Type Design for Sign Painters with Gen Ramírez

THE WORKSHOP

Join us in November for an intensive, two-day, weekend workshop on Type Design for Sign Painters, led by renowned type designer, educator, calligrapher, and sign painter Gen Ramírez at the New York Sign Museum.

This is an in-person, computer-based workshop focused on digital typeface design, not a sign painting class. You’ll learn how to use type design software to develop letterforms into a digital font, exploring how traditional lettering skills can translate into a new set of digital tools for your creative practice.

Gen Ramírez is a type designer, educator, calligrapher, and sign painter from Mexico. His work moves between type design, lettering, and hands-on letter-making, with a strong interest in how letters can carry personality, culture, and visual identity.

He’s the co-founder of Dual Type, a type design studio, and the founder of Letrástica Comunidad and Letrástica Type Festival in Guadalajara. He’s taught workshops and classes in Mexico and internationally, including at Type@Cooper, TypeWest, RISD, and KABK.

LEARNING OUTCOMES

After spending two days with renowned artist and designer Gen Ramírez, you’ll:

• Learn the fundamental principles of type design

• Get introduced to type design software and establish a digital type design workflow

• Begin developing a digital typeface based on your own lettering

• Develop a critical eye for letterform shapes, spacing, rhythm, and contrast

• Learn to proof, test, and refine letterforms for quality and consistency

• Explore the potential of custom typefaces for creating distinctive graphic layouts, working with lettering digitally, and preparing sign painting patterns

• You’ll leave the workshop with a starting point for a personal typeface and the foundational skills to continue developing it for your own creative practice

AUDIENCE

The course is completely beginner-friendly and open to anyone. Whether you’re a sign painter, lettering enthusiast, designer, calligrapher, tattoo artist, or simply someone who works with letterforms, you’ll learn how to begin translating lettering into a digital typeface using type design software.

No previous font design experience is required, although some familiarity with Bézier-based vector drawing tools will be helpful.  

*This is a digital design workshop, not a hands-on sign painting class.

For experienced sign painters, the course will also show you how to turn your lettering into working typefaces, giving you new tools to prepare layouts and patterns more efficiently and to work with typesetting, spacing, kerning, and other aspects of digital type.

We don’t consider ourselves Luddites here at the New York Sign Museum or Noble Signs. We love analog techniques, but both of our teams bring traditional lettering into the digital world every day.

We created this course to help you do the same: take inspiration from vintage lettering and turn it into functional typefaces you can use in your own design work.

MATERIALS REQUIRED

• Temporary Glyphs licenses will be provided to participants for the duration of the course. 

• Macbook (MacOS is required, other operating systems do not support Glyphs. Students will need to bring their own laptop and charger)

DATES

Day 1: Saturday November 14, 2026 from 10AM - 4PM

Day 2: Sunday November 15, 2026 from 10AM - 4PM

SCHOLARSHIP

We are offering 1 full scholarship seat for this workshop. We’d like to reserve this spot for someone passionate about typography and signage who might not be able to attend due to financial constraints. We would also prefer to offer the spot to someone who grew up in or lives in our studio’s neighborhood, East New York/Brownsville. Please fill out this Google Form to let us know why you’d like to be considered for the scholarship. The deadline for entries is November 1st at 11:59PM.

*Please note your application will be considered not eligible if you purchase a workshop ticket.

POLICIES

• Minimum Enrollment Policy: This workshop has a minimum enrollment. If this minimum is not met 4 weeks before the workshop start date, the workshop will be canceled, and all payments will be fully refunded to students, subject to no fee.

• Waitlist: If the workshop is sold out, we do not offer a waitlist. Tickets will be released for sale if anyone cancels their participation. If the workshop is sold out, you can opt to get an email notification when new tickets are back in stock directly from the registration page.

• Refund Policy: Full refund up to 4 weeks in advance of first class start date, subject to $25 administrative and processing fee. After that, no refunds are possible. Email store@nysignmuseum.org to request a refund.

• Rescheduling Policy: NYSM reserves the right to postpone or reschedule workshops to an alternate date. Should a change occur, participants will automatically have their tickets transferred to the new date. For postponed or rescheduled workshops, participants may request a full refund by emailing store@nysignmuseum.org within 5 days of the announcement.

• Cancellation Policy: NYSM reserves the right to cancel workshops. Should a cancellation occur with no rescheduled date, participants will automatically receive a full refund.