Steam Train Restoration Project
Well it was an awesome weekend. Friday Night, I drove to Tottenham, just 15 minutes away from me, (north of Toronto 100km) and met 29 other volunteer signpainters from around Ontario to line up the weekend's work. Together we assembled, painted and vinyled the lettering, logos and pictorials on and around the heritage steam trains and station. The project was organised by one of the local men, Russel, and he had a bunch of his shop's people out and many and much of the work that could be done in preparation before was done at his shop. The volunteers of the tourist attraction station pre-painted the sheds and trains before ready for all our graphics.
Saturday Morning was chaos like I've seen rarely in my career. Everyone going back and forth with paper patterns, looking for the correct information, finding the right materials, paint, drawings, and positioning and within a couple of hours everyone was heads up with brushes in hands working in Beautiful, actually Perfect signwriting weather. Lettering on the 60 year old boxcars and hoppers with 30 coats of paint and rust and splittered wood would have been considered a nightmare but for we were all doing this for our fun and fellowship and the greater cause. If we were doing this as a profit making job, we would have been cursing ourselves for taking it on, but under the group community spirit effort, it was fun. We all Knew of the problems of each of the things we were doing so we could somehow joyfully commisserate because no one else knew better of the conditions than fellow signwriters. Like telling a friend or family of how bad the surface was and how the paint was drying almost before coming off the brush, they might nod there head in un-understanding sympathy. With your fellows around, you just carry on and get it done despite conditions. And we have all had worse ones. Like painting upside down on brick with 70 km winds etc.
I had never attended a Letterheads Meet before, Letterheads being an informal gathering of the signmaking clan from around the world. The meets are usually everywhere else but local to me, a majority seem to be in the States, and i've never gone due to time and money and also a bit of shyness thinking I could never match the skills of these infamous masters of the brush. After this weekend, I tip my hat to each of the individual's skills but importantly realise that I too have very comparible skills to any of them, indeed doing it much longer than most of them with being in the business for nearly 30 years. Well, I will definitely intend on attending more Meets in the future, maybe every other year or so, and hopefully getting more socialising, trading stories and seeing portfolios as is usual with these Letterheads meets.
Overall, for me it was a very satisfying, joyful, interesting - just a Great Weekend.
And gladly too, my daughter was being pleasingly occupied By my new love of life so my mind was at ease to enjoy it fully.
Letterheads has a website too if you're interested, although I've only browsed it a long time ago, as I don't get much time to sit and browse.
Saturday Morning was chaos like I've seen rarely in my career. Everyone going back and forth with paper patterns, looking for the correct information, finding the right materials, paint, drawings, and positioning and within a couple of hours everyone was heads up with brushes in hands working in Beautiful, actually Perfect signwriting weather. Lettering on the 60 year old boxcars and hoppers with 30 coats of paint and rust and splittered wood would have been considered a nightmare but for we were all doing this for our fun and fellowship and the greater cause. If we were doing this as a profit making job, we would have been cursing ourselves for taking it on, but under the group community spirit effort, it was fun. We all Knew of the problems of each of the things we were doing so we could somehow joyfully commisserate because no one else knew better of the conditions than fellow signwriters. Like telling a friend or family of how bad the surface was and how the paint was drying almost before coming off the brush, they might nod there head in un-understanding sympathy. With your fellows around, you just carry on and get it done despite conditions. And we have all had worse ones. Like painting upside down on brick with 70 km winds etc.
I had never attended a Letterheads Meet before, Letterheads being an informal gathering of the signmaking clan from around the world. The meets are usually everywhere else but local to me, a majority seem to be in the States, and i've never gone due to time and money and also a bit of shyness thinking I could never match the skills of these infamous masters of the brush. After this weekend, I tip my hat to each of the individual's skills but importantly realise that I too have very comparible skills to any of them, indeed doing it much longer than most of them with being in the business for nearly 30 years. Well, I will definitely intend on attending more Meets in the future, maybe every other year or so, and hopefully getting more socialising, trading stories and seeing portfolios as is usual with these Letterheads meets.
Overall, for me it was a very satisfying, joyful, interesting - just a Great Weekend.
And gladly too, my daughter was being pleasingly occupied By my new love of life so my mind was at ease to enjoy it fully.
Letterheads has a website too if you're interested, although I've only browsed it a long time ago, as I don't get much time to sit and browse.
posted by Cliff Perry at 08:52
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