Yei (the oldest and the funny one), Seb (the middle and detail orientated one) and Fed (the youngest and the geekiest) joined forces to create Bastarda Type Foundry! Type Designers by trade these guys are paving the way for awesome typography in Colombia—we're loving what they're getting up to, so read on to hear how they go about their day to day and what they design landscape is like in Colombia!
Where did you study and what were some of your first jobs?
As Bastarda is a small studio of three, we have three different stories. Yei (the oldest) studied Graphic Design in Argentina at the Universidad de Palermo, he worked at a small printing press in Bogota for about 4 years, after this he started with four other friends his own audiovisual production agency. Seb (the middle one) studied at the Universidad de los Andes in Bogota, since that time he was focused on typography, later on he started a MA in Type Design at Reading UK in 2015, he worked for about 6 years in Branding. Finally, Fed (the youngest) he also studied at the Universidad de los Andes and after his graduation he started his own business focused on Branding, he also studied and began to specialize in Type Design at the Cooper Union in NY.
What does a typical working day include for you right now?
We can’t start working without music, so we decided as a studio to play music for all, we don’t want to be connected to some headphones all day. On the other hand, we love coffee so we can’t miss it. We’re always looking for internal projects so we spent some time thinking about collabs and funny/experimental projects. Also, after our first coffee, we divide tasks not only commercial projects but also administrative duties.
Who’s on the team, what are their roles and why do you love them?
Fed is the geek, we call him the engineer, he is the one who brings plugins and scripts to include in Glyphs, the software that we use to deign typefaces. Yei is the funny one, the one who brings energy and positiveness to the team, he is a total workaholic. And finally Seb, who is the one that wants to have everything well organized and the one who is aware of details. What unites us is the pleasure of experimenting with typography and sharing ideas and knowledge.
What role does digital design play in your studio in 2018, and how to you apply traditional graphic design skills in a digital age?
Right now Bastarda is shifting towards the digital world through some experimental work with variable fonts, from brands to editorial design. The way that we are trying to include this type exploration is by bringing a traditional printing outcome like screen or risograph printing into most of our work.
What unites us is the pleasure of experimenting with typography and sharing ideas and knowledge.
What is the design landscape like on your city and where do you fit in?
If we talk about Type Design we are a very small community in Colombia, but right now and because we are the only studio with three type designers in it, we are using our place to join forces to strengthen the type production in our country and our region. We are achieving this not only among typographers but also by inviting art directors, brand and editorial designers to our typographic discussions to share our work.
Whats on the cards professionally and personally in the next 12 months?
Our new website is now our most important project for Bastarda, this because we want to become more well known and sell our work abroad. This has led us to learn Cyrillic and Hebrew to include these languages in our typefaces. Of course we would love to spend more time traveling and teaching but for now drawing letters and sharing our projects are perfect!
Where to find Bastarda online.
Website: bastardatype.com
Instagram: @bastardatype
