THREAD
JAIN SoDMCA
A globally recognised centre for life-centred creative education integrating design, art, media, technology, research, and innovation. SoDMCA shapes future-oriented creative professionals who imagine, design, and communicate meaningful futures for industry, society, culture, and the environment.
No. 840/12/2, Sugatta Village, Hunasamaranahalli Post, Jala Hobli, Bengaluru, Karnataka 562157
DEPARTMENT OF DESIGN
A Centre for Excellence fostering creativity, innovation, and technology through studio-based education in Communication Design, Product Design, Interaction Design, and User Experience Design. Learners are guided through 'Learning by Synthesizing', 'Learning by Doing', and 'Being through Reflection' to create meaningful, future-ready solutions.
DEPARTMENT OF ART and DESIGN
A vibrant centre for creative practice cultivating imaginative, skilled, and socially conscious practitioners through practice-led research, artistic expression, and cultural engagement. Preparing professionals across disciplines with critical judgment, inclusivity, diversity, sustainability, and creative entrepreneurship.
VISION
To emerge as a nationally and globally recognised learning centre for life-centred creative education integrating design, art, media, technology, research, and innovation that shapes future-oriented, responsible creative professionals who reflect, imagine, design, and communicate meaningful futures for industry, society, culture, and the environment.
MISSION
- Nurture creative thinkers, designers, artists, and innovators with strong conceptual, technical, aesthetic, and ethical foundations.
- Promote life-centred design, sustainability, cultural sensitivity, and social responsibility across all teaching, research, and practice.
- Integrate traditional creative practices with emerging technologies such as digital media, UX, immersive media, and artificial intelligence.
- Encourage interdisciplinary learning and collaborative entrepreneurship across communication, product, fashion, film, and media arts.
AN EXPERIMENTAL TYPOGRAPHY FESTIVAL and CREATIVE CHALLENGE
THREAD 2026 is structured into three connected phases designed to foster typographic literacy, hands-on visual experimentation, and community collaboration.
2–4
WHO CAN PARTICIPATE ?
THREAD 2026 provides distinct access points for each day of the festival, tailoring workshops, competitive hackathons, and celebrations to each community stage.
HANDS-ON WORKSHOP
A dedicated experiential day of letterform design, talks, and tactile creative experimentation designed specifically for young aspiring designers.
THE TYPOTHON
The intensive live design hackathon. Teams tackle briefs, build comprehensive typographic systems, and receive expert mentor reviews.
AWARD CEREMONY
Jury presentations, exhibition walk-throughs, celebration, and distributing the ₹1,00,000 prize pool alongside trophies and certificates.
EXPERIENCE
Participants enter the world of typography through talks, guided workshops, interactive visual activities, networking discussions, and community bonding.
THREAD TALK and INSIGHTS
An introduction to typography through ideas, stories, and practical perspectives.
HANDS-ON WORKSHOP
Get practical and experiment with letterforms through guided tactile making.
COMMUNITY NETWORKING
Meet fellow participants, exchange ideas, and build connections over meals.
CURATED MOVIE SCREENING
End the day with a relaxed shared film experience focused on design culture.
CREATE
The Typothon is the central creative typography challenge inside THREAD 2026. Participants interpret the brief, experiment with visual forms, receive rounds of expert mentorship, and refine their final submissions.
CELEBRATE
The finale of THREAD 2026. Deliverables submission, transparent AI usage recording, jury panel presentations, finalist announcements, awards, and celebrating everyone who contributed to the festival.
CELEBRATING IDEAS, WORK and PEOPLE
“Type isn’t just what we read. It’s what we feel.”
THREAD 2026 — THE RUNWAY
Designers reinterpret typography through clothing, exploring how letterforms, words, and visual language can be transformed into fashion. Think garments inspired by typefaces, woven letterforms, typographic textures, and the relationship between text and the human body.
TWO WAYS TO COMPETE
Whether you are on-ground at JAIN SODMCA, ATRIUM or participating online remotely, THREAD 2026 provides dedicated challenges to showcase your typographic vision. Registration closes on the 23rd of September.
