BETWEEN WORLDS
BETWEEN WORLDS
Between Worlds is a typographic self-portrait shaped by a familiar feeling in the Puerto Rican diaspora: at home in two places, but never claimed by either. Living in the US while carrying Puerto Rico in language, culture, and history, the project uses type to explore that tension. The narrative is told through three custom display typefaces designed for bilingual Spanish/English use and rooted in PR historical reference. Across animated posters, 3D objects, and posters built around cultural phrases, the letterforms become the message.
Borinqueneers Display draws from Puerto Rican military history to hold the tension of service, citizenship, and colonialism. Piragua Display echoes mid-century advertising and street commerce to question desire and consumer culture shaped between island and states. Callejón Display channels signage and street vernacular to archive everyday language before it disappears. Together, the work frames typography as cultural documentation and activism for island and diaspora.
Between Worlds Display Bundle: $50 (Includes all three displays with Desktop and Webfonts in otf, .ttf & .woff2). The typefaces are Uppercase only, with basic punctuation for Spanish and English language support (Glyph set below). This one-time purchase grants you the license to use the font for everything and any way you would like.
Type Tester
Select a typeface & type to test
BORINQUEENEERS DISPLAY
Borinqueneers is a bold condensed display typeface inspired by the 65th Infantry Regiment of the U.S. Army, a unit composed of soldiers from Puerto Rico. Once segregated within the U.S. military, the regiment served honorably despite facing racism, discrimination, and even a wrongful court-martial, and was later awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 2014. During the development of this typeface, I discovered that three members of my own family had served in the regiment, and today many of my relatives still serve in or work for the U.S. military.
Within Between Worlds, Borinqueneers becomes a microcosm of the tension between serving a country that does not always fully accept or claim you. It anchors the project in the long arc of Puerto Rico’s colonial relationship to the United States and asks, quietly but directly, what it means to give loyalty, labor, and even life between two often opposing cultures.
PIRAGUA DISPLAY
Piragua is an inverted-contrast display typeface inspired by Puerto Rican advertising, commercial posters, and the bright visual language of early to mid-century street commerce. It draws from the bold typography that once promoted both local and U.S. products to Puerto Rican consumers, exaggerating the warmth and urgency of that advertising—friendly, loud, and persuasive—while holding the tension of a consumer culture shaped by the relationship between island and mainland.
Within Between Worlds, Piragua is the part of me that loves the craft of graphic design and recognizes it as a powerful way to communicate important ideas, while also functioning as a mechanism for shaping who gets to desire what, and why, in two often opposing cultures.
CALLEJÓN DISPLAY
Callejón is a signage-inspired condensed display typeface rooted in the voice of the people. It celebrates the visual language of Puerto Rican street culture from the 1920s to the 1960s, drawing from the hand-painted and manufactured signage that animated plazas, markets, neighborhood storefronts, and bodegas. An uppercase sans serif with condensed proportions and exaggerated accents, it reflects the practical artistry of sign painters whose work shaped the look and rhythm of urban Puerto Rico.
Within Between Worlds, Callejón represents my love for typography, lettering, and language. I came to graphic design through an interest in graffiti and lettering, and Callejón captures what first made me fall in love with design: the power of everyday language—words, phrases, jokes, and sayings passed down through families and across neighborhoods—and a desire to archive that street vernacular before it disappears.
DESDE LA CASA DE CITA
Desde La Casa De Cita extends Between Worlds into lived language—six animated posters built from the project’s three custom condensed display typefaces, designed for bilingual Spanish/English use. Each piece is anchored by a Puerto Rican saying my mother (Cita) repeated throughout my childhood: quick lines that carry humor, warning, and survival logic. The posters treat the three type styles as distinct voices within the same identity—military gravity, advertising persuasion, and street-sign directness—selected per phrase to sharpen tone and subtext. Motion stays restrained but purposeful: type assembles, snaps, repeats, and loops like recollection, so the words feel spoken, handed down, and kept in circulation. Together, the series becomes a small archive of diaspora memory—using typography not just to communicate, but to preserve what’s easily lost between island and mainland.
NOW AVAILABLE FOR PURCHASE
Between Worlds Display Bundle: $50 (Includes all three displays with Desktop and Webfonts in otf, .ttf & .woff2). The typefaces are Uppercase only, with basic punctuation for Spanish and English language support (Glyph set below). This one-time purchase grants you the license to use the font for everything and any way you would like.
DANIEL IRIZARRY
EMAIL —
the.daniel.irizarry@gmail.com
© 2026 Daniel Irizarry All Rights Reserved
All company, product, service names, logos, and brands are property of their respective owners and are for identification purposes only. Use of these names, logos, and brands does not imply endorsement.