The archive · Design & Visual · Product decision · 2020-2023
Ilai gives Tamil a psychedelic display voice drawn from 60s counter-culture
Anagha Narayanan's Ilai reworks 60s-70s psychedelic poster and record-cover lettering into a variable Tamil display typeface with fluid, ink-like forms.
Universal Thirst
What it had to solve
Type designer Anagha Narayanan wanted to take Tamil into new territory. Drawing on counter-cultural visuals - movie posters and record covers with compressed, experimental lettering - she reinterpreted them in a different form as her first typeface release, within Universal Thirst's mission of experimental Indic type.
How it works
Ilai is a modern interpretation of 60s psychedelia drawn for Tamil, a script with little history in that register. Designer Anagha Narayanan took her references from counter-cultural visuals - the movie posters and record covers of the era and their compressed, experimental lettering - and reinterpreted them in a different form.
The result is a variable Tamil typeface that can speak in many voices: an elegant monoline, deliberately top- or bottom-heavy weights, and heaviest forms whose letterforms resemble slow-moving fluid or puddles of ink. It is designed for subheadings, posters and display use, including branding, and sits inside Universal Thirst's mission to create new experimental expressions for Indic typefaces.
Ilai began with Narayanan's 2020 SOTA Catalyst Award, when the work in progress was already described as one of the first variable Tamil typefaces. In 2023 it won Best of Type Design at TDC69 and entered D&AD's professional annual under type design.
Why it lands
- Borrowing a loud 60s and 70s display style gives Tamil an expressive register it had never had.
- Variable-font technology lets one typeface range from elegant monoline to heavy ink forms, so a single release serves many voices.
- Starting from movie posters and record covers ties the letterforms to the culture the style came from instead of copying shapes blindly.
- Reinterpreting the style in a different form keeps the Tamil letters Tamil while borrowing only the energy.
What it did
Ilai won Best of Type Design at the Type Directors Club TDC69 awards in 2023 and entered D&AD's 2023 professional annual under type design. When Narayanan won the 2020 SOTA Catalyst Award, the work in progress was already described as one of the first variable Tamil typefaces.
What you can take
A script nobody associates with a style can still carry it: reinterpreting psychedelic poster lettering for Tamil gave designers a new display voice and proved the genre could cross alphabets.
Since then
Ilai grew from a 2020 Catalyst Award work-in-progress into a released variable Tamil typeface within Universal Thirst's Indic-type line. TDC69's Best of Type Design award in 2023 and a place in D&AD's 2023 professional annual made it a documented reference for experimental Indic display type.
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