The Lines of Ogham.

This project was a response to an ISTD brief:

‘The line occupies a central role in graphic communication in general, and typography in particular. The baseline, the timeline, the underline... from the basic building blocks of our alphabet which emanate from the individual strokes of the written word to make the rhythmic pattern of stems in a typeface, to the hot-metal typesetting innovation of the lin-o-type, and the Bézier curve which has facilitated the description of identity in the scalable, mutable forms of variable typefaces. We open up the lines of communication, toe the line, push something over the line, or have a line of work. The line describes, invites, directs and frames.’ (ISTD brief 2024)

When first reading this brief, the old Irish writing system of Ogham came to mind. It is a full developed writing system consisting only of parallel lines. The outcome of this project was a zine that typographically explored Ogham and highlights its visual beauty and simplicity.