Nadav Birenboim

The project

NovoRelic is a bilingual display typeface for Hebrew and Latin, inspired by research into the medieval "Semi-cursive" Hebrew script and the historical Latin Proto-Gothic script. Rather than a strict historical revival, it is a contemporary interpretation designed for modern editorial and headline use, bringing a lost typographic voice back to life.

The Hebrew is built on a deep analysis of eighteen manuscripts, distilled into a single system, while the Latin pairs a 12th-century Proto-Gothic structure with the Hebrew's logic, sharing the same structural tension between round Uncial forms and dense Blackletter. NovoRelic is a variable font, constrained from Medium to Black weight to preserve the compressed, dark energy of its source material across all instances.

Concept

The most crucial design decision in NovoRelic was rounding the bottom baselines of letters while keeping the top "roofs" strictly flat, an unprecedented combination in contemporary Hebrew typography that injects dynamic rhythm and energy into an otherwise rigid structure. To preserve the compressed, dark energy of the source medieval script, Birenboim abandoned an initial plan for a Thin weight, constraining the variable axis from 500 (Medium) to 900 (Black) instead. For the Latin, he explored two parallel approaches: a Light weight inspired by Garamond that matched the Hebrew's typographic color and organic flow, and a Black weight built on medieval Proto-Gothic script, a transitional style bridging rigid Blackletter and rounded Uncials that mirrors the role of Ktav Beinoni in Hebrew. He chose the Proto-Gothic route for its deeper historical dialogue, applying the same "flat on top, rounded at the bottom" logic to the Latin.

Process

Birenboim's process for the Hebrew involved analyzing eighteen distinct regional manuscripts and abstracting their shared anatomical structure into a single vector system, rather than tracing individual historical letters directly. His interactive research, comparing manuscripts to vectors, is documented in Hebrew on his website. For the Latin, adapting a Gothic-leaning historical source to harmonize with the Hebrew without losing its charm remains an ongoing challenge: the Latin design has not yet fully matured, and Birenboim believes the ultimate solution lies somewhere between the color of his initial Garamond sketches and the strict Proto-Gothic framework, requiring further morphological exploration, redrawing, and testing.