Research Projects
India Street Lettering (2013–ongoing)
India Street Lettering is an online archive of the shared typographic culture that thrives in the country’s urban spaces. Built over a decade, this ongoing effort is focused on meticulously documenting, annotating and geo-tagging public lettering made by analog means from around India. This archive informs and deepens my understanding of Indian typographic cultures and design in local scripts, and has been the driving force behind type walks, zines, workshops and lectures. India Street Lettering has been featured in Creative Boom, Kottke, It’s Nice That, Better Letters magazine and Casual Archivist, among others.
In 2023, I was awarded the B•LORE Grant by the Bangalore International Centre to complete a short film — called Letter by Letter — about the street lettering around Bengaluru’s M.G. Road. Photographs from the India Street Lettering archive have been exhibited at Bangalore International Centre (2023), Indian Institute for Human Settlements (2024), Mahindra Sanatkada Lucknow Festival (2025) and the Institute of Mathematical Sciences (2025). Most recently, this archive became the basis of my first book, India Street Lettering: A Journey through Typographic Craft & Culture, published by Blaft Publications (2026).
Primarium (2021–2025)
Primarium is a groundbreaking educational project by TypeTogether, which studied the methods of Latin script-based handwriting instruction for primary school children in over 40 countries. I played a multifaceted role in the development of Primarium’s online research repository: project manager, co-editor and one of the lead researchers. As a researcher, my work was focused on nations in Asia and Oceania. Primarium won Gold in Digital Design for Social Change at the Indigo Design Awards (2024). The project also won Gold at the European Design Awards (2024) in recognition of its excellence in depth and breadth of information, as well as its simple presentation.
In 2025, TypeTogether published the results of the research project in the form of a book, Primarium: Handwriting Education across Cultures and Continents, which I co-edited with José Scaglione. The book reveals how local history, cultural factors, and educational reforms have shaped diverse handwriting models around the world.
This work also formed the core of an exhibition called Primarium: A Case for Cursive, held at the Hoffmitz Milken Center for Typography (2026).
§ Image credits: TypeTogether and Hoffmitz Milken Center for Typography
Selected Writing
Saxena Pooja, “Rereading, rewriting, rethinking: On alternative publishing perspectives,” in Alphabettes Soup: Feminist Approaches to Type, ed. Amy Papaelias (Bikini Books, 2026), 369.
Saxena, Pooja. India Street Lettering: A Journey Through Typographic Craft & Culture. Chennai: Blaft Publications, 2026.
Saxena, Pooja. “Character building: The enduring language of Indian streets” The Caravan, December 2025.
Saxena Pooja, “Indian Sign Painting: A Typeface Designer’s Take on the Craft,” Better Letters, July 17, 2025, https://bl.ag/indian-sign-painting-a-typeface-designers-take-on-the-craft/.
Saxena Pooja, “Lessons from Letters,” Purée Mag, January 12, 2025, https://pureemag.com/2025/01/12/lessons-from-letters/.
Saxena, Pooja, and Scaglione José, eds. Primarium: Handwriting Education across Cultures and Continents. TypeTogether, 2025.
Saxena, Pooja. Review of Sadak: Hand Painted Street Signs in India, by Aradhana Seth. BLAG: Better Letters Magazine, 2024.
Saxena Pooja, “Remnants of Single-Screen Cinema Signs in Delhi,” Paper Planes, March 2, 2022, https://www.joinpaperplanes.com/remnants-of-single-screen-cinema-signs-in-delhi/.
Saxena Pooja, “Devanagari Type Anatomy,” in Building Ligatures: The Power of Type, ed. Linda Kudrnovská (TypeTogether, 2022), 110. (pictured at the top of the page § Image credit: TypeTogether)
Saxena Pooja, “A Beginner’s Guide to Multiscript Typography,” in Building Ligatures: The Power of Type, ed. Linda Kudrnovská (TypeTogether, 2022), 102.