This latitude and longitude sign is a great way to document all the towns you have lived in.
I love all the large wooden signs that are popping up everywhere.
About a year ago, I bought this one:
It is wonderful, but it was expensive. After studying it, I decided I could make my own! I had an idea to make something showing the names and coordinates of all the cities/towns where my husband and I have lived, so I began designing. I use Adobe Illustrator, and I created this:
I was excited to test out my new Silhouette Cameo machine for this project. This machine is amazing, but I probably should have started with a small project rather than jump immediately into a large 2 feet x 4 feet project! However, I called the silhouette support team, and they were wonderful and helped out this novice silhouette user. Silhouette has a really great program for designing and well as purchasing pre-made designs. Since I had already created my design in Illustrator, I had to import my design into the Silhouette Studio program. It was actually fairly easy thanks to this tutorial by Geek Chick Online. Once my design was imported into Silhouette Studio, I had to split my design into two-part since the silhouette machine prints vinyl that is up to 1 foot wide and my design was 2 foot wide.
One little trick I learned is when you are printing something large scale, you need to select “no cutting mat.”
The program will want to print it as a 12 x 12 square – as you can see by the red lines. Off to the right, there is the option for selecting not cutting mat. And when you do that, your silhouette machine will print the length of your design.
I printed out my vinyl in two sections. Once the printing (or cutting) was done, I removed all the extra vinyl.
Silhouette’s little hook comes in handy for the harder-to-reach areas like inside the letters.
Once all the extra vinyl was removed I added the transfer paper to my vinyl.
For the wooden sign, I bought a large plywood board and had it cut into four pieces approximately 2 feet by 4 feet.
I spent around $6 for what became four pieces.
Once home, I painted one of the sides with black paint. I wanted black lettering, I was going to use my silhouette letters to create a stencil so my sign appeared to be hand-painted.
When the paint was dry, I added my vinyl using the transfer paper.
With my vinyl was on the board, I painted the entire sign with white paint.
Once the paint was dry, I removed the vinyl.
There were some areas I had to touch up with a brush. I didn’t perfectly match the two separate pieces of vinyl, but with a little paint, it isn’t noticeable. For the frame, I bought a couple of inexpensive furring strips.
And I stained them with dark walnut stain.
I used a chop saw to cut the trim and a nail gun to attach the frame to the sign.
There will definitely be some more DIY projects like this latitude and longitude sign coming thanks to the help of my Silhouette!
Go create something!
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Absolutely fantastic and your tutorial is very easy to follow!!! I still have to get a bigger cutting machine and I like the Silhouette! Great job and super idea!!
Thanks, Sarah! I appreciate your comment and hope it’s a helpful tutorial!
This is pretty sweet. Do you know if there are any services that will cut letters for a custom design? Not sure buying a machine for a project or two would be very economical.
Hi Trey, I know there are several shops on http://www.etsy.com that will make/sell customized vinyl lettering designs. I assume you just send them your design. I hope this helps!
Beautiful project, thanks for sharing! Could you please let me know which fonts you used?
Hi Christine – thanks! I used Avenir and Baskerville.
I have made many signs just like you described. But I had to figure out how to simplify the process when I made a Love is Patient sign. I peeled off a lot of letter for those verses! So now I do the reverse. After cutting out my design, I remove the letters and use the rest (which is actually what you peeled away in your design) as a stencil. I still use clear contact paper to transfer it to my project. Then I use the background color (in your case white) to paint over the letters and let them dry. This “seals” the vinyl around the letters and prevents bleeding when I apply the color I want my font to be (in your case black). I usually apply to coats of the letter color. When it is all dry, then you peel the stencil off and you are done. Hopefully this makes sense.
This is so interesting! Thanks so much for sharing. I may have to try this next time. Thanks, Jennifer!
I LOVE this! I can’t stop looking at your blog. ❤️
Keep looking, Molly! You’re keeping my traffic up! 🙂
Sara, what size trim did you use. Your sign turned out great!
