Sign Painting
with
John Downer
A discount is available to Typographics conference participants. A promotional discount code will be found on the PDF of your conference ticket. Please apply the code to workshop registration.
John Downer’s sign painting career began in the late 1960s
and was instrumental in steering his path toward type design.
In this introductory course, he will teach the two main kinds
of letterform construction which have traditionally been done
with a brush: single-stroke and built-up. Students will learn
the importance of paint consistency and brush control. The
class will focus on rendering a few particular styles of capital
letters that were commonly used in American sign painting
during the 20th century. Script lettering will be addressed in
the final day and a half.
About John Downer
Mr. Downer is a sign painter, a typeface designer, and an educator. He has written about type and type history for various publications and is widely known as a perceptive type critic. His typefaces have been published by Bitstream, Font Bureau, Emigre, House Industries, and Design Lab. Among his most popular type designs are Iowan Old Style (on Apple Books and iOS 7+), Roxy, Ironmonger, and the ubiquitous food and beverage branding favorite, Brothers.
A native of the Pacific Northwest, a region of the US with a rich history of sign painting and hand-lettering, Mr. Downer was first introduced to commercial pen & brush lettering in the 1960s in junior high school. He began an apprenticeship in a sign painting shop at age 18. He holds BA, MA, and MFA degrees in art.
Mr. Downer has been a journeyman sign painter since 1973, a freelance typeface designer since 1983, and a crusader for designers’ rights his entire adult life. He began teaching lettering at the university level in 1972, making him one of the most experienced American educators in the fields of lettering and typeface design. He’s been teaching in the Type@Cooper program at The Cooper Union since its founding in 2010. He established the Sign Painting Support Group on Facebook as a platform to educate and guide serious enthusiasts and professionals in the principles of letter construction and the tricks of the trade.