---
title: "What is a Grawlix?"
description: "What kind of thing is that? I've never heard of it."
url: "https://kaspar-allenbach.ch/en/blog/what-is-a-grawlix"
date_modified: "2026-07-16T19:41:39+02:00"
---

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##  [Kaspar Allenbach](https://kaspar-allenbach.ch/en/) 

###  [Poster & Artworks](https://kaspar-allenbach.ch/en/) 

Thu 16. Jul 2026  [rss](https://kaspar-allenbach.ch/en/feeds/news.rss) 

# What is a Grawlix?

##  What kind of thing is that? I've never heard of it. 

While designing a new poster, I experimented with various approaches to sophisticated swearing.

##  Reddit-Style Censorship 

When designing the tennis poster, my first idea was to use a simple curse word that hides the actual curse behind asterisk symbols. But of course, it’s obvious what’s being said. Boring.

##  Tableflip EMoji 

My second idea was the good old [table-flip emoji](https://looks.wtf/flipping-tables). It consists of Unicode characters depicting an annoyed something or other that flips the desk in frustration.

I hung up a test print in my [Studio](https://kaspar-allenbach.ch/en/postervault), and people who came to [my store on Saturday](https://kaspar-allenbach.ch/en/postervault) did react positively to the poster itself. But nobody knows this old-school emoji anymore—from before the era of graphic emojis, back when IRC and ICQ were still around. So come on, let’s get rid of it.

##  [The Grawlix](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grawlix) 

As a comic book enthusiast, the next thing that naturally came to mind was Captain Haddock’s cursing or Automatix.

[Pinterest](https://in.pinterest.com/pin/580823683231155429/)   

This type of swear word representation is called a "[grawlix](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grawlix)." It’s a sequence of typographic symbols used to hide swear words while gracefully paraphrasing them—all under the guise of beautiful typography. Typically, these are characters that are unpronounceable.

A typical Grawlix with unpronounceable characters.

[Myresa Hurst, Public Domain Wiki COmmons](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grawlix#/media/File:Grawlix.jpg)   

So I decided to go with this kind of swearing. May everyone decide for themselves how they want to swear from now on.

[How #$@!% became shorthand for cursing](https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-grawlix-1690824)

My poster, which will be released soon, featuring a Grawlix.

##  [Find out when the poster will be released.](https://kaspar-allenbach.ch/en/newsletter) 

Sign up for my [newsletter](https://kaspar-allenbach.ch/en/newsletter), and you'll be the first to know when I publish the poster.

Other than that, "[Das Sommerfest](https://kaspar-allenbach.ch/en/shop/summer-party)" just arrived at my studio, hot off the press. The tennis poster will have a similarly minimalist design. I'm going through a phase like that right now, you could say.

[## Summer Party](https://kaspar-allenbach.ch/en/shop/summer-party?utm_source=what-is-a-grawlix&utm_medium=blog-entry&utm_campaign=product-card)