Signature ideas

Six signature directions for Eliana

Each one is a genuine drawing of the name — not a font — made by the same studio that draws the paid commission, with the design decisions stated under it.

Drawn from the name · 6 directions · capital E

Understated · flowing · fully readable

The capital keeps its place, which puts the emphasis on the whole name.

a capital on its own shelf · finished on a long sail

An angular and urgent hand. The turns are cut rather than curved. It is also one of the few here that stands the name on the E's own foot.

Confident · flowing · signature-legible

It gives itself room, and reads as unhurried because of it.

a capital on its own shelf · finished on a long sail

An urgent and restrained hand. It leans 38 degrees off vertical. It is the rare one that stands the name on the E's own foot.

Commanding · sharp · signature-legible

Long and low, it takes the whole width of the line.

a capital thrown inside a loop · finished on a long sail

A dramatic and grand hand. The stroke swells and thins by a factor of 2.7. Almost nothing else here throws a flat loop right around the E.

Confident · sharp · fully readable

Measured rather than dashed off, and the steadier for it.

underlined in one return stroke

A theatrical and even hand. One letter is pushed well past the proportions of its neighbors. It is also one of the few here that lays a line back underneath the name.

Understated · sharp · signature-legible

Everything rounds, nothing is cornered.

a capital thrown inside a loop · finished on a long sail

A theatrical and level hand. One letter is pushed well past the proportions of its neighbors. It is the rare one that throws a flat loop right around the E.

Commanding · flowing · fully readable

Generous with its loops, and unembarrassed about it.

finished on a long sail

A deliberate and compact hand. It is built in 9 separate strokes.

What Eliana gives a designer

The capital E carries the mark. There are 2 distinct professional constructions of it on the studio's shelf, and which one a design commits to changes the whole gesture.

What follows the capital decides the middle of the mark: the l reaches into the ascender line, which gives the mark its upper silhouette and the dotted i leaves a mark above the line that a fast hand turns into a flick.

6 letters is the length most signatures are built on — enough travel for character, little enough to repeat exactly.

Making it yours

These studies are drawn on the first name alone, because that is how the question is usually asked — but a working signature is built on your full name: the second capital, the balance between the two words, and the short everyday version are where the real design decisions live.

The studio draws twenty directions for your full name in about a minute, and the kit — the files, the report that explains the design, and the stroke-order lesson — is what the three you choose become.