Ghost sign sightings

Ghost sign1
Melbourne CBD

Those of you who follow my Instagram feed (and if you don’t already, go follow it,  I post fun pics over there every day!) will know that I have a bit of an obsession with photographing and posting photos of ghost signs  that I come across. Mostly ones from around the inner suburbs of Melbourne, but recently I’ve also found some in Bendigo and a particularly fabulous one in the CBD of Sydney.

Ghost sign3
Bendigo in Victoria, Australia

So, what is a ‘ghost sign’?

Ghost sign: an old, usually hand-painted, advertising sign that remains on a building long after its original purpose has finished.

Some of these signs are kept for their heritage significance, some remain because they’re in hard-to-reach places which make removal difficult, some are uncovered when surrounding buildings are demolished, and others are there simply because the building owner doesn’t care to remove them.

Ghost sign 4
Sydney CBD

What I love about these signs is the little glimpse they provide into the past of these urban landscapes.

We look at these signs with very different eyes than the generations before us have. To us, they are a quaint remnant of a past time, and a hint to the previous uses of these buildings. To the contemporary population when they were first painted, they were every bit as impactful as say, multi-media marketing is to us today.

Ghost sign 8
East Malvern in Melbourne. Formerly a delicatessen, now a professional office.

And many of them are very beautiful. Carefully hand-painted signage with an aesthetic that we now view as ‘retro’. Elegant fonts. Simple graphics. In an era when most things are mass-produced, there is a loveliness to encountering something that was painstakingly crafted by a real person.

Ghost sign 2
Bendigo in Victoria, Australia

There are a number of websites you can visit to find out more about ghost signs and see some great examples:

  • ghostsigns.com.au: Ghost Signs (Australia) is a web site project that aims to catalogue and protect ghost signs throughout Australia.
  • ghostsigns.co.uk: A research and publishing initiative to photograph, archive and promote awareness of the fading remains of hand-painted wall advertising a.k.a. ghost signs.
  • hatads.org.uk: The History of Advertising Trust hosts archives of ghost sign photos.
  • ghostsignproject.com: Discover, share and preserve faded ads and ghost signs all over the world.

If you find ghost signs in your travels, please photograph them –  who knows how long that wall or building will last? Upload them to Instagram and tag them #ghostsign and #ghostsigns, so they will join the collective archive of this rapidly disappearing phenomenon.  Tag me also and I’ll stop by and like them too!

Ghost sign
Melbourne CBD.

I saved the photo above for last, not because it is a particularly beautiful example of a ghost sign, but because I think it will resonate with many Melbournians.

Remember that quirky shop on Bourke St – Job Warehouse?  It had been part of the ‘fabric’ of Melbourne for 60 years before closing in 2012. It was a dusty, odd shop, piled up haphazardly with bolts of cloth of all types and colours.

But with the building up for lease, that simple, graphic signage over the door will possibly not be there for much longer. Admire this ghost while it lasts.

Are there ghost signs in your neighbourhood? Tell me about them. And show me them on Instagram!

(Remember to tag me so I find them)

 

Weekend Wanderlust

This post is linked up to With Some Grace’s FYBF …

Click on any link to find lots of other great posts to read.
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