France

Karen Stamper’s Ghost Sign-Inspired Collages

Artist Karen Stamper shares the process behind her collages, inspired by the ghost signs in the south of France.

12 Apr 2024
Alain Murzeau, Furniture Maker, Angers, France

The former home of this century-old business tells a story of its changing family ownership. Photos: Keith Roberts.

23 Mar 2024
Advertising Time Capsules in Paris and London

In the London Underground and Paris Metro these advertising time capsules show original posters dating from the 1950s and earlier, as revealed by works.

29 Dec 2021
Two Paris Beauties Under Wraps

A couple of years ago these two well-preserved ghost signs were revealed in Paris (see Streetview), presumably by the removal of billboards that covered and protected them. [Update via Caroline’s Miscelleny: The uncovering was in 2012, and the works can be seen underway in the legacy Streetview.] The first adverises Ripolin, a paint brand, which […]

7 Dec 2018
The Shopfronts of ‘Paris Re-Tale’

After publishing the wonderful photos of one-time Paris sign business E. Gautier, I was alerted to this project and the above video where the sign makes a brief cameo. Five of my favourites below, but make sure you check out the full collection, including background notes, by photographer Sebastian Erras for Pixartprinting.

4 May 2018
E. Gautier’s Beautiful Paris Ghost Signs

Independently of each other I have been sent photos of this beautiful Paris ghost signs by Wim Dammers and book contributor Leisa Clements. It is a remarkably elaborate piece of work, including picturials in other sections. This is isn’t surprising as it is advertising the services of E. Gautier’s sign firm. He no doubt wanted […]

6 Apr 2018
NOTICE: An English Language Ghostsign in Paris

I heard about this ghostsign in Paris via an email from Ralph Adam. It caught my attention for the use of English language on an historic sign in France and reminded me of the British Legion sign in Ypres, Belgium. It was then photographed by Adam Roberts of Invisible Paris and some email correspondence between […]

21 Jan 2017
Ghostsigns in the Typographic Universe

A new book from Steven Heller and Gail Anderson features a handful of my ghostsigns photos from around the world (London, Cambodia, France and Australia). Typographic Universe documents a variety of ‘found’ letters in the environment, people and animals, alongside the creation of letters from everyday objects. These are split across ten themed sections with […]

5 Nov 2014
Cassannet: A Dubonnet-Inspired Typeface

This film is promoting the typeface Cassannet, inspired by the iconic Dubonnet triptych found on numerous ghost signs across France. The campaign was originally designed for the brand by the artist Cassandre and this typeface has been designed by Atipo in Spain. Thank you to Jess over on the University of Wolverhampton Visual Communication blog for passing this […]

24 Nov 2013
Ghostsigns from Invisible Bordeaux

Tim Pike runs the Invisible Bordeaux blog. I recently helped him find some locations in the area for a new series of posts about ghostsigns. In addition to this first blog post about ghostsigns in Bordeaux, Tim has cleverly plotted them all on a Google map which he will add to as he makes more […]

3 Nov 2012
Dubo, Dubon, Dubonnet in Paris, 1983

I had to share this as it is a brilliant example of the classic ‘Dubo, Dubon, Dubonnet’ campaign with illustrations in the hand painted form. It was captured by Scott Phillips in Paris in 1983 and, on his blog, he describes how he was able to create this wonderful image. The original artwork for the 1932 campaign was produced by French artist A. M. […]

25 Aug 2012
French ghostsigns blog: Les murs peints s’affichent

Les murs peints s’affichent is a blog written by Philippe Célérier on the topic of ghostsigns in France. He adds updates quite regularly and it is well worth following if you are interested in hand painted signs on buildings from this country which seems to have so many. The image above is taken from this post […]

29 Jul 2012
The origins of painting on walls

I’ve become increasingly intrigued by the origins of painting on walls, and the evolution of the form over time, up to the current vogue for street art. While the walls of caves were not made of brick, they did nonetheless provide people with an early canvass for their painting. The transition from these depictions of […]

11 Jul 2012
Faux ghostsigns

Sometimes hand painted signs on buildings are created to look old and weathered intentionally. The example pictured (original photo on Flickr) was produced in 2003 for the Disney film, ‘Miracle’. (Does anyone have a clip showing where and how it features in the film?) Another Disney example is this sign for the ‘New Orleans Trading […]

1 Jul 2012
The ‘Books of Clio’ is a great blog for ghostsigns in France

I’ve just started to follow this blog which is regularly throwing up interesting material. Above and below are three of my favourites from the last couple of months (from here, here and here), the first for the interesting arrow shape, the Zanussi one because I’ve never seen a washing machine brand advertised in this way […]

12 Jun 2012
Walls by Deidi von Schaewen

Deidi von Schaewen’s ‘Walls’ is a lovely hardback book that documents hand painted advertising on walls in the 1960s and 1970s. It’s geographical coverage is noteworthy with examples from Berlin, London, New York, Paris and elsewhere in France. Most of the photography is in black and white with a handful of colour images, all of […]

11 Apr 2012
The beauty of cracking paint on Paris’ trompes l’oeil

Adam at Invisible Paris has written this blog post about the changing state of the city’s trompes l’oeil. This example in partticular caught my eye, the craking and peeling of the paint creating something new from something old. It is similar to the way that some ghostsigns deteriorate, with the paint sitting on the surface of […]

27 Mar 2012
Four layers of Dubonnet palimpsest

Great discovery here from Sebastien in which he has identified four signs for the same brand vying for position on the same wall. There’s a great gallery of French ghost signs here (Dubonnet here) and my posts on the country are here with additional photos in this Flickr set.

20 Mar 2012
The Devil is in the Detail: Emmanuel Nouaillier Masterclass

Emmanuel Nouaillier is a French artist I admire for his attention to detail and his focus on Ghostsigns as subject matter. Below are some of his tools of the trade and a detailed exposition of his techniques can be found on this website. Absolutely fascinating as ever…

20 Jan 2012
Ghostsigns World Tour

Perhaps being in Cambodia has sensitised me to the world of Ghostsigns beyond my home shores. Or maybe awareness of the project has encouraged those from around the world to make contact. Whatever it is, I thought it was time for a round-up of what’s landed in my inbox and surfaced on my internet radar […]

21 Jul 2011
Emmanuel Nouaillier Update

Just under a year ago I featured the work of Emmanuel Nouaillier whose artistic treatment of the ghostsigns in his native France is fascinating. It’s worth having a read of this site to understand some of the meticulous technique that goes into producing his work. Emmanuel describes the final print output as, “a mix between sculpture, […]

14 Nov 2009
Emmanuel Nouaillier

One of the best things that has happened since setting up this blog is people sending me ghost sign related materials from around the world. The most interesting of these are when the signs have been used as a springboard for artistic and other creative activities. Most recently I got a series of emails from […]

8 Dec 2008
French Connection

I’ve just recently returned from five weeks in the south of France, hence the lack of Ghost Sign news since late June. It looks like Frank Jump was also doing something similar recently and details of my trip last year are here. Just before I left Caroline tipped me off about a Ghost Signs ‘convention’ […]

10 Sep 2008
Ghost Signs Received (Europe)

Having been fairly busy over the last few months at work and on my course I’ve only been making the occasional posts of things that people have sent to me. What has resulted is a slight backlog of pictures and so these posts will pull these together along geographic lines (London, UK, Europe and USA). […]

11 Mar 2008