Being one of the chosen artists for the pilot of the PA Wilds Collaborative is one of the biggest highlights of my career so far.
I’ve learned so much over the past almost year while working on this project, not only in terms of refining my skills as a designer but also about myself. As a graphic designer who specializes in branding, and mostly works with clients, I don’t typically have the opportunity to have physical products as my work is primarily digital. So this program, being paired with a manufacturer and creating a series of physical products, is a dream come true. I don’t think I would have been able to do something of this scale on my own without the PA Wilds Team and this pilot.
REVIVING A TYPFACE
At the core of everything I did for this project, the center of the designs and products was the PA Wilds inspired typeface. I've been wanting to design a PA Wilds inspired typeface since 2023. I even have a screenshot of when I added the idea to my digital notes (August 14, 2023), and I am THRILLED that I was able to bring it to life on this scale.
The fact that it's being incorporated into the PA Wilds brand gets me emotional as that is the sort of thing that you dream of happening as a type designer. I'm still learning and relatively "new" to type design, and to be a couple years in and have a typeface I've spent a year pouring my heart and soul into come to life in this way, in a place that I call home, is just pure magic.
s part of the project I wanted to do a revival of a typeface from a Pennsylvania Type Foundry. A revival is a way for type designers to bring type that was traditionally made from metal or wood to the digital era. There are typically two ways to do a revival: a type designer can stick as true as possible to the specimen or you can use the specimen as a starting point and make decisions for the typeface based on the envisioned end use and modern application. I decided to do a little bit of both. I stayed true to most of the features of the typeface, but made modifications based on modern use. After doing some research on Type Foundries from Pennsylvania, I read about the Keystone Type Foundry, which was founded in 1883 headquartered in Philadelphia (and absorbed into the American Type Founders Co. in 1919), and ultimately picked one of their typefaces from a digital specimen from 1907, called Niagara. There were a couple of options that I had narrowed down to, but I felt that Niagara was the typeface that aligned best with the vision and audience for the end products.
I knew I was going to need support with the typeface as I am still relatively new to designing type, and I wanted this to be the highest quality possible. So, I turned to Troy Leinster of Leinster Type, whom I had the pleasure of taking my first type design course from in the fall of 2022. I started working with Troy on a weekly, sometimes bi-weekly basis, and he has helped me refine and develop the typeface into something that I am very proud of over the course of the past year. It still has a long way to go! The Niagara specimen is an oblique, meaning that the typeface has a slant. It’s not a true italic, but designing an italic typeface from the beginning without having a roman to base it on proved to be more challenging than I expected. Up until this point I hadn’t designed an italic or oblique typeface so it was a learning process.
Niagara Specimen (left) and OT Wilds used to recreate the specimen page (right)
My goal is to continue working on the typeface, which I have named OT Wilds (OT referring to my studio name, OneTen), and I plan to turn it into a family. The initial release will have OT Wilds Oblique, and in the next few months I plan on continuing(!) to work on the roman (upright) version and eventually expanding into at least two additional weights (light, and bold) with matching oblique versions.
PA WILDS INSPIRED ICONS
When I was not working on the typeface, I was working on other elements of my project which included drawing a series of minimal icons inspired by the 6 landscapes of the PA Wilds. Using reference photos from my collection, my moms collection, and copyright-free images, I drew icons on my iPad using my apple pencil. I wanted them to have a clear hand drawn feel and be fairly minimal as traditional drawing is not necessarily my forte. I did most of the icons by starting with an outline, filling it in with black color and using white overtop to carve out the details of each icon.
FROM DESIGNS TO ACTUAL PRODUCTS
For the products, I started by doing some mind maps and ideation around phrases that I would be putting on the products that would then use the icons and typeface. I came up with a few sets of phrases and then went from there with developing each design. At this point, I only had a rough idea of what products would go with each phrase and started sketching out various layouts thinking about what products they could go on.
I was super anxious initially about working with a manufacturing partner in this way, but after my first visit and getting to meet Kerry and the XtremeWear team in person, I walked away assured that I was in good hands and that they would be able to guide me and help me as we went along.
Kerry (one of the graphic designers) and I hit it off right away, and I'm super excited that she and I have quickly become friends :) She is super knowledgeable, and was really helpful with suggesting products, helping me sort through options, sending me different color tools and being a sounding board through this project. I hope to work with them more in the future. When I have client projects moving forward that need printing on apparel etc. I will absolutely be recommending the XtremeWear team as people that my clients can trust to get the job done, and get it done well.
I also worked with Saint Mary's Box Company on the box design, and it was very very smooth. I was a bit anxious about working with packaging, but they provided the dielines that I needed and they said that I laid out the pattern for the box very well! Which is a high compliment in my eyes from someone who works on packaging constantly. I hope I can recommend them for any packaging projects I have with clients in the future. I'd love to work with them again.
The PA Wilds as a place influenced my designs primarily in terms of the icons that I chose to develop to represent the landscapes and the phrases that I picked for the products. It also influenced my original design direction for the products as a whole. I came in looking at this from my POV as a brand designer—who are these products intended for? What sort of designs does the ideal purchaser like? How do I want this to fit into the current products sold in the stores? My parents ultimately ended up being my main inspiration as they are who I pictured as the ideal clients for these products and designs. I wanted the products to be things that they would wear. This thinking also influenced which typeface I chose for the actual revival. There were a couple of options from the Keystone Type Foundry that I thought would work, but I ultimately ended up choosing the one that I felt was best aligned with the consumer I imagined purchasing the products.
A REWARDING PROJECT
I truly enjoyed every phase and aspect of the project! The typeface, being the heart of everything that I designed, might be my favorite element, if I had to choose just one. However, I also enjoyed being able to draw the icons and use my drawing skills for that part of the project, and then using them on the pattern for the box is just so cool, and even adding a bit of my handwriting across all of the soft goods. The "PA Wilds" script in the designs was written by me using my ipad.
I’m excited to see how artists and other creative people use the OT Wilds typeface and PA Wilds inspired icons in the future. It’s been such a rewarding project, and I can’t wait to see what is next. I'm hoping that someday I will walk into a store, or local brewery and see someone wearing one of the designs or carrying the tote bag, and I fully intend to walk up to them and introduce myself as the designer and get a photo with them.
