About Cholla
The Cholla™ typeface family was designed in 1998-99 and named after a species of cactus indigenous to the Mojave Desert. Cholla was originally developed for Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California. Denise Gonzales Crisp, then art director of the college’s design office, collaborated with Hagmann to design a family of typefaces that would include a vast variation of font weights. This diversity of cuts was applied to echo the institution’s nine different areas of study, yet the fonts were to exhibit a unified feel. Formally the individual styles have slightly varying personalities with subtly distinct ideas applied. For example, Cholla Sans Bold includes letterforms with their own peculiar details, rather than being a linear interpolated bolder Sans Regular. All weights share a tapered curve marked out as, for example, in the lowercase a’s bottom transition from the stem into the bowl as their unifying detail. The Cholla family was first used in the radically designed 1999/2000 Art Center catalog which won a honorable mention in I.D. magazine and was featured in Eye No. 31. Cholla’s original weight range included 12 different styles. Today the type family is offered in OpenType format with an extended range of 20 weights, bundled into Sans, Slab, and Wide subgroups.
Cholla™ is identifiable as the first large-range original typeface designed by Hagmann commercially released. Moving on new ground, Hagmann designed these typefaces while: "I could feel comfortable making, first of all, and one that would serve a purpose and had a clear idea behind it, and something that I would want to use myself." Gonzales commented: "The forms seemed classical as well. This combination could have a long life, and be timely. I also saw—at least in the beginnings of Cholla—forms that connoted hybrid, of inter-connection, of human and machine growing together. These notions seem appropriate for a school that teaches design and art."
Sketches of the development of the typeface family Cholla
The Art Center catalog of 1999
Awards
Cholla™ received an award for excellence in type design from the Type Directors Club of New York in 2000.
The Cholla™ type family was a winning entry of bukva:raz!, an international type design competition of the Association Typographique Internationale (ATypI) in 2002.
Exhibited
Cholla was one of the typefaces showcased in the exhibition Frische Schriften (Fresh Type), at the Museum für Gestaltung, Gallery, Zürich, Switzerland, in 2004.
Readings
Experimental Typography, edited by Teal Triggs, published by Thames & Hudson: London, U.K. , 2003. The publication showcases sketches of Cholla's development.
Language Culture Type, edited by John Berry, published by Graphis, New York, 2002. The publication presents the winning entries of bukva:raz!, including the type family Cholla.
Frische Schriften (Fresh Type), Edition Museum für Gestaltung Zürich with texts from Andres Janser, François Rappo, and Fred Smeijers, German/English: Zürich, Switzerland, 2004.