may see my lettering getting used. This was my unintended first step into public typography,” says the unassuming 40-year-old.
Satya co-founded Indian Kind Foundry (ITF) in 2009 in Ahmedabad.
“We began ITF with only one font household (Fedra Hindi). Since then, we’ve got produced over 450 font households, together with 300 retail font households obtainable for licensing and round 150 customized and open-source fonts. A few of our hottest fonts are Kohinoor, Volte, Akhand, Poppins, Satoshi, Common Sans, Swatzer, Teko, and Hind,” he says.
Remodeling typographic panorama with Indian languages
The agency clocks an annual income of near USD 2 million (Rs 16.48 crore roughly) and has round 300 shoppers from Fortune 500 corporations. Amongst its shoppers are giants — equivalent to Apple, Google, Samsung, Sony, Amazon, Hyundai, Unilever, Tata Play, Star Sports activities, SBI, Zee TV, Mahindra, Disney, Kotak, Discovery, and Aaj Tak.
In 2010, Satya acquired the distinguished ‘SoTA Catalyst Award’ offered by the Society of Typographic Aficionados. He has been featured in Fortune India’s ‘40 Underneath 40’ checklist for 3 consecutive years (2016, 2017 and 2018). In 2017, he was additionally on GQ India’s ‘50 Most Influential Younger Indians’ checklist.
At present, ITF is recognised as one of many main sort foundries globally, having developed fonts for non-Indian languages — together with Thai, Cyrillic (Russian), Greek, Hebrew, Sinhalese and Korean.
Nonetheless, what makes ITF particular is its give attention to Indian languages.
“Our mission was to create a complete assortment of premium fonts for Indian languages, pushed by a want for cultural preservation, innovation, and addressing the wants of India’s various linguistic heritage,” says Satya.
The organising of ITF was the results of a collaboration with a Dutch typographer, Peter Bilak.
Peter provided him the possibility to design a Devanagari (Hindi) font for his firm. “When this font was full, we looked for foundries that might publish it. Nonetheless, there have been no foundries in India at the moment for Indian languages. This realisation prompted us to launch our personal foundry with only one font in our library,” he relates.
The corporate secured Star Plus as one in all its first shoppers, who licensed its first Hindi font.
The huge linguistic range of India, with over 11 official writing techniques and quite a few languages, was largely underserved by the worldwide typographic business. Satya and Bilak observed the shortage of high quality and selection in fonts obtainable for Indic languages when in comparison with the intensive choices for Latin scripts.
Creating fonts for Indian languages is tougher than doing so for world languages, says Satya, as a result of Indian languages, in contrast to Latin, are complicated to attract and have bigger character units that require a number of months, and generally even years, to design.
Moreover, it’s exhausting to seek out seasoned designers who’re snug with each the language and the kind design. The ‘matras’ in Indian languages add to the complexity.
‘I can’t think about a single day not serious about fonts’
Satya’s dad and mom needed him to develop into a physician; so he spent two years in Kota however did not clear the exams. That’s when he determined to pursue his curiosity in artwork as a substitute. He joined Chandigarh Faculty of High-quality Arts, and whereas finding out there, he realized in regards to the Nationwide Institute of Design (NID), Ahmedabad. He then secured admission to the distinguished design institute.
“The 2 years at Kota had been the worst of my life. I used to be not pupil in school besides in artwork. Even when I had cleared the medical exams and develop into a physician, I’d have been a horrible physician as a result of it was not one thing I needed to be,” says Satya with a rueful smile.
At NID, he bought involved in movement graphics, one software of which is creating titles and credit for movies. Nonetheless, right here serendipity performed a key function. He “stumbled upon an surprising alternative” in his third 12 months — an internship in sort design at Linotype, the pioneer in making high-quality typefaces.
“That have was transformative. In these three months, I delved into the world of typography, gaining an understanding of its significance and intricacies. The expertise ignited my ardour for sort design and reshaped my profession trajectory,” explains Satya.
His internships at Linotype in Germany and Dalton Maag within the UK had been pivotal in getting ready him to arrange his personal enterprise. They taught him the essential mix of precision and creativity wanted in sort design.
