Compose every wordmark from one glyph library on a shared grid

Context and Problem Statement

The nine unit wordmarks were delivered as nine SVG exports at four different scales (1.0×; AKRIMET 1.19×; AKLEIA 1.33×; AKIoT 1.735×), with five different colours that match neither each other nor the palette CSV, with letters drifting up to half a unit off their own baseline, and with three different spacing systems (AKLEIA and AKIoT looser, AKRIMET mixed). Every site then copied, recoloured and rescaled them by hand. Are the nine one design, and how is that design kept consistent, extended to new units, and delivered?

Decision Drivers

• One coherent, expandable family: a tenth unit must be able to join without a designer redrawing anything (criteria, ADR-0009).
• Measured, not eyeballed: the geometry is asserted in the build.
• Equity: the marks are already recognised; letterforms do not change.

Considered Options

• Compose every wordmark from one glyph library on a shared grid, with one spacing table
• Normalise the nine exports onto shared metrics and keep them as nine separate files
• Keep the exports as delivered and only unify colour

Decision Outcome

Chosen option: “Compose every wordmark from one glyph library”, because measurement showed the nine already are one design and the differences are export artefacts.

Every letter was measured in all nine files. After scaling each file by the height of its x-height glyph, every occurrence of a letter is the same outline (Hausdorff distance ≤ 0.05 of the originals’ units at scale 1; ≤ 0.37 for the rescaled AKRIMET export). AKRIMET was not redrawn: its paths encode straight sides as degenerate curves, which is why an earlier comparison flagged it.

• Grid. x-height 500, baseline at y 750, box 1000 tall (ascender top at 103.4, deepest descender at 960.5). Round glyphs overshoot 11.3 above and 9.4 below.
• Library. Nineteen glyphs (a b c e f g i k l m n o p r s t u z 4), each taken once from a file exported at scale 1 and well placed, at brand/marks/glyphs/.
• Spacing. One table of side bearings per glyph (brand/marks/spacing.yaml), fitted by least squares on the six files whose spacing agreed (AKRIBIS, AKURALAB, AKUTEMP, AKZOTEC, SOLFARMA, SINGULAR4), leaving out SINGULAR4’s i→n and n→g, which sat far outside the family’s rhythm (0.9 and 1.5 of the originals’ units, where comparable pairs sit at 3.5 to 4.1). Glyphs built the same way share bearings: n takes m’s, g takes o’s left bearing. The table reproduces the other five files within 0.2 grid units (0.03 of the originals’ units). SINGULAR4 opens by 41 grid units at i→n and n→g; AKRIMET becomes 25.5 wider (its k→r was tight); AKLEIA 33.9 and AKIoT 46.2 narrower (they were loose).
• Clearspace of half the x-height is baked into the published files; a tight variant and an inline (currentColor) variant are also published.
• Build. brand/src/build.ts composes the marks from brand/units.yaml; tests fail the build if a glyph leaves the grid, if the six reference marks drift, or if a published file uses a colour outside brand/colour.yaml.

Consequences

• Good, because adding a unit is a row in the register plus any missing glyphs.
• Good, because the nine marks now share one baseline, one x-height and one spacing rhythm wherever they appear together.
• Bad, because AKRIMET, AKLEIA, AKIoT and SINGULAR4 change visibly in their letter spacing; the units should see the before/after (brand/evidence/wordmarks-before-after.png).
• Open: SOLFARMA’s two-colour version, minimum sizes, monograms and favicons (topic 2.3).

Ratified by Demian Montes de Oca on 2026-10-03.