Aisha Arabic is a fun, funky typeface that walks the line between text and display typography, with a fluid and carefree style that echoes the unique type and lettering traditions of North African Arabic.
Aisha originated from Titus Nemeth’s research into the Maghrebi style of the Arabic script. Its regular weight is based on antiquarian foundry type Nemeth discovered in a 19th century book, reinterpreted for contemporary usage and technology. He extended the family to four weights, and developed a Latin face to accompany the Arabic.
Aisha’s generous curves and joyful variations are inspired by the expressiveness of regional Algerian and Moroccan lettering. Its smart features provide a variety of contextual alternates, discretionary ligatures, and stylistic sets ready to accommodate Arabic, Berber, and the multilingual typesetting common across the Maghreb. Aisha may be a historically informed typeface but — just like the Maghreb itself — it blends influences from a host of origins into its own unique, contemporary identity.
Numerous alternate letterforms and variable swashes are available to customise the voice of Aisha, either raising or lowering the volume of expression. In the Maghrebi manuscript tradition, exuberant swashes that sometimes reach beyond word boundaries and across lines are a common feature. We have included a selection of such swashes to enable users to implement this typical Maghrebi characteristic in their designs. Taking advantage of variable font technology, all swashes can be customised to the desired length, handing users more choice and flexibility. To offer a broad palette of typographic choices, we have dug deep into the rich heritage of Maghrebi manuscript practice and included many stylistic variations of letterforms. It contains alternates of initial and medial ه (heh), variants of ص (sad) and ط (tah) that can be elongated, two additional forms of final م (mim), as well as some variant letterforms that are particular to the Maghrebi tradition. With the latter – a miniature form of ي (yeh), an alternate rendering of ء (hamza), and dotless forms of ن (nun) – specific manuscript styles can be represented more faithfully.
