A Study in Direction
Date
Category
Personal Projects
by Joel Waldrep
Form, Structure & Space
I made this typeface in 2016, and looking at it now, I can see both the appeal and the problems almost immediately. The strongest thing about it is the basic geometry. The narrow vertical strokes, heavy diagonals, and repeated cuts give the letters a recognizable character. There is a real visual idea here. The forms have weight without simply becoming bold, and the diagonal elements create movement that keeps the alphabet from feeling completely static. The arrow-like shapes are particularly successful because they give some of the letters a sense of direction. At its best, the typeface feels somewhere between architecture and machinery. It has the presence of a sign or monument rather than the neutrality of ordinary text.
But the system is inconsistent, and I think that is the biggest weakness. Some letters feel carefully considered while others feel like variations on an idea that hasn't quite been resolved. The relationship between the vertical strokes and diagonals isn't always equally convincing. Some of the internal spaces feel intentional and elegant; others feel more like whatever space was left over after the shape was constructed. The small alphabet exposes this even more. At large scale, the letters can hide their problems because their silhouettes are strong. At smaller sizes, the unusual proportions and internal cuts start competing with legibility. I don't think this is a typeface that wants to be used for paragraphs, and I don't think pretending otherwise would make it better. It is a display face, and probably a fairly narrow one at that. It needs scale, space, and a sympathetic composition around it.
The Art Deco influence is easy to see, as are connections to industrial lettering, science fiction, signage, and mechanical graphics. None of those references are inherently a problem, but they mean the typeface doesn't become interesting simply because it occupies that territory. The interesting part is the particular combination of proportions and directional forms, and that is where I think the work still has room to develop. If I continue with it, I wouldn't add more decoration or try to make every letter more complicated. I'd probably do the opposite. I'd look closely at the alphabet as a system, identify which decisions are genuinely mine, and remove the ones that are only there because they seemed cool at the time. I'd redraw the weakest characters, test the spacing more rigorously, and see whether the arrow motif actually needs to appear everywhere. The typeface doesn't need to become more impressive. It needs to become more coherent. That's probably the most interesting thing about finding it again after all these years. There is something here, but it isn't finished, and I'm more interested in figuring out what it actually is than convincing myself that it already works.