Video Imagines What It Would Be Like if Fonts Interacted

Funny Video Series Imagines What It Would Be Like if Fonts Could Talk to Each Other

By Regina Sienra on February 5, 2024

Fonts hanging out pic.twitter.com/rXUzNNlQp7

— Elle Cordova (@ellerhymes) January 23, 2024

You don't need to be a designer to know that different fonts serve different purposes. For example, typefaces with serifs—those little tails at the end of the letters—make it easier to read long texts, while sans serifs (meaning without serifs) offer a clearer design that you can recognize quickly, like subway stop names. Playing on this idea, Elle Cordova has created some funny videos imagining how typefaces would interact with one another.

Cordova imagines the famed Times New Roman as a reflective person. Wearing glasses and a sensible cable knit sweater, this typeface doesn't dwell on the past. “Do I miss being the default font? No,” Cordova says, impersonating the font. “Like I told Calibri back in 2007, I've done my time.” A fellow serif replies that it was made for newspapers and shouldn't be languishing “in double spaced essays written by eighth-graders.”

In Cordova's tale, the sans serifs like Futura and Arial disagree, saying that their counterparts “think they're so important just because they're wearing little top hats and booties.” But it's not all arguments between these anthropomorphized typefaces. Cordova also imagines an whole story arc in which Arial falls head over heels for designer-favorite Helvetica, who doesn't miss a beat telling an excited Papyrus there's no room for them at its “art poster thing.”

For a video that is a little over a minute, Cordova expertly outlines the personalities of a handful of typefaces. Even the controversial Comic Sans makes an appearance, donning colorful hair and a tie-dye sweatshirt.

In a follow up video, Cordova even addresses a shake up in the design world. In 2023, Microsoft switched from Calibri to Aptos as their new default font. And so, Calibri one day walks into work and notices someone sitting in its chair. Having been through the same experience, Times New Roman offers some comfort, reminding it that at least it's legible—unlike the Dingbats, which apparently know the secrets of the universe.

To stay up to date with Cordova's clever videos, you can follow her on X, formerly Twitter.