2025TypographyType Design

Ephemeral Foam

A reimagining of Helvetica through the organic texture of soap foam — dissolving typographic precision into fragility.

01
Concept

Helvetica's skeleton is permanent. Foam is not.

Helvetica

Precision

Foam

Impermanence

Poster
02
Material Experiments

Every material was tested on the same letterform — Z — processed identically: desaturate, maximize contrast. Only the material changed.

Rope

Rope

Steel Wire

Steel Wire

Aluminum

Aluminum

Band-Aid

Band-Aid

Chicken

Chicken

Mushroom

Mushroom

Broccoli

Broccoli

Cigarettes

Cigarettes

Selected for final
Soap Foam →
Soap Foam
Selected

Soap Foam

Foam was the only material that combined organic unpredictability, surface fragility, and transience.

03
Process — Z

Each letter followed the same three-step workflow. Z is shown here as a representative example.

Helvetica Neue LT Pro 75 Bold printed at large scale.

Step 01

Helvetica Neue LT Pro 75 Bold printed at large scale.

Soap foam placed directly on the printed letter and photographed. In Photoshop, the shot was desaturated and pushed to maximum contrast.

Step 02

Soap foam placed directly on the printed letter and photographed. In Photoshop, the shot was desaturated and pushed to maximum contrast.

Final refinement in Photoshop: tone, balance, and edge treatment adjusted per letter.

Step 03

Final refinement in Photoshop: tone, balance, and edge treatment adjusted per letter.

04
Outcomes

The full alphabet, A to Z, in two emotional registers. Black ground amplifies the drama of dissolution; white ground reads as clinical, archival.

Dark Ground — Dramatic

Dark Ground — Dramatic

White Ground — Archival

White Ground — Archival

05
Details
Detail 1
Detail 2
Detail 3
Detail 4
06
Reflection

Working with a material that actively resists control forced a different kind of design thinking.

Typeface

Helvetica Neue LT Pro 75 Bold

Medium

Photography + Photoshop