Terrible Typography in Asia

Katsumi Asaba is a Japanese graphic designer born in Yokohama in 1940. In 1975, he founded Katsumi Asaba Design Office and created advertisements for major brands, including Suntory and Nissin Cup Noodles.

While creating works focused on Asian writing systems, he was strongly drawn to the pictographic “Naxi script” used by the Naxi people of Yunnan Province, China, and developed the work based on field research.