PRE-EVENT COMPETITION
A nationwide digital challenge leading up to the main festival. Open to individual creators and students to experiment, interpret, and push typography beyond its conventional role. Enter one or multiple challenges with separate submissions.
TYPE THE ICON
Completely recreate a famous app, brand, or product icon using purely letters and glyphs. No direct logos, vectors, or graphics—use glyph scale, density, and kerning to preserve instant recognition.
OPPOSITES ATTRACT
Visually contradict a word’s actual definition through its typographic form. While the text remains legible, its weight, composition, and visual texture must evoke the exact opposite meaning.
FONT FLIP
Disrupt the cultural bias of a ubiquitous typeface. Subvert its ingrained tropes and identity via unexpected styling, negative space, hierarchy, and context without modifying the base vector geometry.
BREAK THE TYPE
Push a word past the boundary of plain text until the letterforms become the primary artwork. Stretch, slice, fragment, rotate, and distort the letters while keeping a thread of recognition intact.
TYPOTHON
The flagship live sprint inside THREAD 2026. Teams receive an intensive creative brief, build original visual typographic systems, receive real-time expert mentorship, and present directly before our jury panel.
THREAD 2026 TIMELINE
EXPERIENCE / 28th of September
ARRIVAL and BREAKFAST
Settle in, meet fellow participants, and kick off the experience together.
THREAD TALK / WORKSHOP
An introduction to typography through ideas, stories, and practical insights.
PURELY HANDS-ON WORKSHOP
Get practical and experiment with type through guided making.
MOVIE SCREENING
End the day with a curated film and a relaxed shared experience.
CREATE / 29 SEPTEMBER
Breakfast and Starting Typothon
Begin the challenge, understand the brief, and start exploring your direction.
Mentor Session
Get feedback, ask questions, and refine your approach with mentors.
Last Mentor Session — Start Evaluating
Make your final refinements while the evaluation process begins.
CELEBRATE / 30th of September
Submission of Deliverables + AI Usage
Submit your final work along with a transparent record of your AI usage.
Final Presentations in a Jury Panel
Finalists present their work and the jury evaluates the ideas, process, and execution.
Prize Distributions
Recognise the winners and celebrate everyone who contributed to THREAD 2026.
ACCOMMODATION
Find comfortable nearby lodging options for your visit during the THREAD 2026 typography festival.
Accommodation will NOT be provided by the college on the 28th of September (participants must book a hotel room). However, accommodations will be provided inside the campus on the 29th of September.
Special discounted rates are available for attendees at our recommended partner hotels below. To claim the discounted rate, please contact our student coordinators:Aadarsh R (+91 94877 83279) or Aditya M (+91 79074 49211), or you can contact Anand (+91 97415 56888).
SG5 INN SUITES
Contemporary suites offering comfortable rooms and rapid transit access to the campus.
AV COMFORTS
Budget-friendly hospitality with essential amenities located in close proximity to JAIN SoDMCA.
SRI SAI GURU COMFORTS
Reliable accommodation providing clean rooms and easy transport connections for teams.
SAS ROYAL GALAXY
Premium rooms and well-appointed facilities ensuring a restful stay during your festival journey.
JUDGING CRITERIA
All challenge entries are scored independently by our jury across six structured evaluation benchmarks.
CONCEPT
Depth of idea, narrative intent, conceptual clarity, and thoughtful thematic interpretation behind the design.
TYPOGRAPHY
Letterform anatomy, kerning sensitivity, hierarchy, curve accuracy, and expressive typographic mastery.
ORIGINALITY
Freshness of creative angle, unique visual experimentation, breaking conventions, and authentic voice.
EXECUTION
Craftsmanship, technical finish, grid discipline, color harmony, and overall precision of the final deliverable.
RELEVANCE
Direct alignment with the challenge brief specifications, contextual appropriateness, and functional purpose.
IMPACT
Visual memorability, emotional engagement, and immediate aesthetic impression on first viewing.
SPEAKERS
Industry leaders, typographers, and visual artists guiding talks, hands-on workshops, and jury sessions.
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WHO THREAD IS FOR
THE PEOPLE BEHIND THREAD.
A small group of people building THREAD from the ground up.
Sujay Nair
Naveen Kumar A
Aditi Dutta
Aadarsh R
