Distressed Five 1 is a bold, very narrow, high contrast, upright, short x-height font.
Keywords: posters, album art, packaging, headlines, stickers, handmade, gritty, playful, indie, raw, handmade feel, distressed texture, display impact, diy character, brushy, rough-edged, inked, irregular, compressed.
A compact, hand-rendered display face with brush-and-ink construction and noticeably uneven contours. Strokes show strong pressure shifts: thick fills and tapered terminals, with occasional pinched joins and ragged edges that read like dry-brush or rough printing. Letterforms are simplified and slightly inconsistent in width and curvature, giving an organic rhythm rather than a geometric one. Counters are often tight and asymmetrical, and the overall texture is speckly and worn, especially in rounded forms and diagonals.
Best suited to short text where texture and personality are desirable—posters, album covers, event flyers, packaging labels, and punchy headlines. It works especially well at medium-to-large sizes where the distressed edges and brush contrast remain clear.
The font conveys a gritty, handmade energy that feels informal and expressive, like quick sign lettering or a marker/brush title. Its distressed texture adds a scrappy, DIY attitude, balancing friendliness with a slightly edgy, street-poster tone.
The design appears intended to emulate energetic hand-painted or marker lettering with a deliberately worn, imperfect finish, prioritizing character and impact over typographic neutrality.
Uppercase and lowercase share the same hand-drawn logic, with the lowercase appearing more casual and compact. Numerals follow the same brushy, uneven treatment, maintaining the rough texture and strong contrast. Spacing appears visually tight, reinforcing the punchy, headline-driven character.