Hand-Painted Signs of Kratie book

Sam Roberts and I became friends through our interest in London's ghostsigns (faded hand-painted advertisements on brick walls). Sam was recently out of the UK for two years doing voluntary work in the Far East. He started to notice that some of the lovely hand-painted signs in Cambodia were gradually being replaced by modern versions, so he got his camera out and started taking snaps. The end result is this 140pp book, that I designed and artworked for him applying his words and pictures onto a simple, and very adaptable square grid.

Sam has written a fabulous recommendation regarding my work on this project on LinkedIn. It reads;  "Jane took my idea for a book and turned it into a well-finished piece of design that now proudly sits on mine and many others' shelves. However, it wasn't just the design that impressed. It was also Jane's guiding hand throughout the whole process that helped me to learn and make considerable improvements throughout the project. It was very much a team effort, done across two continents and seven time zones, me in Cambodia and Jane in London. This was only made possible by Jane's positive and flexible approach. Thank you Jane, I look forward to our next project together. 
Service Category: Graphic/Web Designer – Year first hired: 2010 (hired more than once)
Top Qualities: Personable, On Time, High Integrity

A book about London ghostsigns

Back in May 2008, Sam Roberts, another fan of faded ads painted onto walls, contacted me with an idea to collaborate on a book about the old painted signs that cling to the walls above our busy modern streets. 'Ghosts signs' or 'ghostsigns' hint at a bygone past, depicting local traders and services, products and potions, as well as brands that are still going strong today, albeit advertised in a different style. The signs were hand-painted by talented men who were proficient at climbing up and balancing on tall ladders (no scaffolding or hard hats back then!) whilst deftly using a paintbrush and paint.
Sam had seen my my website Jane's London and my vast collection of photos on Flickr, snapped during my extensive wanderings around London, and he thought that we'd be the perfect fit. We were both of the opinion that this would make a fabulous book. Sam was to be the wordsmith and I was to be the photographer, plus, with my graphic design and typography skills, I was well-placed to produce the artwork for print, thus saving on costs and keeping control of the look and feel. We planned for a print date of June 2010.

A square format was agreed and two months later I had produced a basic flexible grid and pulled together some initial spreads (above) that we hoped would tempt the publishers. Many of the reference elements shown in these layouts, such as the yellow tin, are my own personal items having sourced physical examples of product-related ephemera.
The project was put on hold when Sam went to Cambodia for a couple of years although we almost secured a publishing deal in 2011. When Sam returned to the UK we were both too busy on other projects to properly return to the idea. It will happen soon but more likely as a self-published title. In the meantime, I plan to produce some books of my own to tie in with my website – little 80pp books, each a collection on a subject (bootscrapers, coal hole covers, ghostsigns with pictures, ghostsigns of traders, doorway mosaics etc). And I continue to take photos of old signs when I spot them, but my Flickr photo account is now not for public viewing – I instead use it as a personal archive.

UPDATE: Since 2018, I have been leading guided walks about ghostsigns in various London areas from Shoreditch to Soho. I also offer online talks on the subject via Zoom. See www.janeslondonwalks.com for more info.

UPDATE November 2021 – Sam never got back to me. He instead produced a book in conjunction with someone else. I am disappointed to say the least. The design and layout is confusing and hard to navigate as regards using the book for reference. Nevertheless I wrote a positive review of it here.

Postcards for the Ghostsigns Archive

In conjunction with The History of Advertisng Trust (HAT) and Rank Hovis, Sam Roberts has been busy setting up an archive of all the old painted advertising signs that were painted directly onto walls over the past century. As well as taking lots of photos of these myself, I have been helping him with design and artwork for various items in conjunction with this project. This set of 10 postcards has been created for the launch event, though we hope we may be able to sell more in the future to help fund the project.

We are also working on a book of the same.