We re-did the exterior dimensional letters on an entrance sign for Forest Lawn Covina Hills, a Memorial Park in Covina, California. Forest Lawn is a long-time customer of ours and Forest Lawn Covina Hills is just one of their many locations. We made them a painted aluminum exterior dimensional letter sign to replace the existing letters.
The existing sign had been up for a very long time and there was some damage along with the fact that you could see where the letters were studded to the wall if you were close enough. The previous sign was made from 3/16″ thick acrylic letters which is why we used aluminum for the new letters. The letters were flat-cut from .090 aluminum and they were painted white. If a client doesn’t have a preference, we will typically use aluminum or another metal if the client is looking for a metal look, and acrylic for black, white, or colorful signs. However, if the letters are going to be thin, we tend to use metal because it’s more durable. For example, 1/4″ thick aluminum will hold up better outdoors than 1/4″ acrylic.
We can also paint aluminum as we can with acrylic, but aluminum dimensional letters are much more expensive than acrylic dimensional letters so if the letters are on the thicker side like 3/8″ thick to 1/2″ thick, we usually lean toward acrylic unless the client specifically wants solid metal letters. The material we use can really depend on the client’s taste and their budget.
If the client specifically wants metal letters and they are going to be 1″ or thicker, we usually switch to channel letters as fabricated metal letters that are 1″ deep are usually more affordable than getting 1″ thick solid metal and routing the letters out. If it’s an interior sign, we may offer foam dimensional letters but that is only if the client has a very small budget.