WT Skrappa
As much as Ken’s lettering served as the foundation for Skrappa, the typeface began taking on a character of its own as the project broadened. Its robust structure an ode to the modernist bombast of decades past – clinical abstraction, methodical construction.
It was first published in 2019 as a single condensed cut – partnered a short while later by an accompanying italic. I gladly worked on a custom version of Skrappa for the NBA basketball team the Utah Jazz for their 2020/21 season which included a new set of wide masters. When I finally returned to Skrappa in early 2023, I noticed a myriad of things which could be improved upon. This led me down the inevitable path of redrawing and redesigning the entire project from scratch – a well needed fresh start in order to expand the family and make it variable in the process.
The update now comes in 5 widths; Condensed to Wide, with accompanying italics. The full family license also comes with a variable font which enables fine-tuned customisation over three separate axes; Width, Italic, and Tracking. As Skrappa gets wider, it also increases in weight to maintain a compact appearance. In its default state, Skrappa has a range of optical spacing adjustments to help improve the letter-fit. However each individual font style also includes a separate ‘Tight’ set with more equal spacing – best used when tightening up the tracking.
The typeface includes a plethora of OpenType features, all the bells and whistles you’d need to create a variety of designs with. For a full overview of the features, technicalities and character-set, make sure to check out the detailed pdf specimen.
