The dissertations listed here represent substantial research-driven outputs that stand independently, or relate to practical projects. This work evidences significant new skills in research, textual and visual documentation, reasoning, and writing clearly. Many topics involve some research with primary material, or developing testing methodologies.
Masters dissertations evidence the knowledge space within which typeface design happens: sociotechnical factors, historical and cultural aspects, material conditions, and intellectual aspects. These constitute the dimensions of typeface design as a field. The research work of Masters students represents the first step in exploring, documenting, and discussing typeface design at a high level.
For several Masters graduates, their dissertations represent the foundations for successful PhD study.
MA Research / MRes dissertations
These dissertations represent the equivalent of half a year of full-time work, and include significant elements of original research. The MA by Research was launched in 1997, and the MRes in 2017.
Aya Krisht (2025), Arabic letterpress revival: A study of the importance of Arabic
letterpress practice and Monotype Arabic typecasting towards its revival
Ragini Siruguri (2024), The typographer in India: A study of typesetting practices and the perception of the typographer in Telugu and Tamil book publishing
Ragini’s Masters research was supported by the Inlaks Shivdasani Foundation.
Weiji Ma (2023), The design norms of Chinese characters: exploration of graphic variations
Weiji is now working on his PhD at Reading.
Meir Sadan (2022), Scaffolding: A case for a multi-faceted approach to typeface design
Abeera Zishan (2022), Reading Urdu on the internet: A study of the typographic gaps between Lahori Nastaʿlīq in print and web browsers
Here is a video of Abeera discussing her dissertation. She is now working on a SWWDTP2-funded PhD project that stemmed from this work.
Steven Swinney (2021), Reframing type specimens
Alisara Tareekes (2021), Font management for conglomerate businesses: Mutually beneficial strategies for type industry and multinational enterprises
Wing Sum Kiki Yau (2021), ‘Outside Western typography’ — The influence of technology on the hybridisation of Chinese-Latin typography in Hong Kong
Andrew Byrom (2020), Letters are things: Roger Excoffon’s Calypso
and dimensional form in typeface design
Andrew is now working on his PhD at Reading.
Dafi Kühne (2019), Alternatives to wood type in the 20th century
Muthu Nedumaran (2019), A fresh typeface for the Grantha Script
Muthu is now working on his PhD at Reading.
Aadarsh Rajan (2019), Knowledge and skill in graphic design: Building towards a parity between qualified graphic designers and DeskTop Publishing (DTP) operators in India
Aadarsh’s Masters research was supported by the Inlaks Shivdasani Foundation.
Deiverson Ribeiro (2019), The tipoGráfica magazine and the emergence
of a Latin American typography community
Wayne Thompson (2019), A comparison of chromatic typeface
production methods in the pre- and post-digital ages
Clovis Valois (2019), Early roman types in Basel 1468 –1500
Wei Jin Darryl Lim (2016), From hot metal to typewriter: studying the Barisan Sosialis’ Plebeian, 1962–1972
Sahar Afshar (2015), The Arabic script: A comparative typographic analysis of characters and styles in various regions
MATD dissertations
These dissertations represent about a third of a year’s full-time work. Given the number of dissertations by students of typeface design since 2000, we list here a selection.
