Le Pain Quotidien, London

Our client was opening up a new restaurant in London and had managed to source the main external
sign, but couldn’t find a company to design and sign paint a large pictorial sign for them.
They wanted a sign which would give the appearance of a chalk board and advertise that they were a French bakery and bar.
Using 4 sheets of 5’ x 10’ marine ply, which we trimmed to size, sealed the edges and then painted it with an external matte black masonry paint. To get the chalk effect, we had to do a bit of experimenting first.
It’s easy to achieve a chalk effect when viewed closely, but achieving it so that it can be seen from a distance and not just look like a dirty board is a different matter. Using the powers of social media, we posted our 3 favourite results onto Facebook and let the public decide which looked best.
We’re not going to give all of our secrets away, but we can tell you that we used a white signwriting paint diluted with white spirit to recreate the chalk marks.
Once the board had dried, the sign painting began!
The following day we transported it to London and with the use of a scissor lift secured it onto its
new home.