The art of digitizing ancient calligraphy

From the moment we wake up and check the messages on our smartphones, we’re exposed to text design. Throughout our day, storefronts and websites announce themselves, first and foremost, through the typefaces they use – whether it’s the Helvetica used by New York City’s subway, the approachability of Cooper Black, or the proprietary CNN Sans that you’re reading on this page.

For Adonian Chan, a 33-year-old graphic designer based in Hong Kong and co-founder of design company Trilingua, the different texts we encounter in our daily lives amount to what he calls a “visual landscape.”

In his hometown, signs written in traditional Chinese characters can be found around every corner. In the hectic district of Mong Kok, neon signs advertise pay-by-the-hour hotels and foot massage parlors. In the quiet neighborhood of Tai Hang, hand-drawn signboards alert passersby to auto repair shops and Chinese medicine stalls.

But one calligraphy style, above all, has come to represent Hong Kong for Chan: Beiwei Kaishu, a dynamic way of writing that has its origins in 4th century China. But Beiwei Kaishu is endangered, Chan says. That’s why he’s on a mission to digitize it into a typeface – and save it.

Written in stone

According to Keith Tam, head of communication design at the Hong Kong Design Institute, Beiwei Kaishu originated in the Northern Wei Dynasty (386 – 534 AD), and was inscribed on stones to document historical events.

In the 19th century, Zhao Zhiqian, a renowned Qing dynasty calligrapher with an interest in epigraphy – the study of inscriptions – crafted his own rendition of Beiwei Kaishu and, using a brush instead of a carving knife, revived the ancient style.

Tam says although it’s not possible to pinpoint when Beiwei Kaishu made its way to Hong Kong, a well-known local calligrapher named Au Kin Kung, who was born in the 1880s, helped to spread its popularity in the city during the 20th century.

“[Au] was what we might call a ‘commercial calligrapher,’ who inscribed many shops and organizations throughout Hong Kong,” says Tam. “His commercial signage work almost always used Beiwei Kaishu.”

The Hong Kong incarnation of Beiwei Kaishu “evolved from Zhao Zhiqian’s rather softer style to become more exaggerated in the stroke beginnings, inflection points and endings,” says Tam, adding that the Hong Kong Beiwei Kaishu is “a lot more dynamic and powerful than Zhao’s hand.”

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Launched in 1957, Helvetica's minimalist and unassuming aesthetic made it versatile, and one of the most used fonts of all time. Easy to read, it has been adopted by many public transport systems, including the New York subway.

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Helvetica is used by many official government bodies, including NASA. It's seen here on one of the agency's space shuttles.

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German carmaker BMW even had its own version of Helvetica designed: "BMW Helvetica" is slightly bolder than the original.

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A brand favorite, Helvetica has been used to create many well-known logos including Fendi, American Apparel, Jeep, LG, Lufthansa, Panasonic, Standard Chartered, Target and WhatsApp, to name a few.

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Created in 1922 by designer Oswald Bruce Cooper, Cooper Black became a staple in 1960s and '70s pop culture. The Beatles used the curvy font for their 1964 album "Twist and Shout," but it was the 1966 album cover for "Pet Sounds" by The Beach Boys that cemented its popularity.

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Cooper Black was also used by The Doors for the cover of their album "L.A. Woman" in 1971.

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The font appeared again on the cover of David Bowie's 1972 album "Ziggy Stardust," cementing its place in the font hall of fame. Since then, it has featured on everything from Nissin ramen packets to Andy Warhol's pop art.

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Designed as a narrow typeset to fit more text per line, Times New Roman was developed for the Times of London in 1929. The newspaper has changed its typeface to variations of Times New Roman over the years to fit with its changing shape and size -- most recently, to Times Modern in 2006.

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Graphique's eye-catching, retro, all-caps typeface was designed by Hermann Eidenbenz in 1945, and most famously used by Netflix until 2014. The streaming service has since updated its logo to the more minimalist red-on-white Bebas Neue font, but the Graphique version still exists in many places on the platform.

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A product of Germany's Bauhaus design movement, Futura was developed by Paul Renner and the Bauer Type Foundry in 1928. It was based on geometric shapes and has been used to great effect in the logos of big-name brands including Nike, Red Bull and Gillette.

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Gotham typeface was originally commissioned by GQ magazine, and designer Tobias Frere-Jones took inspiration from the functional style of New York signage. It gained renown during Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign in his iconic "Hope" and "Change" posters.