Roy Chan (2025), An analytical framework for the revival of physical source-based metal types: Application to the revival of Hong Kong Type
Joke De Winter (2025), Leading women in the print trade during the 16th century in early modern Europe
Chen Yue (2024), The development of Chinese Pinyin and challenges of the application in typography
Zofia Oslislo-Piekarska (2024), Exploring inclusive approaches to handwriting instruction: A case of the Polish language
Josse Pickard (2024), Ink Under Pressure: Investigating how ink squash is affected by different print surfaces and substrates
Misha Soni (2024), Analysis of Gujarati typography in high school e-learning documents to understand the requirements for Gujarati typeface design
Anna Vasina (2024), Cyrillic Printing in Romanian lands: from the 16th to the 19th century
Xin Guocheng (2024), Exploring the originality of Arabic lettering in Egyptian movie posters (1930–79)
Kajama Chakma (2022), Evolution of the Chakma script from manuscript to digital
Damien Chong (2023), Deriving alternative models to script harmonisation: The case of Singapore’s multiscript environment
Alen Anthony Francis (2023), Minority scripts from manuscripts to digital type: A case study of the Takri scripts
Anna Damoli (2022), An analysis of Ludovico degli Arrighi’s influence on Robert Granjon’s italic models
Richard McDonald (2022), Johnston through the lens of Southall: Evaluating the development of Johnston against Richard Southall’s theories on models and patterns and shape and appearance
Giulio Galli (2021), Early 17th century punchcutters in the Vatican Press
Taner Görkem Küçükaksoy (2021), The Process of reevaluating characters sets, and reintroducing letterforms of the past with reference to Malayalam
Linh Nguyễn (2021), Typeface design as a solution to Japanese multi-scriptual design challenges
Ana Sanikidze (2021), Mtavruli letters and secondary styles in Georgian typography
He Shiyang (2021), Sini Arabic’s letterform evolution and type designers’ approaches to digitise it to a digital typeface
Fred Wiltshire (2021), Development and longevity of the Aldine models of the 16th Century in France
Eric Karnes (2020), Type sizes and styles in the French Renaissance
Adriana Perez Conesa (2020), Artificial intelligence as a creative tool for typeface design
Simon Thiefes (2020), Towards systemic typeface design A systems approach to the practice of typeface design
Keya Vadgama (2020), Rendering complex scripts in digital spaces: the development of layout and shaping technologies for complex script and language representation and consequent approaches to type design
Ryan Williamson (2020), Reconstructing a constructed writing system: The impact of acculturation and language politics on the development of the Sirijunga script’s typographic representation in eastern Nepal and Sikkim
Mark Zhu (2020), From vertical to horizontal: the change of Chinese writing direction and its impact on Chinese type design
Muna Abdel Hadi (2019), The role of typography in the legibility studies of dyslexia
Lewis McGuffie (2019), Why and how to draw a bold typeface to accompany a regular
David Williams (2019), Pitching typefaces: A qualitative analysis of the rhetorical strategies used in Banks and Miles’ Typeface design proposals
Kevin King (2018), Design spaces: The limitations of variability in typeface design
Lee Yuen-Rapati (2018), Motivating factors in the trends of horological typography
Paul Hanslow (2017), Evolution of the Syriac script: a typographic analysis from manuscripts to digital typography
Nathan Willis (2017), Conceptual approaches to automated letter fitting
Yui Yoshitomi (2017), Typographic pattern-making from metal type to OpenType
Shani Avni (2017), David Hebrew: The first multi-style Hebrew typeface family by Ismar David
Kostas Bartsokas (2017), Early Greek printing types
Mohamad Dakak (2017), Reassessment of current stylistic approaches to Arabic type design
Pathum Egodawatta (2017), Milestones in the development of Sinhala typography in the 19th century
Matthias Pauwels (2016), Subordinating italics: An investigation of letterforms during the shift from primary to secondary italics
Rob Pratley (2016), Changing the tone of Latin: The development and form of Romanised Vietnamese
Manuel von Gebhardi (2016), Reimagining text sizing in responsive design
Juan Bruce (2015), The origins, evolution and decline of the Khojki script
Sebastián Castellanos de la Hoz (2015), Banknotes as typographic monuments
Fermín Guerrero (2015), A study of the development of monograms: from Ancient Greek coins to contemporary logos
Becca Hirsbrunner (2015), Sub-Saharan ajami and the Rubutun Kano script in market editions
Ueli Kaufmann (2015), The design and spread of Froben’s early Italics
Norbert Krausz (2015), Trump Medieval: the story of its creation and a re-evaluation of its historical relevance
Noel Pretorius (2015), Jan Tschichold and Wim Crouwel’s use of typography in graphic design
María Ramos (2015), Type design for typewriters: Olivetti
Sergio Trujillo Pérez (2015), Tai-Ahom and its typographical implementation
[Examples from before 2014 will be added gradually]