How to Choose a Font: A Workshop

Ever spent 30 minutes scrolling through a font list, only to give up and pick Arial? Every font has a personality. Before you even read a word on a book cover, movie poster, or coffee bag, the letters are already telling you how to feel. Most of us interact with fonts every day, but choosing the right one often feels like a guessing game. In this 2-hour workshop at Atelier, we’re making typography simple, visual, and fun - with zero design background required. First, you’ll learn how to distinguish different fonts and pick the right one for any project. Then you'll put that knowledge to use by cutting and gluing your own ransom-note art pieces with paper and letters. Schedule (1:00 PM – 3:00 PM) 1:00 PM – 1:40 PM | Part 1: How to Read a Font A crash course on font choice. We’ll look at the main families of fonts, the small details that give letters their mood, and simple rules for picking and pairing fonts with confidence. 1:40 PM – 2:30 PM | Part 2: The Ransom-Note Collage Lab Time to get hands-on. Using printed font sheets, magazines, scissors, and glue, you’ll cut out letters and mix different styles to create your own ransom-note art piece. 2:30 PM – 3:00 PM | Show & Tell + Hangout + 🍕🍕 Share what you made, check out everyone else’s pieces, and hang out over pizza, snacks and drinks. What to Expect & Bring No experience needed: Whether you make slides for work, build side projects, or just like making things with your hands, as long as you want to learn about font choice, this workshop is for you. All supplies provided! We’ll have font sheets, magazines, paper, scissors, glue, and markers ready for you. Optional to bring: If you have an old magazine, newspaper, zine, or cool food packaging at home that you’d like to cut up, bring it along to share with your table!