Custom Font: Volleyball World
Width as rhythm: a variable font built on an extreme condensed-to-extended range
In early 2021, Blaze Type was commissioned by Ogilvy Social.Lab Amsterdam to develop a bespoke variable font for Volleyball World, a partnership between FIVB and CVC Capital Partners. The brief required a wide range of width variation to support a dynamic, type-focused graphic system. Blaze built the custom font on the structural foundation of Surt Ultrabold, refining its circular construction toward a more squared geometry to maintain consistency across the full width range. OpenType ligatures were used as the access mechanism for the multiple per-glyph width alternates.
Set in Surt
Insights
- The design shifted Surt's underlying circular structure to a more squared one to preserve glyph consistency across the full width axis.
- Per-glyph width alternates were made accessible via OpenType ligatures, chosen as the most practical method over scripting or external font engineering.
- A variable font version was produced alongside the static alternates to serve motion design, app, and web contexts.
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