Typeface Design for Bol’shoi Gorod Magazine

The first magazine sans serif with Cyrillic ligatures

BigCity Grotesque was originally designed by Ilya Ruderman for Bol'shoi Gorod (Big City) magazine, rooted in old-style serif structures characteristic of humanist sans serifs. Olga Pankova later expanded the typeface, refining letterforms and adding small capitals, new styles, ligatures, and non-alphabetic symbols. The Pro version covers display to demanding text settings and includes old-style figures, numerator and denominator sets, localized glyph forms, and over 1,000 Cyrillic and Latin ligatures.

Set in BigCity Grotesque Pro

Insights

The typeface originated as a bespoke commission for Bol'shoi Gorod magazine before being developed into a retail family.
It was the first magazine sans serif to include Cyrillic ligatures.
Pankova's expansion introduced refined letterforms, small capitals, new styles, and additional ligatures and non-alphabetic symbols.
The Pro version offers over 1,000 ligatures across both Cyrillic and Latin scripts.
The family received recognition at the international Modern Cyrillic 2009 competition.