So you want a custom typeface

You want to fully brand your company or a new product. You've been looking around, and at some point you start thinking — maybe we need our own font. Something that's ours. Something no one else has.

If you've never done a project like this before, the process might seem opaque. How does it actually work? What do you need to prepare? What do you get at the end?

This is a short guide to help you figure that out.

Start With a Brief

Before we can talk numbers or timelines, you need to know what you're looking for. Not in vague terms — in specifics. The more precise your brief, the more accurate our estimation will be, and the smoother the whole project will run.

Here are the questions you should be able to answer:

What kind of typeface are you looking for? A sturdy workhorse for long text? A display face with personality? Something in between? Think about how the font will actually be used day to day — in headlines, in body copy, in UI, on packaging.

How many styles do you need? A single weight? A full family spanning Thin to Black? There's no wrong answer here, but it directly affects scope and budget. Sometimes one well-chosen weight does everything you need.

Do you need italics? And if so — true italics or oblique? True italics are drawn separately, with their own rhythm and letterforms. Obliques are mechanically slanted versions of the upright. Both are valid, but they're different things with different effort behind them.

What languages does your font need to support? Latin-only for English markets? Extended Latin for Central and Eastern Europe? Cyrillic? Language coverage shapes the glyph count significantly.

Do you need any OpenType features? Ligatures, small caps, tabular figures, fractions, stylistic alternates — these can add a great deal of refinement and usability to a font, but they take time to design and build properly.

Where will the font be used? Print? Web? Apps? Everything? Different use cases require different file formats, and sometimes different technical approaches altogether.

Who owns the rights? Do you want to be the sole owner of the typeface — full exclusivity, no one else ever uses it? Or are you open to other arrangements, such as an exclusive license for a defined period, or exclusivity limited to your industry? This is worth thinking through carefully because it affects the price.

Take your time with these. A good brief isn't written in ten minutes. But once you have it, you have everything we need to give you a real estimate.

What You Get From Our Side

Once the project is underway, here's what working with us looks like:

Unlimited revisions. We don't count rounds. We work until it's right.

Budget flexibility. Tell us what you're working with. We'll find a way to fit the scope to your budget, or be honest with you if we can't.

Total focus. While your project is active, it becomes our priority. Our commercial releases go on pause. You get our full attention.

A complete product. Kerning, spacing, hinting, testing across environments, generating all necessary file formats — everything needed for a font that actually works in the real world, not just in a presentation.

A proper font specimen. At the end of the project, you receive a professionally designed PDF specimen showing the typeface in use. Something you can share internally, with partners, or with the press.

If any of this sounds like what you're looking for, get in touch. Tell us about your project — even a rough idea is enough to start a conversation.