The Hidden Hay’ven sign is about as simple a sign as we have ever done. The sign was to be presented to a clients retiring colleague and the deadline was a mere four days.
Dan whipped up a quick design which the customer approved on the spot. He paid the deposit and we started work immediately. Creating the file in EnRoute only took a few minutes and Dan sent it off to the CNC router.
The sign was nominally single sided (with text only on one side), however, the back side featured the same woodgrain and texture as the front. The two center layers of 1" thick Precision Board HDU were simple cutouts.
When the CNC router was done Dan glued up the pieces, complete with some structural steel inside. The steel gives the sign all the strength it will ever need.
Next, Dan finished off the edges of the sign — adding some woodgrain texture with a die grinder.
Then the sign received a quick coat of primer and two coats of base colour. We kept the shop fan on the work to speed up drying times as the deadline was quickly approaching... Once the base coats were dry Dan mixed up some light acrylic glaze. This was brushed on in sections...
...then wiped off carefully. Once this was dry a darker glaze was applied.
Then Dan painted the round sun graphic in the same manner, working from dark to light. Last up was the lettering — applied with a small brush. He finished with an extra day to spare to allow the paint a chance to harden up a little.
