The iconic rainbow flag has been an instantly recognisable symbol of LGBTQ social movements since the 1970s. Sadly, its designer Gilbert Baker died on 31 March 2017, and to honour his memory NewFest (opens in new tab) and NYC Pride (opens in new tab) have partnered with Ogilvy & Mather (opens in new tab) and Fontself (opens in new tab) to create free fonts inspired by his work.
![Gilbert currently comes in monochrome and colour versions [click the icon the enlarge]](https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/qBfCJMMjrsigHQXRpDQuQe-1200-80.jpg.webp)
The appropriately-named Gilbert started out as a font designed for striking headlines and protest banner slogans, and is now being built into an entire family of weights and styles, all of which will be available for free from Type With Pride (opens in new tab).
The first fruits of this project are available now as early beta previews. There's a standard vector font, plus a stunning colour font in OpenType-SVG format, both released under a Creative Commons license (see details (opens in new tab)) that means you're welcome to use them in pretty much any way you like. Bear in mind though, that the colour font is currently only usable in Photoshop CC 2017.
Type With Pride has also created some free downloadable art (opens in new tab) intended to be printed and held high at pride events, protests and rallies; you can find them all over at the site. And to find out more about the Gilbert font, including how Fontself managed to turn Ogilvy & Mather's colour artwork into a full font in under a week, check out the development blog (opens in new tab).
Related articles:
- 5 creative uses for fonts you may not have thought of (opens in new tab)
- 10 fun fonts to liven up your design projects (opens in new tab)
- Serif vs sans serif in logo design (opens in new tab)
