Meet 80-yr-old Mahendra Bhai Patel, the man who designed SBI name in several languages

He taught abroad at Rhode Island School of Design, USA; Nova Scotia College of Arts, Canada; Christchurch College of Arts, New Zealand and Indus Valley School of Arts & Architecture, Pakistan. At present, he is busy designing matching fonts across all Indian scripts, including English. Asked what message would you like to give to the aspiring designers, pat comes his reply, "for me, design is a 'common sense' used sensitively, creatively and appropriately with relevance for user's needs and with adaptability to new technology and mind set"

Pune: Meet the octogenarian legendary designer, Mahendra Bhai Patel (80), who has the credit of design matching letterforms for the corporate name of State Bank of India (SBI) in all major Indian scripts, way back in late seventies.

Though it is the only a tip of the large iceberg when one starts counting the achievements made by the alumnus of National Institute of design (NID), Ahmedabad, who is currently associated with DY Patil International University, Pune.

Talking to Bizz Buzz, he says, "it was a great and challenging experience to design matching letterforms for the corporate name of SBI in all major Indian Scripts. It was an attempt to create a harmonious style and sizes among the diversified Script forms. It was designed completely by hand, especially when there was no computer."

Commenting on how does he find himself on completion of 80 years of his life and over half a long century of journey to a celebrated career in the field of design, he says, "I am very excited and happy that I had a very eventful life journey, both personal and academic."

What is Mahendra Patel's future plan in the field of design?

Well, he says that he would love to continue conducting workshops on basics of letter design and typography. Moreover, he would love to continue type design development on Indian scripts.

Not to mention that Mahendra Patel is one of the finest teachers of design, taught students at the National Institute of Design for 39 years. His areas of expertise include typography, typeface design, signage systems and information maps and charts. He pioneered developments in these fields. Since 2004, he has retired from being a full-time faculty at NID. He now spends his time on projects and conducts workshops at different design institutes.

He was the recipient of the 18th Gutenberg award for his contribution to typography in 2010. And, he was honoured with the design grandmaster award during the Icograda design week in India at IIT Bombay during 2007.

He has taught abroad at Rhode Island School of Design, USA; Nova Scotia College of Arts, Canada; Christchurch College of Arts, New Zealand and Indus Valley School of Arts & Architecture, Pakistan. Presently he is busy designing matching fonts across all Indian scripts, including English. Asked what message would you like to give to the aspiring designers, pat comes his reply, "for me, design is a 'common sense' used sensitively, creatively and appropriately with relevance for user's needs and with adaptability to new technology and mind set."