Signage is a graphical display conveying information to an audience, with various types including custom, traffic, warning, and digital. Effective signage has a central iconic element, like McDonald’s Golden Arch, and focuses on legibility and design to communicate effectively.
Signage is a general term for any type of graphical display intended to convey information to an audience. There are many different types of signage and it has been around for thousands of years. Most modern signage is based on words, often in tandem with images, but a great deal of historic signage used images only, and much modern signage geared towards an international audience omits text altogether.
Custom signage is typically designed for a business, either to communicate the business’ name and location, or to promote a specific service or product that the business offers. Bespoke signage can be as simple as a small hand written sign hanging in a shop window, or it can be a very intentional branding put together by a large scale marketing company and featured on thousands of a single retail outlet. society. This type of signage comes in all shapes and sizes, and there are very few common themes between the different types.
Often bespoke signage intended to promote a business will include the company name, but the most effective forms of signage tend to have a central element aside from the name becoming iconic. The signage used for the McDonalds company is an excellent example of this. The iconic Golden Arch used in their signage has become as well known as their name, making them instantly visible from great distances and giving them endless branding opportunities.
Another ever-present form of signage is traffic signs, intended to provide information to pedestrians or drivers. Real traffic signs, for example, such as those seen in many US cities with white lettering on a green background, give street and intersection names to help people navigate a city or town. While these markings have changed over the years, as their primary focus is on communicating location to busy, often fast-moving people, they tend to focus on legibility above all else.
Warning and instruction signs are another form of road signs that can be seen in most countries around the world. Because these signs need to be easily recognizable from a distance and also need to be understandable to anyone driving, including those who don’t speak their native language, they almost always feature some sort of design or infographic theme, accompanied by text or by themselves. For example, a traffic sign indicating that deer may cross the road sporadically, intended to warn drivers to slow down, might simply show an image of a deer, usually in the United States as a simple black silhouette against a yellow background. Similarly, a stop sign, as it is to be easily recognized from a distance and in poor visibility, is a unique red color and unique octagonal shape.
With the advent of the internet, the concept of signage has made its way into the digital world. Digital signage is a term used to describe logos, banners, and other navigation devices found online, even though they aren’t technically signs. However, they serve nearly the same purpose as real-world signage and are often based on a similar design aesthetic.
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