Responses by Panos Vassiliou, director and head of creative, Parachute Creative Studio.

Background: Parachute’s achievements had been downplayed in the past by our previous online presence. After two years in development, we wanted to deliver an elevated e-commerce experience and offer a transparent look into the world of our type foundry. Created by design studio Typical Organization in collaboration with our in-house creative studio, the new Parachute website puts a fresh spin on an all-time classic typographic affair. It brings the full spectrum of our work into the limelight and positions Parachute as a type design agency that offers cutting-edge services and eclectic typefaces for some of the world’s most iconic brands and institutions.

Design core: Structured around highly responsive layouts and grids, the new website invites users to browse our various typefaces via an elaborate font tester. Our unique “test drive” mode lets you discover the many styles and supported scripts of each typeface, type in any direction, and facilitate the pairing of simultaneously multiple variable and nonvariable fonts for the first time online.

The website’s grid structure, which combines a swipe and a scroll, showcases fullscreen animations of detailed typeface imagery and limited edition goods in an environment that lets the beauty of the letterform stand out. The website features built-in color and monochromatic themes to elevate each type system’s mood and context. At the same time, its mobile version offers a comparative user experience by including tester and buying options.

Challenges: Integrating the website’s highly sophisticated tester, which was successfully implemented by the skillful development agency SoFar. We intended to provide an online experience similar to the one designers are accustomed to when working with desktop applications such as Illustrator or InDesign. We spent an enormous amount of time optimizing its functions on all popular browsers, and it was successfully launched on smartphones as well.

Navigation structure: The homepage opens with a set of still images and animated type, which one may view either by scroll or swipe. This is followed by the central section, which includes a showcase of each typeface, a tester and an integrated buying section. With the needs of branding and design professionals in mind, the site combines its minimal, rigorous aesthetic with functions that let users explore and buy fonts effortlessly via an uncomplicated, ultrafast buying process. Overall, our highly configurable, dynamic new online presence engages visitors with an authentic, type-heavy narrative.

Technology: In terms of the front end, the website was developed with the framework Nuxt, which provides server-side rendering powered by Node.js. At the same time, Nuxt takes advantage of the reactive functionalities as provided by the Vue.js framework. A custom PHP server app is implemented using the Laravel framework on the back end. The server handles website content, font assets, and e-commerce transactions and business logic. The communication between the client website and the server is utilized through an extended REST API developed specifically for this website.