City Alphabet

Type design, 2014

For my typography class, I was asked to design a typeface from scratch. Combining my love for illustration and my cultural roots, I drew an alphabet with landmarks and icons of my city. The 26 letters  took shape from local food, architecture, natural scenery, etc. I had lived there for 16 years and the set of letters also captured some of my fondest memories. Each letter starts a word in Chinese Pinyin and the drawings depict the relevant scenes.

The second part of the project is a manuscript with a few letters of my choice. I arranged the letters and short stories to make out the shape and contour of the city map. Stories were written in Chinese Mandarin and English to reflect my dual-cultural identity.

Alphabet design

Manuscript design