Creative! IPB Students Rise The Art of Digital Calligraphy to Distro Products
The art of calligraphy used as decoration, fresco or interior design is often to be found. Now, students from Bogor Agricultural University (IPB) initiated a new ides that is the art of digital calligraphy as merchandise distro product design such as T-shirts, mugs and hats.
Five students from IPB those are Muh. Nur Tegar Wibowo (Department of Agroindustrial Technology), Haifa Az Zahra (Department of Landscape Architecture), Ahmad Nuruddin Zanki Widiyantoro (Department of Agroindustrial Technology), Novia Nur Avifah (Department of Agroindustrial Technology) dan Firda Hidayatul Ichsan (Department of Agroindustrial Technology) with supervision of Dr. Endang Warsiki, S.TP, M.Si initiated this idea. They innovated the art of digital calligraphy which applied as unique distro design. This innovation is written in the proposal of Student Creativity Program of Entrepreneurship (PKM-K) with title “Distro Pondok: Digital Calligraphy-Based Merchandise”.
“Not only used for indoor design, we try to introduce this art of calligraphy to wider community through design on distro product such as T-shirts, mugs, and hats. For now, we are producing T-shirts only,” said the team leader, Muh. Nur Tegar Wibowo.
Uniquely, the calligraphy made on distro product are not derived from verses of Holy Qur’an as in often found. The calligraphy of Distro Pondok is derived from latest famous terms which are trending in young people or they can write the customized calligraphy based on customers’ demand.
“The writings that we designed such as ‘Bogoh Ka Bogor’, ‘Institut Pertanian Bogor’, ‘Indonesia Bersatu’, or if customer want to write their name or other word on our products. This product is suitable for merchandise or souvenirs because of its uniqueness. After Ramadan and Eid Fitr we already set sale target in certain number,” he said.
This idea came from one of team members, Ahmad Nuruddin Zanki Widiyantoro, who is a member of Student Activity Unit Seni Religi (UKM Seni Religi IPB), where he studied the art of calligraphy from handwriting to ornaments or frescoes. Later they initiated the idea to applied the art of digital calligraphy on Distro Pondok products.
“The choice of this made calligraphy design can be enjoyed by everyone. The art of calligraphy is identically linked with Arabic script and usually derived from the verses of Holy Qur’an. Based on that, we hope this art of calligraphy can be more universally used by people from any religious background, not only Muslim,” he explained.
Sales of Distro Pondok products are marketed in online media and around IPB Campus. There are two designs that already marketed, those are ‘Bogoh Ka Bogor’ and ‘Institut Pertanian Bogor’. Design of ‘Bogoh Ka Bogor’ is targeted for Bogor community market, while ‘Institut Pertanian Bogor’ is for IPB Students.
“There are many customers cannot read these calligraphy designs properly. To avoid this misread, we made a catalog to make it easier for customers to choose the fonts, design, along with the meaning of those calligraphy writings,” he stated. (qa)
