Drop shadows – up, down, left or right?

Yesterday evening I presented a talk for the Letter Exchange at The Artworkers Guild on Queen Square. The subject was The Signwriters of Old London and I shared with them my observations and research about some of the people and companies who created beautiful carved and gilded shop fascias or hand-painted ads on buildings. 

The Q&A after the talk was really good and one person asked about drop shadows on letters. He suggested that here in the UK we tend to apply the shadows on the other side to those he'd seen in Germany. I responded that I've seen this applied on both left and right sides here.  

Intrigued by this notion, and wondering if there were more signs dressing to the left or right, I've looked within my picture archive. Here follows a random selection of screenshots showing that there is indeed a winner.

I’ve grouped them into two sections. This first batch shows the 3D/drop shadow effect at the bottom right, making the letters look like they are standing out above us, as if we are looking up at them:

The next ones show the shadow falling to the left:

The drop shadow to the right wins with 20, compared to 6 to the left = approx 75% of the signs. However, I do notice that half of the latter section are post-war era. I wonder what that's about?!

But here's an oddity – at Lloyd's old dairy the name above the door has the drop shadow at bottom left, yet the script along the adjacent windows is the other way:

I think the drop shadow choice depends on the style of letters employed because the words/names need to be clearly legible. It was suggested last night that it was quicker and cheaper to produce the shadows from one direction which I think must be to the left because, with most letters having a vertical on the left side it is quicker/easier to achieve – for instance, using the Lloyds sign above as an example, if the shadows went the other way the internal of the vertical on the letter L would need to be rendered as well as small end of the bottom bar. Plus there's that curve on the D.

To illustrate that a shadow in any direction can produce different results, I have cobbled together these rudimentary examples, the bottom two showing the letters dropping down towards us:

What do you think?

A Ladbroke Grove ghostsign – a huge hidden gem that's hard to see

Within the entrance to Elgin Mews at the rear of The Elgin at 96 Ladbroke Grove which, btw, is an absolutely gorgeous example of a Victorian gin palace, there are some large letters painted on the wall.

Here's a screenshot of the Google map of the area:

Today there are residential properties along the mews, but up until the 1970s, there would have been small tradesmen here offering various services. The postal directories from 1899 through to 1910 show a range of businesses – a horse dealer, a dentist, a chimney sweep, a bath chair proprietor, a locksmith, a carman (that's a man with a van), an upholsterer, a billposter, a couple of builders and a french polisher.

In the mews entrance off Ladbroke Grove there are large letters on the left side. Here it is in eight sections. 

The sign is one long line of big white letters on a black strip. Due to the narrowness here it's not possible to get a better angle on it. At first, all I could make out was S. KER[something]. OUN....
I found it difficult to decipher because I couldn't tie up the letters I saw with any of the trades listed above. I wondered if KER was part of a company name/owner. Nope. Nothing tied up with the available info.

Then, taking shelter here one rainy day I had another good look at it, and the different lighting conditions helped me to ascertain that the full points are actually commas and it says:
TILES, KERBS, SURROUNDS
which means it's surely a sign for one of the builders, either Charles Halford or Frank Richards who were both here in 1915, the latter since at least 1910.

Other elements of the sign appear to have worn away over time – it surely would have shown the name of the company plus other products available, yet how this happened is beyond me seeing as this is very well protected from the elements.

I am also at a loss how anyone would have been able to see the sign from the road as it's only noticeable if you are approaching slowly from the South and, even then, not until you are almost at a level with it. Quick! Turn right now!

There doesn't appear to be any hints of a similar sign on the opposite wall for anyone approaching from the north/the station. There could well have been a sign at the eastern end of the mews, but long gone now. 

This sign features on my Portobello Ghostsigns walk – join me to find out more – see here 

Two Tottenham Ghostsigns

Heading to Bruce Castle from the High Rd on Saturday I checked up on a few things at the western end of Bruce Grove – the repurposed toilets, the old cinema, my favourite blue plaque and hints of bygone businesses. 

The latter category includes this hand painted sign high up on the side of No.2. This advertisement would have been clearly visible from the railway line and station in the days before the building that is now a pizzeria was constructed at the corner. 

MOORE & SON

BUILDER & DECORATOR

SCAFFOLDING LENT ON HIRE

P…… 65 TOTTENHAM

I'm not sure what that last line means – it’s surely an address but it’s odd to have the number after the undecipherable road name. When I have more time I will check the old directories to see if I can find out. 

Update 18Dec: In the comments below, Geoff suggests that the last line probably says PHONE (number) TOTTENHAM. I had dismissed this idea being as phone numbers were usually configured with a three letter code before the four numbers. However, when this sign was painted, Tottenham would have been in the suburbs, outside the London phone district and would not have would not followed that format. I've just sourced a pic I took back in February 2010 and it's clear the word at bottom left is indeed PHONE – thanks Geoff!

