NaN Archy Font Family

NaN Archy Font Family is Hélène Marian first release at NaN. Archy takes its roots in Marian’s practice of paint-brush lettering but processes it through a highly digital treatment, suppressing most its organic nature. What’s left is a sans serif in 2 versions, [ON] and [OFF].

[ON] is an exploration of how, in a typeface with a huge weight range (from thin to ultra), glyph structures are altered from on extreme to the other one. Marian embraces the contradiction and delivers a typeface where the glitch is a feature. The structure simplifications made in Ultra are kept in lighter weights, creating unexpected black spots. The lighter you get, the more the weight artifacts become apparent, bringing rhythm to the text like notes on a music score. [OFF] is a more restrained vision. It abandons the glitches but keeps the charming humanist structure and proportions to make an efficient work-horse typeface. The very subtle influence of the paint-brush lettering gives it a slight hint of Art Deco fragrance.