Fontfabric is an independent type foundry and studio established by Svetoslav Simov in 2008. Since its inception more than a decade ago, Fontfabric has grown to include a team of graphic and type designers who work together to create versatile type designs for a global marketplace.
One of the most notable things about this particular foundry lies in its integration of Cyrillic lettering. From day one, Fontfabric has advocated for greater Cyrillic accessibility in fonts, using its Bulgarian roots to its fullest advantage. The Sofia-based foundry and studio has been a pioneer in its home country of Bulgaria.
Fontfabric has also done its part to advocate for the careers of those involved in the field of type design. They conduct lectures and lead workshops on typography and regularly collaborate with local and international designers. Some of Fontfabric’s client list includes Nike, CNET, Nestlê, Lipton, and Hyundai, just to name a few.
With so much success under its collective belt, it may come as a surprise that Svetoslav is a self-taught type designer. He started out as a graphic designer, eventually making the move toward type design full time. He’d always had a love of drawing and of geometry, two skills that certainly influence his work to this day, and his passion for typography has only grown over the years.
Having such devotion to geometric shapes, Svetoslav is particularly fond of typography from the 60s and 70s – styles that continue to influence contemporary type design. He generally doesn’t begin his fonts in a sketchbook; he works directly in a vector program to develop their geometric styles. He’ll begin with a basic shape before its characteristics emerge on the screen, working directly from his mind’s eye as the project comes to life.
That said, he doesn’t necessarily work on one type design all the way to completion. Instead, he’ll leave the project to stew for a while, coming back to it with a clear head and fresh eyes. This break in between makes it easier to pick out flaws and to discern exactly what needs to be altered before a type design is ready for release.
Despite the success of Fontfabric, Svetoslav approaches type design as more of a hobby than a profession, if only because he simply loves doing it. Between his dedication to his own work at the foundry and his collaborations with other typographers along the way, he’s out there living the dream.
One of Fontfabric’s most recent releases is Mozer, designed by Ani Petrova, Mirela Belova, and Nikolay Petroussenko. Mozer is a semi-condensed neo-grotesque type family that offers high legibility and a contemporary aesthetic with “humanistic flavor.” It was designed with moderate contrast and a generous x-height, giving the viewer a comfortable reading experience in any size.
Mozer is available in Thin, Light, Book, Regular, SemiBold, Bold, Heavy, and Black, with corresponding true italics for each. This range of weights makes Mozer ideal for design projects of all kinds, including headlines, subheadings, editorials, publishing, website design, logos, product packaging and informational inserts, marketing materials, merchandise, corporate correspondence, letterhead, white papers, and mobile applications. It’s beautifully suited for branding and identity projects that require design cohesion across multiple media types.
With more than 800 glyphs per letter set, Mozer is packed with additional OpenType features like case sensitive forms, fractions, standard ligatures, discretionary ligatures, subscript, superscript, oldstyle figures, tabular figures, scientific inferiors, contextual alternates, and stylistic alternates for greater versatility. Its multilingual support is extensive as well, covering Basic Latin, Western European, Euro, Catalan, Baltic, Turkish, Central European, Romanian, Pan African Latin, Dutch, Afrikaans, Basic Greek, and Basic Cyrillic for design projects intended for a global audience.
If you’re curious but unsure, Mozer SemiBold is available for you to try for free! Right now through August 4, 2019, Mozer is on sale for 75% off of its regular price so it’s a great time to add this one to your font collection!
Fontfabric currently offers 48 products through YouWorkForThem, a varied range of serifs, sans serifs, scripts, and display type designs to suit projects in countless themes. Visit their portfolio to take a look at the rest of their work and bookmark it so you can check back for new releases!