Queer Prismatic Font Honors Rainbow Flag Inventor

It's been nearly 40 years since artist and activist Gilbert Baker created the first rainbow flag with his bare hands, dying the strips of fabric and stitching them together one by one. Today the flag, whose colors have been reduced from eight to six over time, flies as a symbol of unity and pride for the LGBTQ community.

Now, thanks to the combined efforts of Ogilvy & Mather, Newfest, NYC Pride, and Fontself, the spirit of the rainbow flag has been infused into a font, with strips of alternating colors laid out to form letters making every word drip with technicolor.

Related | LGBT Flag Designer Gilbert Baker Has Died

"We wanted to celebrate something that he created that actually changed people's perception of that community," Ogilvy creative director Chris Rowson told DeZeenof the font, aptly named "Gilbert." According to Rowson, the merging of the colors speaks to the accepting mindset of the LGBTQ community. "We liked the idea of that crossover and that overlay, it kind of creates new things," he said.

Though Baker died in March of this year, the rainbow flag has all but been immortalized as a symbol of and for the LGBTQ community, and this font further cements the vision that accompanied the first ever rainbow flag. The font is available for free download from Type with Pride. Ogilvy hopes the font will accompany protest posters, Pride banners, and queer-friendly public spaces around the world.