Happy St. Pat’s! Recently, I’ve created a few personal lettering projects. I think they’ve kind of taken the place of my 52 Bugs, which really fell off! They’re all a little bit different, but they do have a lot of textures in common. I really enjoy creating letters, the variations on the same theme. There are only 26, but they make up our entire language, and they connect all of us (even when we don’t spell words correctly, or abbreviate, the idea is still being communicated). And there are so many ways we can create their appearance, they’re still communicating. An H is an H, a D is a D, it can be ornate, thin, tall, wide, simple, serif or without, but people are still understanding what it is. I have enormous respect for people who can hand letter, It’s not simply creating letters by hand, it’s designing how they’ll fit together for a specific purpose, to communicate a feeling or an idea. The lettering foreshadows the story, or article, or event…I think if you can hand letter an entire title or phrase, or can design an entire typeface (and I mean alternates and symbols as well) then you have the skills to design anything. So here are a few that I’ve completed this past week. I’ve got so much to learn about letters, but I’m getting closer to that goal with every project!