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Sharing its name with the fictional city in the Batman comics, Gotham Bold was fittingly used for the DC Comics logo until 2016.

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A pixel-based typeface for the digital age, Chicago was designed by Susan Kare as a user-friendly font for the first Apple Macintosh Computer in 1984. Its name allegedly came from Apple founder Steve Jobs, who wanted the company's custom fonts to be named after cities around the world.

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In 2015, Google retired its classic Catull font for the modern and simple Product Sans typeface that we know today. Rounded and geometric, the new logo still retained the slight rotation of the 'e'.

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Designed by Microsoft as a cheerful alternative to the serious Times New Roman font, Comic Sans was inspired by comic books. Unlike Helvetica, overuse has been its downfall: its misuse in often formal or professional situations led to a campaign demanding it be banned.

Adonian Chan

Hong Kong type designer Adonian Chan has created a new font called Beiwei Zansyu. It's a digitized version of Beiwei Kaishu, a Chinese calligraphy style that originated in 4th century China. The style became popular for use in Hong Kong street signs during the 20th century, but is now disappearing from the city. Chan is digitizing it, in a bid to save it from extinction. Compared to many Chinese fonts, Beiwei Zansyu has a bold and dynamic style.

Adonian Chan

Sweetheart Garden Restaurant is a local Hong Kong cafe, famous for its steak. Its sign is written in the Beiwei Kaishu style. Green and red are commonly used in neon signs in Hong Kong because of the high contrast, says Adonian Chan.

Adonian Chan

Wing Cheung Hing is a medical equipment supplier -- with a plaque written in the Beiwei Kaishu style -- in Hong Kong's Sheung Wan district. The shop is surrounded by Traditional Chinese Medicine stores on busy Wing Lok Street.

Adonian Chan

Recorded in 1964 by Cantonese opera stars Cui Miao Zhi and Sun Ma Sze Tsang, this vinyl album uses Hong Kong's Beiwei Kaishu style calligraphy on its cover.

Adonian Chan

Lau Biu Chiropractor, a Chinese medicine practitioner specializing in bone setting in Kowloon's Yau Ma Tei district, is another company with a Beiwei Kaishu sign. Hong Kong's private clinics often use black and white in their signage, says Chan.

After World War II, Beiwei Kaishu was used prolifically in Hong Kong signage, partly because it is highly legible, even from far distances, says Tam. “Pragmatism is one of the characterizations of southern Chinese people, and Beiwei Kaishu seems to be a pragmatic choice.”

What sets Beiwei Kaishu apart from other Chinese writing styles is its asymmetric construction, bold lines and unexpected angles – something that makes it “energetic,” says Chan.

But with the advent of computer-generated fonts and LED signs, Chan says he observed that signs written in the style – work that depended on the skill of calligraphers – were disappearing from Hong Kong.

“It’s almost extinct,” says Chan, pointing to the rapid transformation of Hong Kong’s urban landscape. “They demolish old buildings and, of course, the shops, as well. So it’s really destruction to the visual culture.” As a consequence, few designers working today are aware of the Beiwei Kaishu style, he says.

Creating ‘Beiwei Zansyu’

In 2016, Chan asked Wong Gok Loeng, a master of calligraphy in Hong Kong and apprentice of the famed Au Kin Kung, to teach him to write in the Beiwei Kaishu style.

Chan then started the process of digitizing the characters. He first writes the characters on paper with a brush and ink, which gives him a sense of proportion. Next, he makes a pencil sketch. Finally, he recreates the characters digitally, using a computer program called Glyphs.

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One of the main challenges when digitizing the ancient calligraphy is striking a balance between the artistic expression of handwritten lettering and the need for consistency and coherence in font design, says Chan.

He can complete two characters a day, depending on their complexity, and is aiming to digitize 6,000 characters.

Chan says his project is geared at doing more than preserving a centuries-old writing style and that he sees himself as building on the work of previous generations.

“We are like co-creators of this design,” he says. He has named his typeface Beiwei Zansyu and hopes it will eventually be installed on phones and computers.

“I see Adonian’s (Chan’s) efforts in turning Beiwei Kaishu into a typeface as a form of historical preservation,” says Tam. “It’s more than waxing nostalgic to bygone eras – it’s reinterpreting and continuing its heritage in contemporary life.”