What is Allerta?
Allerta is an open source typeface designed for use in signage. Allerta was designed to be easily and quickly read from a distance. Each letter exploits the most unique aspects of that individual letter so that each character can be easily distinguished from any other.
Allerta has been released as an open source project so that those countries, communities, and/or organizations without a proper signage system may have a way of quickly designing and implementing one. While Allerta is complete with a large character set, because it is open source, modification and expansion is encouraged.
For the more urgent of circumstances, Allerta Stencil and an accompanying kit have been designed so that signage can be created with nothing more than the kit of letters, a can of spray paint, and the nearest available substrate. Although the stencil kit may allude the finer points of typographic spacing, it is intended to serve the most basic purpose of signage: guiding people towards their destination or towards assistance.
The name Allerta is derived from the origins of the word alert (adj. swift, v. to advise or warn). The Italian origin all'erta literally means on the lookout.
The PDF Specimen
Click here to download the PDF. The PDF includes the full character map of both Allerta Medium and Stencil plus additional information about the project.
Images of Allerta
The Allerta Kit
The kit is a physical collection of letters created by laser cutting Allerta Stencil into cardboard and using a simple dieline for each letter. The dieline is used to create a locking mechanism, so that each letter can be locked into the next. This makes spray painting one message on multiple substrates quick and easy.
The physical kit only exists as a prototype at the moment, but the files needed to create a kit are included in the downloadable file. Kits can be hand, laser, or die cut.
Images of The Allerta Kit
Allerta was designed by Matt McInerney. If you have any questions, feel free to get in touch.