“I can’t think about a single day not serious about fonts. A font is a group of letters, numbers and symbols, all dressed up in a sure type. Once I design fonts, it’s like I’m designing outfits for phrases to allow them to categorical totally different feelings and concepts,” shares Satya.
Fonts have long-term worth. As an illustration, Helvetica was first printed in 1957, but this font stays related even at the moment. ITF develops each conventional fonts (used for textual content in books and newspapers) and experimental or show fonts.
Conventional fonts, equivalent to Occasions New Roman and Arial, prioritise readability and flexibility. In distinction, experimental fonts transcend performance and embrace modern shapes, ideas and designs. These fonts prioritise creative expression and invigorate visible design. They’ve a number of character and are utilized in headlines, logos and posters. For sports activities occasions, kids’s books, and movie posters, ‘grunge’ (messy textual content) is used at occasions, he explains.
The corporate’s hottest font is the Kohinoor collection designed by Satya. “Earlier than Kohinoor, there was no font that might assist all Indian languages. As an illustration, in an airport in Gujarat, we’d like signage in three languages — English, Hindi, and Gujarati. Fonts in a household are aesthetically constant. Apple has licensed the Kohinoor household. In the event you get a message in Hindi or Gujarati from an Apple gadget, the font will probably be from our Kohinoor collection,” says Satya.
By the way, the Kohinoor font household is on show completely in London’s The Design Museum.
The inspirations and improvements driving ITF
One of many greatest challenges ITF confronted was the shortage of expert sort designers in India. College students and interns had been skilled and added to the crew. At present. the crew of 25 members are unfold throughout the globe.
One other vital hurdle was cultivating a marketplace for fonts. Extra individuals, together with college students, at the moment are keen to spend money on high quality fonts, recognising their affect on the effectiveness of communication and branding.
The costs of ITF fonts vary from simply Rs 2,500 for a one-user desktop licence to a number of lakhs a 12 months for a big enterprise licence.
“At ITF, we provide free licences to college students and academics, aiming to assist schooling and nurture the subsequent technology of designers. In 2021, we launched ‘Fontshare’, offering 25% of our retail font library totally free, to make high-quality fonts accessible to everybody. Fontstore was envisaged as a market however at the moment, we promote solely our personal fonts. High quality and royalty are two points that come up if we promote fonts developed by others,” he explains.
Aside from growing fronts from scratch, ITF additionally acquires fonts. Just lately, it has acquired a number of impartial foundries. “We’re on the cusp of launching a brand new umbrella-type foundry that can unite all our manufacturers. Our objective is to broaden our retail library. A key focus for us is guaranteeing our library is inclusive, representing not simply English or Indian languages but in addition these which might be endangered and fewer represented worldwide.
Speaking about his inspirations within the sphere of typography, Satya names Adrian Frutiger — the Swiss sort designer identified for his readability and performance in fonts like Univers and Frutiger — and Herb Lubalin — a inventive typographer who infused letters with emotion and narrative. Eric Gill’s harmonious mix of basic and fashionable types, evident in typefaces like Gill Sans and Perpetua, has additionally guided his strategy to design.
These pioneers have formed his understanding of how sort can talk past phrases, mixing artistry with utility, says Satya.
Satya is the eldest amongst three brothers and one sister. His dad and mom have settled down in Jodhpur. He’s glad that his profitable enterprise has enabled him to repay a big debt for his father and assist his sister’s pursuit of a design profession. Presently single, he has been dwelling in Ahmedabad since 2004 when he joined NID.
He enjoys classical, Sufi, and Rajasthani folks music. Whereas he used to play sports activities at school, at the moment he sometimes finds time for video video games. He likes watching motion pictures, principally Bollywood dramas and comedies. He prefers low-budget movies, which don’t function massive stars — a latest favorite is ‘12th Fail’.
Concerning work-life steadiness, Satya says, “Operating my very own enterprise affords me the pliability to work by myself phrases. Additionally, I discover immense pleasure in what I do, which blurs the strains between work and leisure for me.”
Edited by Pranita Bhat
