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Luminor Sign Co paints Time Out’s Christmas cover

You may have spotted this week’s Time Out London magazine when you were out and about in London – perhaps you even picked up a copy.

Well, if some of you East Enders found something familiar in the intricate, stylised lettering telling you to ‘shop til ye drop’, it is because they were drawn by Roman Road’s very own sign painter Ged Palmer of the Luminor Sign Co.

Ged has become somewhat of a local celebrity for his hand-drawn signs on the entrances of many Roman Road establishments like Cafe East, East London Liquor Company and G. Kelly.

And this week, Ged’s tell-tale handpainted letterings can be seen all over London – on the cover of one of the city’s most prominent magazines.

He was invited by Time Out to visit their offices and paint a cover heralding the Christmas shopping season.

‘We painted it in their studios. They wanted an old-fashioned vibe, like the ‘ye old sweet shoppe’ style lettering, but about Christmas shopping.’

The sign took Ged more than six hours to paint. The shine of the lettering that you can see on the cover is not Photoshop; it was achieved by hand.

‘We used gold leaf paint for the surface. And we used burnishing where we polish the panel with velvet, to create an illuminating effect.’

Although the glossy, three-dimensional effect was achieved by Ged’s hard work, a digital touch was used to make the cover look glass-like, as if looking through the window of a traditional London ye olde shoppe. The TimeOut team took photos of London’s shopfronts and layered the sunlight over Ged’s sign, to fully achieve the effect of natural light gleaming through the windows.

Ged says that, as a sign painter, this mixed media magazine cover was a whole new experience for him.

‘I’m an independent, hand-painting sign artist, and most of the jobs I get are to paint shop fronts or front door numbers. So it’s really breaking new ground for hand-painted lettering to be used in that way, as a magazine cover.’

He says it is also encouraging for small businesses like Ged’s to be recognised by a magazine like Time Out.

‘It’s an honour to be part of a great publication that is all about our city.

‘To be on the cover like this shows that small, independent business like ours that does hand-drawn lettering – we are part of the city too.’

Don’t forget to pick up a copy of Time Out with Ged’s cover if you spot it around London.

If you liked this article you may also be interested in our review of Eleanor Crow’s book of illustrations: ‘Shopfronts of London’. 

Time Out Christmas front page designed by Luminor signpainters, Roman Road


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