Carving

The first thing people notice about our signs is the clarity and crispness of the carving. You will see that the signs that have natural coloured lettering are just as clear and easy to read as those that have painted infill. This is because our deep V-carving produces many light reflecting surfaces and reveals more of the darker end grain.
Shallow, flat bottomed carving has to be picked out in paint just to make it readable but with our signs you have a choice. In most cases we recommend natural, unpainted lettering so as not to obscure the beautiful grain but when coloured lettering is requested, we are happy to oblige. There is no extra charge for this service.
In 1979 we carved our first house sign using only hand tools. Even today, a lot of the work from layout to finishing is still done by hand.

Materials

Oak is our preferred timber because it has an attractive grain and is strong, durable and hard enough to allow fine detailed carving. 

Timber is a natural material that reacts to the varying temperature and humidity of our weather and a small amount of movement is quite normal and not regarded as a fault.

To protect the exterior signs from the weather we apply four brushed coats of yacht varnish.

Fonts

Nowadays there are many fonts on your computer but most are variations of a few basic styles. Many are not suitable for woodcarving so we have picked out a range of fonts that we have found to give consistently good results. If you have something different in mind, let us know and we will give it a try. Generally the more elaborate fonts do not carve well because the finest details tend to snap in the direction of the grain. Probably the easiest fonts to read are Arial and Times, partly because we are familiar with them in newspapers and on road signs etc. Old English, on the other hand, can be very difficult to pick out if you are not used to it, especially if you are in a moving vehicle. Mackintosh font is very distinctive but only available in ALL CAPITALS. Pristina is reminiscent of hand written script and is very compact, alowing a lot of lettering in a small place.

Capitalisation of text

As standard, our signs are supplied with a bevelled edge and no border. For a small additional charge, we will carve a line border around the edge of the sign. If you order pre-drilled mounting holes, the border will run around the holes. If you do not order mounting holes it will run parallel to the edge of the board.