Gallery: Mad Scientist Makes an Alphabet Out of Bizarre Ferrofluids

  • These spidery corallike designs aren't just doodles. They form the Fe2O3 Glyphs alphabet.
    Craig Ward and Linden Gledhill
    01

    03-Unmounted-print

    These spidery, coral-like designs aren't just doodles. They form the Fe~2~O~3~ Glyphs alphabet.
  • Image may contain Stencil Graphics and Art
    Craig Ward and Linden Gledhill
    02

    01-Original-Fe2O3-glyph

    Craig Ward, an ex-ad man who creates unorthodox typographies, and Linden Gledhill, a biochemist who develops cancer therapies by day and conducts otherworldly chemical experiments in his extracurricular hours, made the type system together.
  • Image may contain Art Graphics Pattern and Drawing
    Craig Ward and Linden Gledhill
    03

    03b-Unmounted-print

    In his lab, Gledhill experimented with ferrofluids (magnetic fluids) by spinning droplets of it between two glass plates. With every spin, the liquid would scatter into a unique, snowflake-like configuration.
  • Ward is a designer so saw the configurations and immediately thought of symbols or hieroglyphics. Together they chose...
    Craig Ward and Linden Gledhill
    04

    Fe2O3-138glyphs-grid

    Ward is a designer, so saw the configurations and immediately thought of symbols, or hieroglyphics. Together they chose 138 of the designs and made them "type" characters.
  • Image may contain Accessories and Accessory
    Craig Ward and Linden Gledhill
    05

    07-glyphs-in-typedrawer

    Letterpress prints of the type system are available through the duo's Kickstarter campaign. As for the font's usefulness? That's up to its admirers to decide.
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