I love typography. It’s not something I get to talk about often… but I love it. I find little ways to let little type focused projects find their way into my life.
Some time ago while searching for a typeface to use for my wedding invitations, I ran across a wonderfully inspiring project on Veer called Type City. It’s just a great example of what a talented artist can do with interesting shapes. In this case, the shapes happened to be part of a well-designed typeface.
Greatly inspired by what veer did with that awesome fly-through (turn up your speakers, even the soundtrack is perfect), desktops, and letterpress prints, I started a project of my own bringing together two great loves of my creative life. Typography & Disney.
Here is a peek at the result:
I thought it would be fun to turn this piece into a desktop image for those who find this sort of thing interesting.
- 1920 x 1200
- 1680 x 1050
- 1600 x 1024
- 1440 x 900
- 1280 x 1024
- 1024 x 768
- 800 x 600
- and of course… iPhone
The castle is set entirely out of characters, ligatures and ornaments from the Affair typeface created by the totally amazing type designer, Alejandro Paul. Every single bit of type was individually placed (and in many cases placed and replaced several times). It took a lot of hours to hammer out how I was going to approximate some of the beautiful architectural detail of the castle. But it really was fun work. A wonderful diversion from my usual faire of markup and style sheets.
I’ve got an awesome letterpress shop ready and waiting to do some large prints for me. Letterpress was the plan from the outset… these desktops are really just a fun little project for tonight. In it’s final form the Sleeping Beauty Castle print will be approx 35″ x 24″ (I had to scour the country for a shop with a press this large). It’s really going to be a stunning piece… I’m very excited to finally get it to press.
This is the first in a series. I’ll be starting with the classic Disneyland attractions and just see where I end up.
This is amazing! It had to have taken you forever to create! Can you actually print one out for framing?
For now I’ve only got them out in the world as desktop wallpapers. There will be letterpress prints available on this site soon!
Just so it’s clear: the prints won’t look exactly like the desktops. They will rely on the type and impression in the paper stock to stand out without the background colors.
Oh my God – this is absolutely gorgeous. I’ve downloaded and installed as my desktop wallpaper and each time I look at it I am struck by just how complex and beautiful it is.
Who knew typography could look this good?
Amazing work!
Lovely wallpaper! Just saved the 1680×1050 one to my wallpapers folder 😉
@Jonathan Hollin – Thanks so much. Truly happy that you’ve enjoyed looking at it. I tried to put as much eye candy, in the form of detail, that I could. I want people to enjoy looking at it up close, as much as far away
@Fubix – Thanks very much!
@Eli – Than you. Happy to add to any sort of collection 🙂
I will be using this as my new desktop in my office at Disney!
Awesome! I love stuff like this. Would definitely order a letterpressed print of this piece. Great work, Rustin!
This is truly amazing! I cannot imagine the amount of work, time, and love you must have put into this.
@Dan – Thanks! I’ve still got a few prints left if you’re still interested.
@Frinavale – I appreciate you checking it out. It was absolutely a labor of love.