HEX Projects

An interactive web experiment combining a springy-baseline hover effect with a variable font whose glyphs can flex to match the baseline’s curvature:
https://hex.xyz/Shop_Sans/boing/

The CSS code is based on demos from @css@front-end.social with tips from @kizu@front-end.social yesterday:
@css@front-end.social

The variable font is Shop Sans, which I made for exactly these kinds of curved-baseline situations:
https://www.futurefonts.com/hex/shop-sans

It’s just CSS with a variable web font (no JavaScript involved) and would have been impossible until fairly recently.

Issue #2 of HEX News just went out, featuring the new Shop Sans typeface for setting text on curves, previews of other fonts in progress, font uses, miscellaneous personal recommendations, and more.

You can read the web version here:
https://hex.xyz/news/2/

Subscribe to get infrequent new issues in your email inbox or RSS reader:
https://hex.xyz/news/

HEX launched 7 years ago tonight, on Halloween 2018.

To celebrate, I’m releasing a preliminary version of an experimental typeface I started even before that …

Shop Sans is a typeface for setting text on circles and curved baselines. Its ‘Curve’ variable font allows for bending type smoothly along arched paths, with adjustable curvature.

The initial version 0.1 is now available from @futurefonts@typo.social, with more updates and improvements coming soon:
https://www.futurefonts.com/hex/shop-sans

If you’re in Portland, Oregon, tonight @futurefonts@typo.social and friends are hosting a @typecon@typo.social party at the Outlet studio. It’s free and open to the public.
https://www.futurefonts.com/blog/582-future-fonts-friends-typecon-party

Unfortunately I won’t be there, but I’m happy to see Diego Garibay’s design for the flyer uses my HEX Franklin fonts (https://www.futurefonts.com/hex/hex-franklin), including some funky manual adaptations.

@nazhamid@mastodon.social I’ve had Lauweriks up on the site for years, but I’m glad you found it and like it – thank you!

The wild 6 and 9 came straight from the source material, which is still hard to believe is from the early 1900s. @MathieuLommen@typo.social recently published a related article:
@MathieuLommen@typo.social

At some point I also added more tame stylistic alternates for a client who wanted the option to not always be so zany.🤪 I’ll have to add those to the samples on the HEX site soon.

Designer: Writes a nice 3-sentence email asking about using some of my fonts.

Me: Replies with a 600-word essay explaining every possible thing there is to know about those fonts.