2016 Winners & Shortlists

Brief Explanation

Al Ismaelia is a real estate development company tasked with restoring the classical grandeur of Downtown Cairo, the city’s neighbourhood relic of a bygone era – while preserving its architectural heritage. We work to celebrate this past and to adapt it to the future. Just like the buildings that we buy; we refurbish them to their previous glory and fit them to accommodate today's needs. This bridging of the past and the future is what has always made Downtown Cairo a fascinating place layered with stories, events, and people.

The Brief

Al-Ismaelia is focused on the restoration of old buildings in the Downtown area to their former glory in terms of architecture, while equipping them to today's needs. The interests of Al Ismaelia in Downtown does not stop at the buildings they acquire, but rather extends to its historic, cultural and artistic values. We are looking to launch a project that would shed the light on the cultural and artistic side of Downtown. The key objectives of this project is to attract the right type of crowd and to reflect the company's passion and interest in the area beyond its buildings.

How the final design was conceived

The idea was executed with the deployment of a team with diverse specializations – Designers, research, typography specialists, branding and advertising, with the aim of spending time in main and narrow streets of Downtown researching and documenting all the different signage in the area. From shops signs, to cafes, restaurants and bars, to lawyers and accountants offices, to theaters, all serve as canvases for many fonts and type faces that could be looked at as a documentation of history, culture or art, or all of the above. This project recreates these fonts in a contemporary setting, develop them into complete alphabet and makes them available for free to be used by today’s artists, businesses and retailers through a micro-site. A book was also developed to document the whole project - Research, design process and outcome. A project to document the fonts of Downtown Cairo and to recreate them is not only needed but also falls at the core of what Al Ismaelia is about; the restoration and preservation of the old neighborhood and its revival in contemporary times.

Indication of how successful the outcome was in the market

Our name, Khotout West El Balad, carries a simple double meaning as the Arabic word khotout is used for both “fonts” and “lines”, honoring the typefaces we created and the lines across downtown Cairo's streets, architecture and signage that inspired them. Our identity was designed as an homage to downtown Cairo’s iconic stature and ubiquity in the midst of constant cultural shifts. Our logo is meant to be dynamic and versatile, yet always recognizable; no matter how things in and around it change.