A nod to local materials and craftsmanship, Amakan is a typeface patterned after the woven split-bamboo mats used as wall cladding for traditional nipà huts in the Philippines, translating repeating motifs of diagonal, zigzag, and diamond-like shapes in the weaves into typography.
Constructed inside a square grid producing its monospaced format, it is composed of 3 styles, namely: Sheet, occupying the entire area for the glyph; Strips, made up of horizontal strands to draw the character; and Stripes, filling up the negative space with vertical lines.
Developed as an entry to the 9th edition of the annual 36 Days of Type challenge in 2022, Amakan is now a functional font with 66 glyphs per style, which includes basic Latin, numerals, Filipino diacritics, and some punctuation and symbols.
The current version has a filled 'space glyph,' with an upward weave direction as the default, a reverse stylistic set 1, and a blank space stylistic set 2. When the contextual alternates function is activated, the weave direction cycles between the default and ss01.
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