The design process involved sketching by hand, vector reconstruction, and typographic refinement in digital type design software. Each curve and angle was adjusted to balance legibility with personality—exaggerated arcs, compressed spacing, and sharp intersections evoke mid-century optimism while maintaining a futuristic rhythm.

To accompany the typeface, I created a detailed process book that documents how the glyphs developed. It traces my steps of digital construction, showing how the original signage translated into clean, functional letterforms. Working in Adobe Illustrator, I focused on perfecting curves, adjusting spacing, and finding a balance between the exaggerated retro shapes and the sharper, futuristic angles that define the font. The process book highlights how the typeface evolved.

To conclude the project, our group created a poster that showcased the completed Sputnik typeface. The goal was to highlight its distinct retro-futuristic personality through bold composition and expressive layout. Using our finalized glyphs, we explored different typographic arrangements, scales, and color combinations to emphasize the character of the design.

I developed the initial poster concept, starting from my abstracted S letterform sketches, which became the foundation of the composition. I refined the design in Illustrator, creating a smooth gradient background and adjusting the form’s placement to guide the viewer’s eye and create a sense of flow. The result was a poster

Rachel Lee, Luna Mazin, Caden Mueller, Mareez Saad, Tori Webb, and Emme Camp
Created in collaboration as part of Loyola University Chicago's Fine Arts Department (Explorations in Typography)