Sign board painted and prepared along with other signage for clients who had taken over a failing restaurant in Walthamstow Village to give it a new lease of life  bring a better dining experience to the residents.

The previous sign board had a look that appeared either corporate or like it was trying to merge with the Vodka Kick drink branding.

The clients came with a rebrand & new name. They already had a visual & simple style. They just required a traditional signwriter to impliment it.

The visuals were quite simple & plain but smart. My job was just to convert this onto their premises & sign board.

The first work to be done was to paint their branding on the ready prepared fascia. The design was reliefed from a drawing on paper, leaving a chalk outline of the lettering. A specialist signwriting brush was used to paint in the lettering. As can be seen the lettering after only 1 coat of paint is still streaky with brush strokes being seen, so a 2nd coat is painted over once dry to make fully opaque.

The fascia signwriting looked better once the 2nd coat had been applied. The next piece to be painted was the phrase on the window. The clients chose to have all the wording on one window in the end rather than across both windows as planned originally in the visual. To produce this amount of wording neatly but still painted, the best option for this is a paint mask. That is a specialist vinyl material which has letters cut out of it & is used as a stencil. The mask is measured into position, stuck to the window, before having the backing paper removed allowing paint to be brushed onto the mask in the same way the letters would be painted by hand. The mask is then peeled off leaving just the painted lettering.

This method gives an opque finish to the lettering, which are also sharp & neat. This matches vinyl stickers, but producing this method rules out any peeling away of stickers from the winow. Instead the paint is painted back over each letter with a protective clear varnish, which once dry hardens & prevents any window cleaning from affecting the lettering.

An image showing the combined paintwork of the restaurant fascia & the window lettering, both painted but one produced by hand & the other with assistance of a mask, but a time saver & produces the same results.

As a finishing touch the clients decided they would like their names witten on the shutter box in a script style. This was just to show that the restaurant has new owners & that they are a couple. They are a scociable pair & work well together, which would bring in more trade to the restaurant.

The wording was just drawn out by hand in a marking out pencil. It was sketched with the sizing & thickness of the lettering so it could be seen from the other side of the street & could be judged if ideal or not. Once it was considered the correct sizing it was then hand painted.

This completed the on site work for the restaurant but they also wanted an a-board & a hanging sign board painted. This was easier to produce in the studio & then deliver completed.

The supplied A-board was taken apart, sanded down, painted in an oil based primer on both sides, before adding chalkpaint to the centre of each front facing panels. As an added touch I scalloped the corners of the chalkboard area & outlined it with oil based white paint. The rest of the boards & frames were painted in an oil based paint & once dry varnished.

The signwriting was then added at the top of each panel of the board. The branding was sized to scale & reliefed from a paper drawing to the board in a chalk outline. This was the guide to be able to hand paint the lettering & cutlery logo.

The clients also suuplied the existing hanging sign board. This too was sanded down, given an oil based paint primer before a re-painting of a top coat. The lettering was hand painted in white oil based paint.

The logo & branding was matching in layout throughout.

Both sign board types completed in the studio, with the A-board having been re-assembled with hinges & hook over locks.

Finally an image of all the signwork together, with the hanging sign in place, the fascia, shutter box & window all painted & just in shot is the sun reflecting A-board in use with the clients having added some chalk written menu within the chalkboard area.

So pleasing to produce the work & the clients so happy with the outcome. They were a nice pair of guys. I’m sure they’re making the ‘Kitchen’ thrive in the village.

Hand Painted Traditional & Contemporary Sign writing in London

Sign writer: Traditional Signs of London

info@traditionalsignsoflondon.uk