PLAYPEN SANS

Playpen Sans typeface family, where digital excellence meets casual handwriting.

Playpen Sans is part of a bigger research and design project, Primarium and Playwrite, that was funded by Google Fonts. Playpen Sans is one of the font families produced by TypeTogether after more than two years of primary research into handwriting education for Latin-based languages.

To create the Playpen Sans font for the educational project, TypeTogether teamed up with Laura Meseguer. Laura used a digital pen and tablet to draw letters, trying out different styles, tools, and speeds. Her drawings were natural and imperfect, just like casual handwriting. The team chose up to seven different designs for each letter and number. They kept the designs looking fresh and natural by not over-correcting them. This way, the spacing between words looked more like real handwriting than the spacing of typesetting.

Playpen Sans is a variable font with a weight range from Thin to ExtraBold, including support for over 150 Latin-based languages and a set of reward emoji stickers for breezy and encouraging uses. Its straight and curved endings for ‘i, l, y’, the two-storey ‘a’, and optional shapes for ‘f, G, I, M’ are clarifying features. The family was made for non-designers and to shine within short, informal settings: greeting cards and invitations, casual signs and documents, and of course children’s books and educational materials, comic books, and graphic novels. It also comes in a variable font version for developers and designers who value ultimate control, data savings, and design superiority.

Prizes: ED-Awards Gold Prize 2024
ISTD International Typographic Awards 2024
Hiiibrand Awards 2023

To read more about the design process:
EXPANSIVE TYPOGRAPHIC SYSTEM: MAKING PLAYPEN SANS