Jul 14, 2009 | Signs I Like |
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A traveler to Afghanistan sent me this somewhat foreboding signage from a bus in Kabul. The handling of the brush is earnest and ambitious — especially in juxtaposition with the second line, which appears to be a radical version of Taped-Off Gothic Bold. The way the words run together in the third line suggests a certain breathless anxiety to get to the finish line. If this was painted on the side of the #9 Broadway I'm not sure I would get on.
Jul 2, 2009 | Signs I Like
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This wildly expressive sign advertises a nursery tucked between a metal shop and an auto mechanic in Seattle's Ballard neighborhood. Anarchy, flower-power, deeply retro color, it all works as an organic whole. I especially like the little roots coming off the bottom of the stems.
This came to me from Jeff Lacoste of Design Heavy. Check out his exquisite letterpressed label for Coeur Cellars — a great use of Copperplate with original watercolor.
Jun 2, 2009 | Signs I Like |
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This sign from a small town in the Okanogan demonstrates a unique blend of pen-made Gothic with the sensibility of Blondie and Dagwood. Note how the sign maker became reflective and doubtful at the end, forming a k with a completely different serif, lifted no doubt from a manuscript in the Newberry Library. Consistency is one of the greatest challenges of the letter arts: how exactly DO you get to the end of a sentence in the same style you began? Here the work is unified by soothing wood grain which flows from the hard-edged and somewhat brutal content of the words into the mind of Blondie as she dreams of being wak-ed into beauty.
This comes to me from Jake Seniuk, Director of the Port Angeles Fine Art Center. His hair was salt and pepper at the moment of documentation, and in spite of urging from his young sons, he chose to get his hair cut farther down the road.
May 28, 2009 | Signs I Like
It's hard to tell if this sign was planned, or vandalized by an astute graphic artist. But that crazy truncated O seems to be both a devil's crown and a moon in perfect horizontal to the earth. The morning light tells you sleep was in short supply in a strange bed, and the antenna shoots from right field like cupid's arrow.
From Ernest Hilsenberg, sculptor and ceramic artist.
May 28, 2009 | Signs I Like
The wistful bleached out poetry of this impromptu signage speaks for itself.
From Rhuby Architectural Glass
Designer, calligrapher, lettering artist. 