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FontDiscovery 🖼️ 41: Communicate Warmth & Openness, with this font

I'm Hua, a designer and bootstrapping founder building Typogram, a brand design tool. As part of running Typogram, I create this digestible weekly guide with fonts, colors, and design ideas to help founders, creators, and makers step up their game in marketing and get creative!


Hi Everyone 👋

Hope you are having a wonderful week so far! A little update about my pet project, indiegrow. Since the last time we talked, I have been quietly working on it. I sent out my first issue on Monday and I feel really motivated!

Now on to our issue this week!

In This Issue

  • Theme: Openness 😌
  • Font of the Week: Koho
  • Design Idea of the Week: Gif Yourself!
  • Color Inspiration: Chainat Bird Park, in Thailand

cover-1.png

https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fb1000f57-eee9-418f-9eba-365814a9f3e6_716x462.png

img: sample of Koho


Font of the Week

Overview about Kaho

Koho is a humanist sans serif mixing calligraphy with modern influences. It has characteristics of both monospace fonts and humanist sans serif. If we look closely at the letterforms, we see a slight turn right at the beginning of each stroke. Little details like this bring us a calligraphic feel. After the turn, the stroke width remains consistent, which feels functional and mechanical. This harmony between the organic and functional creates a unique vibe that is inviting to the user. Kaho also supports Thai characters.

Font Details

  • Oblong close counters
  • Single story “g”: to showcase its modernness, as opposed to a double-story “g”
  • Slight turning at strokes to hint at its calligraphic influence
  • large x-height (forgot what x-height is? Check out this post)

https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4ec7317e-8ea9-4ce0-a0ae-bd92f06a2a99_1349x462.png

https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F10233354-d382-4a23-b0bc-84ebd8f96dac_1349x462.png

img-top and bottom: font-details of Koho

How to use it for logo

  • Oblong shapes, consistent stroke, calligraphic influence, and large x-height communicate warmth and openness
  • Perfect for tech brands

How to use for marketing and branding

Koho can be used for display and for smaller sizes and more complex reading and information rendering. It has regular and italic in six weights. It can support complex projects like product landing pages and app interfaces. It can pair with Daubenton.

https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F9e625a9a-43b0-4784-8853-e8ab94ab4da1_863x462.png

img: different weights of Koho

https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6d2e2376-062c-455a-8ab9-a51864d96e69_1075x693.png

img: Koho pairing with Daubenton.


Design Idea of the Week

Gif yourself!

You probably encounter gifs every single day. Making your own custom animated gifs can be fun and memorable for marketing your product. It is also simple to do with online tools like ezgif by uploading a video and edit it down to a gif.

My hack is to use Figma’s prototype feature to auto animate quickly (this video does a good job of overviewing this feature if you are looking for one.). Then use screen recording to make a video and edit it down to a gif. This trick allows me to create simple yet custom gifs from scratch when I’m in a pinch.


Color Idea of the Week

Chainat Bird Park

Today we have some beautiful colors from Chainat Bird Park, in Chai Nat Province, Thailand.

Tree Bark #AFA079 | Grass #CFCF7D | Grass #98AC55 | Petal #EED0D3

https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Ff1e295e9-3e51-4498-89bb-6ae1af50d92b_1075x693.jpeg

img: Chainat Bird Park, in Chai Nat, Thailand; source: tripzilla


Jargon Buster!

Sans Serif

Sans Serifs are first seen before the 18th century but weren’t used as widely. Sans Serif fonts do not have serifs extending at the end of strokes. By the early 19th century, Sans Serif became more popular.

https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fda63a80e-5484-41f6-8a0c-9649cc8ba37e_1518x759.png

img: sans serif has no serifs


Creative Prompt

Create a graphic with Koho!


Thank you!

Thanks for being hanging out here this week. Koho is available here. It is designed by Cadson Demak.

https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fe93a1900-2e79-4c30-82d8-f66c527d07e2_1519x759.png

img: Infographic of Koho


If you enjoy this series, you can subscribe here:

Have more questions about design and fonts? 
Please email me [email protected] or find me on Twitter at @HuaTweets.
You can also read the past issues on Typogram's blog.

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