Fen Faivan Font
A gothic typeface inspired by the nostalgic Fen Faivan and its classic pattern.
Concept Inspiration
On a cloudy day in late September, as usual, we were on our way to work. At the midway of the Male'-Hulhumale' Highway, it started pouring tho we had no cover. We both were soaking when we arrived at work. My shoes were dripping wet. You know how uncomfortable it is when this happens undesirably.
So I borrowed Mahryn’s sandals and went off to buy a pair of slippers.
Thankfully, most of the generic slippers are too expensive for onetime use. So I thought of the Fen Faivan, an inexpensive classic. A timeless piece of design. Almost every Maldivian has a deep nostalgia for that.
I walked from stores to shops asking if they have it. After a long tiring walk i found it in a local store down the Bentheyo Goalhi. Surprisingly, It costs just 14 Rufiyaa.
After coming back to the office I felt the urge to write my name on it. Because back in it's time, we used to write our names/initials on Fen Faivan using its geometric pattern as the grid.
Later that day, it just hit me;
"What if we make this a font?"
Even before this day, Mahryn has been talking about making a Dhivehi typeface.
So Fen Faivan became an ideal starting point for us to learn the basics of Type Design. Therefore it'll be much easier if we begin with a Latin Typeface.
Creating the Glyphs
Alphabets
We started with the Fen Faivan pattern as the Grid for Glyphs. The more we explored the more challenges we faced. Along the way we both learnt a lot of new names and terms for the anatomical features of a letter. We added descenders to 15 letters which has a shorter anchor balance the baseline.
Did you know that letters can be dissected into parts as if they were a puzzle? Like people, fonts have personalities, moods, styles — and even anatomical features!
Numerals
Numerals in Fen Faivan turn out to be a sharp looking old gothic typeface. Which is very versatile. But we had to break the Fen Faivan pattern (again) to create the bowl in 2 & 5.
Special Characters & Symbol
At first, we didn’t want to create the symbolic characters because it has to be designed off the grid.
If one must design a typeface, one must include the commonly used glyphs to make it functional.
These symbols and characters are likely to change in future because the font is still in Beta.
Sample Mockups
Get Fen Faivan
Fen Faivan is free to use. By that we mean its for everyone. It comes to life when you use it. The larger you type the cooler it looks.
So go play with it, Create things. And keep us in the know!
Click Here to download the beta version of Fen Faivan.
