Eagleson

Eagleson is the result of a 10-week project created in the spring of 2023 in Marks & Symbols, a course taught by Karen Cheng in the Visual Communication Design program at UW. This project was also guided with insight from teaching assistants Peyton Todd and Burke Smithers, as well as type designer Marta Bernstein, a graduate from the Royal Academy of Art.

Eagleson is inspired by a hand-painted sign outside of Eagleson Hall at the University of Washington. This Collegiate Gothic building began construction in 1922 and gained landmark status in 2019. The building was named after a former UW student and “yell king” named Jimmy Eagleson. The structure's ornate flairs and somewhat bizarre features have helped inspire the character of our typeface. In digitizing the original sign into a typeface, we wanted to maintain its characteristic quirkiness and modernize the hand-painted lettering.