My nephew and niece were invited to a twin’s birthday party and as their chaperone, I bought the gifts. With twins, it’s always a package deal so naturally I bought two cute shirts but with different designs (I was told that it’s good for twins not to have all their things similar so they’ll have their own identity).

The dilemma: Who to give what? Which gift/design is for whom?

I asked my nephew and niece to be the ones to hand the gifts to the twins (the twins are still babies, but I wanted it to be meaningful and all 😊). My nephew gave me a puzzled look and asked which gift to give whom? He was so concerned about giving the right gift to the correct twin, it made me laugh. He’s a smart boy and that was a legit concern so I thought of a solution: To make an ambigram out of the twins’ names and let the parents handle the decision 😊.

My best friends are twins so I know a few things about the complexities of twin relationships. With twins, names usually sound close or nearly resembles each other but they have their own preference and identity hence, the shirts with different designs and the ambigram for the twins’ names.

What are ambigrams?

An ambigram is a word or art form which retains its meaning when viewed from a different direction or perspective. Its meaning could also change when interpreted from different perspectives, depending on how it’s made. It was described by Douglas R. Hofstadter as a "calligraphic design that manages to squeeze two different readings into the selfsame set of curves."

There are different types of ambigrams but for the purpose of naming gifts for two people, I used a symbiotogram. It is rather different than the usual ambigram as because it presents two different words in inverse positions. It’s a word design that shows one word when upright and reads another word when upside down.| <a title="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambigram">source</a>

The process:

It’s fun to make although tedious and if you want to create your own to make the gift more personal, I’ve added the process I went through to create the symbiotogram. I’m not an excerpt at this as I didn’t study typography but I like to personalize and create designs that are out of the ordinary or those that make that make you think. There are also other ways to create one depending on your preference. You could do some experiments on your own, but here’s how I did it.

1) Write the names

I wrote the first name the way it is normally read then the second name right beneath it, in an upside down manner. This helps me spot patterns to be able to connect the letters.

2) Pair up the letters

Names with the same number of letters are easier to connect since it has a 1-1 ratio.

For names with different number of letters, you'll have to be more creative. As an example, I used a 2-1 ratio in some letters as shown in the pairing of "ay" from Kaye and "a" from gay, I saw a pattern for the letters so I meshed those.

3) Combine both names

In my case, I used pens with different colors so I could see the lines for each name. This way, I can lessen the confusion from the tangle of lines.

4) Spot patterns and mesh the names

This is the challenging part; to see patterns and connections from the combination of letters, and be able to integrate them in a way that the name is still readable. My remedy for this is practice and patience.

5) Add the curves and lines

When viewed upside-down:

Here's another variation:

When viewed upside-down:

Extra: Names with uneven number of letters

It’s a fun process and it’s feels pretty cool when you’ve seen the result. Have fun on creating one. If you find it time consuming, you could use ambigram generators which you can search online. I'm not sure if they generate symbiotograms though as I haven't seen a generator for one.

Hope you enjoyed the process. Now, you can spice up your greeting cards and personalize your gifts.

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