Currently in production! Releasing December 2025! Pre-order now!
India’s cityscapes are a typography lover’s paradise. Take a short walk in any urban neighbourhood and you’ll find signboards in a riot of languages, styles, materials, and colours, spanning decades of design history. So far, this enviable living typographic archive has survived on the fringes. And as digital printing technologies become more popular, we risk losing its handmade, creative essence. That’s where this book comes in.
INDIA STREET LETTERING is a 200-page hardcover full-colour book by Pooja Saxena showcasing striking public lettering from the country — in paint, in relief, in mosaic, in neon, in wood, you name it. Spanning over a dozen cities and scripts, it will be a visual treat!
Photographs of signs will be complemented by essays and interviews that locate them within the broad sweep of language, culture and typography. Pooja will break down peculiarities of local scripts, analyse sign painting styles, and shine a light on visual idiosyncrasies that define street lettering in different Indian cities. She is also creating guide maps for the book, which will inspire you to go type-spotting next time you visit one of the featured neighbourhoods.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Pooja Saxena is an award-winning typeface designer, lettering artist and typographer from India. Through her practice Matra Type, she focuses on designing for Indic scripts, and studying the country’s emerging typographic visual languages.
For over a decade, Pooja has been photographing, geo-tagging, and annotating public lettering to build India Street Lettering, a vast online archive that celebrates the linguistic diversity, historical curiosities, and artistic expression that thrive in the country’s urban spaces. She also guides design enthusiasts on type walks through New Delhi and Bangalore, leads workshops and exhibitions, and publishes zines that bring together stories and photographs from her documentation. Her years-long experience and work on this project will be the backbone of INDIA STREET LETTERING, the book!