The Joy of Creating Hand Drawn Lettering

Hand Drawn Lettering.  13 May 2024

I was sitting in a café enjoying a latte, when my attention was drawn to a chalkboard behind the serving counter, whoever had designed their sign must have spent hours creating the stunning hand drawn lettering, flourishes and decorative elements that all combined to create a well-designed piece of art in it’s own right, but which effectively told me all about the dish of the day and speciality coffees on sale.

The person who had designed and chalked up the information displayed, showed real flair for their art, making it look easy and flowing, but I know that creating hand draw lettering is a skill that only comes with practice.

As early as primary one, I was encouraged to begin the process of hand lettering, beginning first learning the letter forms, hand drawn (printing) the letters of the alphabet and progressing to cursive handwriting (joined up lettering).

I wasn’t aware of the different letter styles of which there are many, such as:

·      Serifs (sub categories such as: old style serifs, transitional serifs, modern serifs, glyphic serifs or slab serifs),

·      Sans Serifs (sub categories: grotesque, square, humanistic and geometric)

·      Brush and

·      Script

The letterer creating the chalkboard masterpiece must have first decided on their letter style that they would use, next selecting their colour scheme. On looking more carefully I could see that they had also added dimension and shadows to their letter forms, creating texture with mark making, lines, details and perspective. These aspects made the letters come to life as if they were 3D.

Overall, the letterer had managed to create hand drawn letters that were eye catching but overall had kept legibility at the core of the design, a job well done.

By creating this handmade sign there was something nice and organic about it, and something I would encourage all graphic designers to try.

Get out the basic tools of pencils, rubbers, rulers, paper, felt pens or chalks and give it a go, get practicing and sketching and enjoy creating letters that are full of your personality and style. Remember to have fun and not be too precious about your sketches, skill will come with practice.