Liberty Letters: Pentagram-inspired capsule collection turns fonts into fashion

Looking to update your summer wardrobe with designer items boasting a typographic twist? Liberty Letters could be the collection for you. Boasting 21 items made by Liberty and Pentagram, the range of items on offer is a bold collision of colour and form that result in endless typographic patterns.

Fonts and fashion might sound like strange bedfellows on paper, but remember that Pentagram recently created a new visual identity for the 148-year-old brand. This included a new logotype adapted from the lettering in the original sign above the Great Marlborough Street storefront, plus the bespoke Lasenby Sans font.

It's this font which makes a reappearance of sorts in Liberty Letters. Created in collaboration with Colophon type foundry and named after Liberty founder Sir Arthur Lasenby Liberty, the Liberty sans letterforms have been cleverly transformed into colourful designer patterns.

Working to a brief from Liberty Fabric's design director, Mary-Ann Dunkley, which instructed them to play without any strategic outcome in mind, Pentagram set about making something in the spirit of 'unapologetic eccentricity'. Fitting, really, seeing as this ethos is at the heart of the Liberty brand manifesto.

The result is a capsule collection where every aspect of the Liberty sans font has been refitted for fashionable purposes. Keen eyes will spot how the negative spaces and stems of the letters have been broken down and rearranged into patterns, although even if you don't spot these Easter eggs, the collection is a visual delight.

Launching with a special scarf created for Pride, the Liberty Letters collection is designed to expand over the coming years. Everything will be available to order online and pick up from Liberty's London store, with a collection of bags, scarves and fabrics currently in the works.

"What's so pleasing about this endeavour is the brand's ability to create authentic products directly from its core identity," says Harry.

"The Lasenby Sans font adapts, allowing multiple re-interpretations of abstract typographic patterns into infinite numbers of fabrics. Liberty has always been as much a maker as a retailer, and hopefully, this project is the epitome of that spirit."