House Sign

The sign for “Castlebank House” at the bottom of our drive was a very rusted dusty black.  My task for today was to renovate it.

The easiest way by far would have been to remove the letters from the wall and then clean and repaint them in the garage.  That way I could have spray painted them which would have been super quick. Unfortunately half an hour with a screwdriver, a pair of pliers and a can of WD40 convinced me that the screws were going nowhere without an angle grinder.

So I had to do it in situ without risking getting paint all over the stonework behind.  I carefully pushed sheets of thin card behind the letters and masking taped them in place.  Then I painted with two coats of primer.

The paint I had in the house was “antique gold” which I had been using for the handles of drawers.  It is a bit dark but I thought I would give it a go.

I had to leave the paint to dry for ages – I had forgotten that traditional enamels take eight hours to dry.  Then I removed the paper with some difficulty.

It looks much more elegant, but not that much more distinct for delivery drivers.  I could paint it a brighter gold but that might be a bit naff.  It is not authentically Victorian anyway – more 1950s when it would have been the height of modernity.  Even if we could, I don’t think with a house like this that you should even try to airbrush out all the rest of its history as though you were sealing it in amber.  After all, it has electrics and modern bathrooms and central heating.