Custom
I extend existing Latin families into Cyrillic and build variable fonts that ship clean. Production files, tested and validated, ready for release.
Extending a family into Cyrillic
Cyrillic is not a translation of the Latin. It is built on different construction logic, with different proportions, different stroke distribution, and different reader expectations. A family carried across without that understanding keeps its shapes and loses its voice. The colour shifts, the rhythm breaks, and the result reads as a second typeface sitting inside the first.
Native readers register this in the first line. Clients usually cannot name what is wrong, only that something is. The work is to carry the same design intent into a script that resolves it differently.
What I do
Cyrillic extension
Extending an existing Latin family into Cyrillic, matching the original design intent across all weights, widths, and optical sizes. Includes localised forms for Bulgarian and Serbian, full diacritic coverage, and kerning built against the Latin.
Custom typeface design
A typeface designed from the ground up for a single brand or publication. Latin, Cyrillic, or both. Variable or static.
Font engineering
Variable font production, OpenType feature development, designspace and interpolation architecture, STAT tables, vertical metrics, localisation logic. Available as a standalone service on typefaces designed by someone else.
Production and QA
Turning drawings into files that pass. FontBakery-clean builds, cross-platform testing, web font packaging, and the unglamorous work of making a release survive contact with real software.
Development under your direction
Taking a concept, a pilot set, or two drawn masters and building it out: full character set, remaining weights, consistent across the family. Your design decisions, your name on the release.
How it works
Assessment — 3 to 5 days
You send the source files and the scope. I return a written assessment: what the extension requires, where the design will need decisions rather than translation, a fixed price, and a delivery date. No cost, no obligation.
Proof — 2 weeks
A pilot set: two masters, full uppercase and lowercase Cyrillic, set in running text. Design questions get settled here, before they get expensive. You approve or we adjust.
Extension
Full character set across all masters. Weekly progress files. Every interpolation instance tested, not assumed.
Engineering
Kerning, OpenType features, localisation, hinting, variable axes. Validation against FontBakery and manual testing on macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, and browsers.
Delivery
Source files, production files, and documentation. Sources are yours: UFO, designspace, feature files, everything needed to maintain or extend the family without me
How the files are built
Designspace and interpolation
A variable font is only as sound as its designspace. Masters have to stay compatible point for point, and intermediate masters have to be placed where the interpolation actually fails rather than where the axis looks symmetrical. Every shipped instance is generated and inspected, not assumed to be correct because its neighbours are. Where a family has more than one axis, the corners of the space get the same attention as the defaults.
Vertical metrics and cross-platform rendering
Line spacing is decided in three places at once: hhea, OS/2 sTypo, and OS/2 usWin. Applications disagree about which of the three to believe. Set inconsistently, the same paragraph leads differently in Figma, in a browser, and in InDesign, and the problem surfaces after release rather than before it. I set the three sets deliberately and test the result across macOS, Windows, iOS, Android, and current browsers.
Cyrillic localisation
Bulgarian and Serbian readers expect forms that differ from the Russian defaults. These are handled through locl so they appear automatically when the text is tagged, and through stylistic sets so they remain reachable when it is not. Kerning is built against the Latin rather than beside it, so mixed-script setting holds together. Non-Slavic Cyrillic ranges — Kazakh, Tatar, Bashkir, Abkhaz — are available where a project needs them.
Track record
Foundry collaborations
Pricing
Every project is quoted individually. These are the ranges most work falls into:
Cyrillic extension, single weight
from $1,500
Cyrillic extension, family of 4–8 weights
$4,000–9,000
Variable font engineering, existing masters
from $2,000
Custom typeface, single weight
from $6,000
Custom family with Cyrillic
from $15,000
Production and QA only
hourly, $85
Retainer arrangements are available for foundries with a recurring pipeline.
Assessment is free. If the scope does not fit these ranges, say so in your message.
I would rather tell you early than waste your quarter.
FAQ
Can you work from our existing sources?
Yes. UFO, designspace, Glyphs, or FontLab. I work in whatever you already use and return files in the same format.
Who owns the result?
You do. Full transfer of rights on final payment, sources included. I retain no licensing claim on commissioned work.
Can you sign an NDA?
Yes, before the assessment.
How long does a family take?
A family of six weights with full Cyrillic typically runs six to ten weeks from approved proof. Rush work is possible and priced accordingly.
We need Cyrillic but nobody here reads it. How do we review?
That is the normal situation, and it is why the proof stage exists. I set the pilot in real running text and explain what each decision does. You review what you can judge — colour, rhythm, fit with the Latin — and I take responsibility for the rest.
How does billing work?
Fixed price agreed at assessment, invoiced in two parts: on approval of the proof and on delivery. Payment by bank transfer or Wise. Contract and NDA before work begins.
Do you do Greek?
Not currently. I would rather decline than deliver something outside my competence.
