NOW THAT 2011 IS OVER, IT’S TIME to crawl out of hibernation, and begin sorting through the best and brighest Custom Letters of the year!
Our Best of 2010—Day 1 and Day 2—featured more than 900 images, our Top 10 lists, and our Person of the Year. Last year, we scoured hundreds of personal sites, yet took in a relatively small number of submissions.
We hope to get more subs this year, so if you or anyone you know create Custom Letters, please pass on the link! We don’t want to miss anyone.
WHAT WE ARE LOOKING FOR
The Custom Letters category includes calligraphy, sign painting, graffiti, stone carving, digital lettering, hand lettering, paper sculpture, and original type design. It could also involve making letters with sticks and berries, or carving letters into a tree. It’s an elastic category.
The Custom, in this instance, means built from scratch; we ARE NOT looking for customization—a type treatment or 3d treatment—of an existing typeface. Again, no type treatments.
A few other things:
• The deadline to submit is Wednesday, February 1, midnight Pacific time. We will be publishing our Best Of later in February.
• E-MAIL ADDRESS: lettercult [AT] gmail.com. You can submit for yourself or others. You can include the actual files or submit links. Please put 2011 SUBMISSION in the SUBJECT FIELD.
• SUBMISSION FORMAT: .png or .jpg, 600 pixels wide, 72 dpi. We’ll confirm receipt of your submissions, but we won’t contact you after that. There is no limit to the number of submissions you can make, but please edit yourself, and pick your BEST WORK. Please include a link to your site. And please do not send work completed before 2011, or work from 2012.
• ALPHABATTLE LETTERS: The Alphabattle wrap-up will be separate so INDIVIDUAL LETTERS will stay separate from the Best Of.
• If you don’t submit, there’s still a good chance we’ll find your piece if you’ve uploaded it somewhere—Flickr, Behance, etc. However, if it’s on your site, and it’s unclear what year you created it, we won’t include it.
• We are aware of certain styles that get copied. If you’re aping the current Letterer of the Moment, we’d ask you to please, find something original to submit.
• If you or someone you know are not on our list of LetterMakers, email us.
Finally, we always get questions about why a Best Of would include so many images—why don’t you narrow it down to a manageable number so it’s truly a BEST OF. Well, the continuing goal is to introduce people to Custom Letters, and to celebrate those who are making Custom Letters. It’s as simple as that. Our aim to be inclusive, not exclusive.
Thanks!
