Handmade Type Project by Luisa Himmler

                         What reminds you of Christmas?
                         This is exactly the question I asked myself and tried to present an answer                           in my third project.

Our third project is a Handmade Type. We were allowed to choose which program we wanted to use. Besides GoodNotes and Sketches (apps on the iPad), I started out using Adobe Illustrator, but then switched to Procreate. More about that later.

Ever since we had our brief for the third project, I wanted to create a Christmas theme. Originally I thought of a typical Christmas saying with a certain Christmas decoration that reminds me of my home. The Christmas decoration is still in my current design, but I replaced the Christmas saying with a sentence that reads: "Christmas is a feeling!" This sentence describes exactly what I wanted to express with this project.

I browsed a bit on Pinterest to get inspired by different fonts.
Then I just sketched away. Here are a few sketches that didn't make it into the design in the end.

The first two sketches were done on the iPad, the last sketch was done with Adobe Illustrator. However, I just wasn't satisfied with the font. The font I had made with the mouse was not how I imagined it.

After a lot of back and forth, I talked with a fellow student who recommended Procreate.

I watched some tutorials with Procreate, it was exactly what I was looking for, and yet I didn't want to use it at first because I had no experience with it.

However, I knew I was stuck with Adobe Illustrator at the moment. So I got Procreate and just started drawing some sketches.

Here you can see my normal handwriting and on the following picture the improved version of it.

2) Background Details

To reinforce the meaning of the phrase, I wanted to draw Christmas items that reminded me of home. I ended up looking through my albums on my phone and finally found a picture of our Chrismtas cookies from last year. Two of the cookies made it onto this design, here are the individual images of the cookies.

Next to the cookies, I wanted to depict a Christmas market without distracting too much from the font. Germany is kind of famous for its Christmas markets, where you can buy hot chocolate, children's hot punch or mulled wine. Every Christmas market has its own mulled wine cup and for some people it has become a tradition to collect mulled wine cups from the different markets.

I chose a design from my hometown that shows the Ansbach Christmas market.

Finally, I sketched an Advent wreath.

3) Background:

Last but not least, I took care of the background. In the end, it took me longer than expected because I was very indecisive about the choice of colors. It should not be too colorful, evoke a Christmas mood, but at the same time not distract from the lettering and the Christmas themed items.

Final Design:

This is my final design. In the end, I colored the font green, because green looks like Christmas to me. I decorated the lettering with snow, too. The background is gold and I background details consist of Christmas cookies, the mulled wine Christmas market mug and the Advent wreath.

I have been looking forward to this project since the beginning of the semester as I love experimenting with fonts.

Switching from Adobe Illustrator to Procreate was ultimately the best decision for me. I couldn't have done the lettering as it is now with Adobe Illustrator during this time.

Since I already sketched a lot on the iPad before the course and also wrote summaries for other courses on it, it was much easier for me.

Color scheme:

I have been thinking about the color choice for a long time. Especially how the font should appear in the end and I decided to color the font green at the end.

All in all, I am really happy with my color choice for this project. You can see all the colors I used here.

Even though it's only the end of October, I might have been able to get you into the Christmas mood a little bit already. I had a lot of fun with this project and I hope you were able to follow my creative process.

Feel free to write what you think, or if you have any suggestions for improvement. Each of the three projects so far has challenged me more than I thought at the beginning, but I am still very satisfied with each project.