We began this workshop by looking at some examples of vernacular typography, such as the work of the prolific and incomparable Mike Perry. Our task was to create our own typeface based on the vernacular of Elephant & Castle. I tried my hand at emulating some of Perry’s hand drawn lettering but apart from being nice to look at they did not really say ‘Elephant & Castle’ to me (apart from literally). I went back to my research photographs to try to discover an overall vernacular or aesthetic of the area. The overarching idea I got from my images was one of decay - there were many different typefaces but they were mostly peeling off, dirty from years of traffic pollution or obscured by grafitti and fly-posting. I decided therefore to make my typeface more about texture than form and I have created something that hopefully emulatles the down-at-heel tattiness of Elephant & Castle. I used Helvetica as a template because I thought as a well-known and generic typeface it would not detract from the overall feel of the piece.
