Seemingly straightforward, its construction in fact has more variations than any other character. How, then, to choose the right shape? Just copy the Latin or invent something eccentric (to make it looks more “Cyrillic”)? Curved or straight branches? Which form will fit my typeface?
Sure, you have to follow your intuition. But as a starting point Gayaneh gave us a set of rules and pointed out what to take into account. She showed and criticized examples from her own rich experience and analysed the solutions of other designers.
Rules
The main rule is: curved branches are increasingly viewed as being archaic. A new generation of type designers prefers to use the Latin model for Cyrillic. The only excuse for designing something specific is when the Latin form creates a problem with the letter Ж. In this case it is too complicated in the middle, and will look too heavy and spotty in set.
Gayaneh deduced some other helpful rules during her workshop:
- For geometric, humanistic sans and humanistic serif you can just copy the Latin construction (don’t forget to correct the diagonals after cutting off the ascender and check whether it works well for Ж).
(have a look: Geometria, Fedra, Humanist 531, Venetian 301) - The shape with diagonals is for dynamic typefaces, the shape with a horizontal bar is for static typefaces.
(have a look: Institut, Formular, Plan Grotesque) - The curved branches are suitable for a Modern Antiqua. These are not diagonals, but verticals, they make the K look more static and suit the rhythm of the typeface well.
While no rules can be applied to the transitional forms, here are some possibilities:
- You can curve only the bottom branch
(have a look: Mysl) - You can use drops for the upper branch in lowercase to distinguish it from the uppercase
(have a look: BT Kis, Original Garamond) - Or you can just mix all the options, or invent something, but still: try to keep it as simple as possible and keep in mind the intended dynamic.
Compare the solutions of the Caslon 540 with it’s modern version, William. Both are acceptable, but the latter is simpler and looks more dynamic and would thus be preferable today.
You can also check Greta and ITC New Baskerville, which were cyrillised some years ago by Gayaneh Bagdasaryan and Tagir Safaev respectively, though Gayaneh admits that today it would have been designed a different way.
More letters
After the presentation we had the opportunity to discuss our own typefaces or to add the cyrillic K’s to an existing Latin typeface. But unfortunately most participants had neither laptops nor any experience with the topic, which was quite disappointing for Gayaneh and for me, as I expected more action.
In two hours we learned only the roman K, but of course there are also italics. They are much more complicated, because Cyrillic K’s are not clones of Latin K’s in this case, and the letter Ж is not a multiplied flipped K. And there are 32 more letters in Russian Cyrillic alone, plus all that in uppercase. There are also quite a few other languages that use the Cyrillic script and have additional letters. And each character has its own specific feature.
Gayaneh Bagdasaryan
Type Designer (Moscow)
All that you can learn during the three days intensive workshop at Serebro Nabora Conference in Moscow this autumn.
