Design

Eastward Ho!

A California signpainter implements his skills during a trek to Wisconsin

Published

13 years ago

July 21, 2011

Steve Aust Signs of the Times July 2011 Issue

It’s easy to assume that craftsmanship is dead. Conventional wisdom says any sign on the market today has been produced with automated equipment. Thankfully, conventional wisdom can be wrong. Derek McDonald, proprietor of Golden West Signs (Berkeley, CA), plies his trade solely with handpainted and gilded signage and window graphics.

He mustered his skills and his courage to trek approximately 5,000 miles round trip. Ostensibly, he was headed to the Plymouth (WI) Rock the Cheese Capital Walldog meet, but he also stopped along the way at various businesses to create new signage. The trip required courage because he and his girlfriend, New York transplant and lettering enthusiast Tina Vines, left their home with only $200 in their pockets and no backup plan. Thus, their wits, skills and powers of persuasion subsidized their trek east. Along the way, they adorned a Sacramento, CA pizza joint’s sandwich-board sign; a Laramie Wyoming tattoo parlor; and a Rochester, MN high school stadium, among other venues.

In this case, a picture is worth at least a thousand words, so I’ll let McDonald’s photos provide a novel’s worth of graphic inspiration.

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