For Ishan Khosla (MFAD 05) the impetus to start Typecraft came about after he moved back to India in 2008, following a 13-year stay in the United States. He noticed mainstream graphic design in India looked, “or tried to look,” like design in the U.S. or Europe, and felt designers in India who were trained in a Eurocentric methodology had completely turned away from the depth of visual languages and cultural heritage of South Asia.

The Typecraft Initiative Trust launched in 2011 to engender avenues for greater exchange between urban graphic designers and rural craftspeople. It started as a way to celebrate the rich handmade crafts (and tribal arts) of South Asia in the digital avatar of a typeface. 

Khosla—an MFA grad whose thesis involved the creation of a new design school in India—talks here about Typecraft’s the interaction between craftspeople and type.