I decided to work on the identity for [retry.school](http://retry.school/) based on a typeface draft I had previously created to save resources, as my main task at the time was redesigning the entire service. Creating a custom font was my initiative, not a necessity — but it was warmly welcomed by the platform team. Additionally, the style of this draft suited retry more than other available grotesques with Cyrillic characters, which were either too playful or too technologically serious. Therefore, I wanted to personally fine-tune the brand's voice, based on the already established friendly tone of voice present in the brand's communication.

The creator of the retry platform had previously founded another [major 3D school](https://www.school-xyz.com/) and decided to pursue gamified online learning. Given his extensive expertise in 3D, it was crucial to convey professionalism, as clients would surely expect an educational service that takes the learning process seriously. Hence, a sans-serif font with slightly wider-than-normal proportions and squared circles was chosen to reflect technology — after all, this is an online 3D school. After some sketching, a visual solution with curved terminals was found to represent friendliness and the playful component of online learning.

The initial draft was created directly in Glyphs, without any sketches or research. At the time of the draft's creation (before working at retry), I wanted to see what kind of grotesque I could design quickly based solely on my own perception, rather than historical references. I had no desire to create another perfectly neutral grotesque since I lacked both the technical capability (I am not a professional type designer) and the desire — there are already many such fonts available, even for free. I was attracted to clumsy grotesques that deliberately incorporate errors, thus revealing the humanity in their voice. Visually, it resembled Eurostile but was less square and had curved endings on some of the strokes.

After a couple of months working on the Regular style, I began searching for predecessors to this font's graphics and discovered an unnamed (as of yet) prototype for the Bold style from a 1915 book by Italian Futurists (found in the [Letterform Archive](https://letterformarchive.org/)). I made a rough draft of the Bold, after which work on the font stalled: the startup began facing financial difficulties, and I had to look for another job. Since then, there has been no progress: I was either busy with my main job or started another font without finishing the previous one.

I like the graphics that emerge in the Regular style, so I plan to return to this font and refine the Bold style (make it slightly less bold and work on the quality of the drawing), expand the character set, and add an Italic variation axis.