1914 typeface

Taking advantage of a unique opportunity to develop the future visual identity for the Bolhão Market, we have elaborated a period-based typeface that, simultaneously, has the ability to deploy and assert into contemporary principles. A font underpinned by Porto’s architecture. By means of a process of designing, optimizing and simplifying for a better communication performance, we have used roofs as a metaphor. By assigning three-dimensionality to the typography it became a distinctive one. An imprint that seeks not to lose the nostalgia of an era. This typographic type fits into the category of decorative or ornamental fonts, very common in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and associated with Arts & Crafts and Art Nouveau movements, where its application was extended to posters and ads. These identities are nowadays clearly identified with this period of history and, despite their formal variety, have contributed to the construction of a coherent and cross-identity of the downtown area, itself part of a larger identity — the city of Porto. We designed three type weights, allowing competent execution of all the written graphic communication as well as the construction of an original family of functional pictograms and of a visual iconography theme, as these will strengthen the coherence of Bolhão's identity.

client
GOP, Gabinete de Obras Públicas
Câmara Municipal do Porto

year
2011

credits
Emídio Cardeira
Miguel Palmeiro



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