Fonts in progress

As type designers, we often work on multiple fonts simultaneously in various stages of development—and other projects inevitably put some of those typefaces on hold. That adds up to quite a few fonts in progress that are close to completion, but not yet finalized to meet our high standards of quality and utility. 

Even though these fonts are not completely finished, we would love to get them into the hands of people who can use them. If you license these fonts now, you’ll get free updates as we continue development, including the final versions if and when they’re released.

We’re going to be honest here: designing a typeface is a long and laborious process. We love it and can’t imagine doing anything else, but it takes a lot of time and involves far more than just drawing 26 uppercase and 26 lowercase characters. Designing and finishing a typeface often happens over a span of years and gives us compassion for Sisyphus endlessly pushing his boulder up the hill.

Many of our in-progress fonts grew out of client commissions, some are historical studies of typefaces that we find interesting, and others are self-motivated ideas that we feel should see the light of day.

All of our “fonts in progress” are high quality, usable typefaces, but they haven’t quite reached our usual level of completeness. You’ll see a few notes about the status of each in-progress font on its page. Common limitations include restricted character sets, missing styles, and incomplete kerning. The designs are subject to change before final release—if you really love the ampersand, let us know so we don’t change it!

Our typefaces Ballast and Cedar are available exclusively from our friends at Future Fonts, who are dedicated to distributing fonts in progress from type designers around the world, both new and established.

By pre-releasing these fonts, we hope to get feedback and motivation from our customers—your input may even influence the final design.

If you’re excited about a particular typeface but find that it’s missing something you need, please contact us about fast-tracking or customizing a final, finished version. This is often a quicker, lower-cost way to get a typeface that is tailored to your needs.

Your purchase of an in-progress font license is like a vote for us to finish the font. If we know people will use a certain typeface, we’re more likely to work on it. And if enough people like something, it will motivate us to get that boulder up and over the hill so we can give Sisyphus a break!