Snippets: June 2026

Snippets is a monthly roundup of resources, news items, inspiration and fun for designers. Have a cool book, show, site, game, app, resource, etc. that you’d recommend to your designer friends? Send it to ed*******@*********ro.com.

Dead Fonts Society

For projects requiring a touch of historic typography, Walden Font Co. offers a deep dive into the world of vintage fonts. The site features fonts meticulously redrawn from old books and printed artifacts, organized into themed sets like Wild West Press and Art Nouveau Printshop. These collections often include period-appropriate borders and clip art to help you convincingly transport your designs to another era.

A Font that Raises the Bar (Chart)

Datatype is a clever OpenType variable font that renders inline data visualizations directly from text. By using simple syntax—like typing {p:73} for a pie chart—the font’s built-in ligatures create charts that scale naturally with your surrounding type. It is open-source and free for both personal and commercial use. 

The Write Stuff

Calligraphr makes turning your own handwriting into a functional font surprisingly straightforward. After filling out a customizable template, you simply upload a photo of the characters, and the service generates a standard TTF or OTF file for commercial use. The pro version adds character randomization and ligature support to ensure your handwriting fonts feel organic rather than repetitive.

Geo-graphically Speaking

NASA’s Your Name in Landsat is a delightful interactive tool that spells out any name using real satellite imagery. Each letter is formed by a natural geographic feature—such as glaciers in Iceland or winding rivers in Louisiana—sourced from a half century of Landsat observations. Users can export a customized name graphic or download individual letter images.

Your New Palette Pal

Coolors remains a top-tier color palette tool thanks to its simplicity; hitting the spacebar instantly generates a harmonious five-color scheme. Trusted by millions of designers at such companies as Apple and Disney, the web app offers a deep toolkit for
extracting palettes from images, running WCAG accessibility contrast checks, and previewing colors on UI mockups. You can download results in various formats, including Adobe Swatch Exchange. 

The Classic Mac is Back

Infinite Mac enables you to run fully emulated classic Macintosh systems (from System 1.0 to OS 9.2.2) directly in your browser with no setup required. This nostalgic environment comes preloaded with software like early Photoshop and classic games. You can even drag files into the emulation or mount virtual CD-ROMs. 

Most Tex-cellent

Designer Tex Jernigan’s site hosts a suite of polished, browser-based retro-media generators. Users can create custom VHS labels, cassette J-cards, and CD labels, making it an excellent resource for nostalgic design projects or media swaps.