After a very pleasant 90 minutes or so inside Bruce Castle (fab – there's so much to see and learn in there) I headed west along Lordship Lane and noticed that there must surely must be a large hand-painted sign hidden behind two large billboards on side of No.205:

A glimpse of black on yellow can be seen between the panels. 

Actually, the sign must have been huge because this 2009 google streetview shows remnants of paint across the whole wall.

Can anyone recall what the painted sign advertised?  I’m thinking it was likely to be a well-known product such as Gillette or Brymay. 

I will update this as and when I find out more info, so please add a comment so that you get alerts about new developments.

J. Troake, Straw Chip & Leghorn Presser – is this London's oldest ghostsign?

Ah Spitalfields... it's ever-changing and there's always more to discover...  

Heading towards the market from Shoreditch High Street last Sunday, I turned into Commercial Street and pondered whether this pillared gateway used to offer access to Nichols and Clarke's sidings and their warehouse buildings in Blossom Street. Very much likely I think. 

On the other side of the road, the view was epic, looking like a painting of a castle on a hill above a rocky landscape and lush pine trees: 

I turned left into Elder Street. A cat in a Fleur-de-Lis Street window stared at me but barely moved. People stopped to coo coo at it. I wondered what the cat thought of them but I was more intrigued by a visibly distressed vintage Bentley plugged into a charger outside a Georgian house. Doi-oi-oing! 

Moving along this street early C18th street, built in the 1720s, I stopped to consider how this street has become so expensive to live here since Dan Cruikshank and his friends saved it back in the 1970s. It went from dilapidation and degradation through regeneration and gentrification to become properties that most of us can't afford to rent a cupboard in. I doubt that was Dan's intention.

On the plus side, the people who snapped up these properties spent a lot of time and effort reinstating many lost features such as door knockers and window shutters that would have been in place when these were the homes and working premises of Huguenot silk weavers. Indeed this next snippet from the 1841 Kelly's street directory shows that most businesses at that time were still associated with silk:

The next excerpt from 1882 shows how the street evolved to be rather more utilitarian. Elder Street and other neighbouring streets were no longer the homes of silk merchants, but of basic trades:

The numbering shown in the clippings does not tally with what we see today, and this is made evident at No.19 Elder St, where, if you look closely, you'll see that it used to be No.20. This was when the street was numbered up one side and down the other, rather than odds facing evens which later became more common. On either side of the door below '20' there are hand-painted signs for J. Troake, Straw Chip & Leghorn Presser, and some other words I have yet to decipher.

I love the way that only the word Presser is in italics, possibly to highlight a trade rather than a product. Also, theres that lovely use of the Georgian f where a double-s occurs, as in Prefser. It looks like the signs have been repainted at some time, and not just retouched. 

On the left street-facing side of the door there is another name in upper case italics which looks like 'L....ES" (see below, left). This is likely the name of another man/business using this address at the same time as John Troake. 

John Troake would likely have been the one of the first inhabitants of this street, selling a fine quality smooth straw used for making hats and offering a pressing service for leghorn style wide-brimmed hats which were popularised by wealthy Georgian ladies who wore them at an angle balanced on the the top of their overly-large wigs, often enhanced by other accessories and concoctions.

I wonder if this is the oldest London ghostsign..? Other similar examples of hand-painted Georgian signage come to mind, such as the lists of lawyers in Middle Temple and Gray's Inn, and those amusing polite notices, but they show names or instructions, not trades. 

Crossing the road to take a wide view of the house, I noticed that there is another faded sign aabove the fanlight, here cropped and enhanced:

I can make out what could be ELT at the top and Stanstead or Wanstead on the curve.  This could be another business within the building at that time. Let's leave it there for now. 

On the other side of the street, practically opposite No 19 there is one of the commissioned set of Spitalfields coal hole covers echoing the blue plaque above that commemorates Mark Gertler.  

Around the corner, Denis Severs House, in Folgate Street has a fine example of Egyptian decoration and a gas lamp, both subjects that I cover on my walking tours.

Sad to see that the old Water Poet pub building isstill empty. I stopped to took photos over two years ago and I'm pretty sure those lamps and boxes were there, exactly in the same place as today. 

Outside and inside

The developers revamped this whole block and built pastiche Victorian terraces along Norton Folgate (today), yet this once vibrant pub has been standing empty for too long. This is a big shame. Empty spaces, yet more tall buildings going up in adjacent streets. Go figure. 

Further info on any of the above, will be most gratefully received.