Hi Kim – thank you! The trim is around 1.25″ wide x .5″ thick. I found mine at Lowes, and it’s really inexpensive. I had to be careful because several of the pieces were bowed pretty badly. Good luck!
What size was the plywood and how did you hang it on the wall? Sawtooth hangers?
Hi Nicole! The plywood was 1/4″, and I had it cut down to 2’x4′. I hung the sign using a couple screws under the overhang of the frame around the sign. It has worked great!
Hi Sara, I have question about shiplap. I cant afford the shiplap, but ipI do have some old fencing that I’d like to use. Do you think that would look ok to do a wall in?
Hi Joni, I’ve seen people do wall treatments with all sorts of things. Fencing can work, but it may be fairly thick and come out further than your trim which could complicate things. Good luck!
I had no idea there’s a “no cutting mat option”. I always thought you needed to use it for every project.
Fantastic! Thanks for sharing. So I am a little confused? Do you type your design words into a computer on a specific program? If so is that hard to do? What if you want the sign bigger than what it allows? Thx
I recognize all those cities…I now live north of LA. You can take the girl outa Indiana, but you can’t take Indiana outa the girl. I grew up in Daleville…
Hi Penny! You were just down the road from me!
I used Adobe Illustrator to create the type layout. It allows me to create any size I want, and unfortunately the program is expensive and requires a little bit of a learning curve. However, I’m sure there are much cheaper and easier programs out there to do large scale prints (unfortunately I don’t have any suggestions). Thanks for taking the time to comment!
Fantastic! Thanks for sharing. So I am a little confused? Do you type your design words into a computer on a specific program? If so is that hard to do? What if you want the sign bigger than what it allows? Thx
I recognize all those cities…I now live north of LA. You can take the girl outa Indiana, but you can’t take Indiana outa the girl. I grew up in Daleville…
What paint did you use? I assume chalk paint? I love how yours turned out and am about to replicate it!
Thanks Rebecca. I actually just used latex paint! Good luck!
What an awesome idea! I just got a Cricut machine and still learning how to use it, but would love to try something similar! Thank you for sharing!
Hi Jen! These vinyl cutting machines open up an entirely new world! Good luck on your machine and projects!
Have you tried this making a large sign with script font? I am finding the letters get cut off since I have to spit the design and then lining them up is brutal.
I didn’t try the script fonts for that very reason. It was time consuming enough with the “simple” fonts I used. However, the outcome is worth it, and I’m sure a script sign will be absolutely gorgeous. Good luck and hang in there!
What kind of paint did you use? Every time I try to paint over vinyl I can’t peal it up once paint dries.
I used a chalk paint and a chalkboard paint – so they were both chalky paints!
I thought in a previous reply you’d said you used latex paint? Really excited to make my own sign for the fall decorating season-and thanks for the tips!
Yes! I believe it was latex – it was at least water-based. It was last year that I made this, so I can’t quite remember. Good luck!!
Hello! I am new to this and I’m hoping you can answer two questions.
1. Once you put the plywood between the frame you create, does it just stay? Is it flush with the front of the frame? I’m just assuming in my head that it will just fall out. Lol.
2. Where did you get this large piece of transfer tape? 🙂
Thank you in advance!
Hi Samantha! I nailed the frame into the plywood – it’s flush with the front of the frame. In regards to the transfer tape – do you mean the vinyl? You can buy it in large sheets. Hope this helps!
I know you selected to not use a cutting mat on the machine…but when you put the vinyl through did you have it on a mat…or can you actually cut without a mat? Thanks!
Abbey, it’s been too long since I did this project to remember! I think the mat was too small for my project, so I believe I cut without a mat. However, I can’t promise that’s what I actually did. I’m so sorry I’m not much help!!
How did you split up the print jobs? How did the bottom half know where to pick up from the top half? If that makes sense, since it was taller than the 12″.
Hi Jennifer, unfortunately it’s been so long since I did this project that I can’t remember much about it. I’m sorry I’m not any help!!
Hi Sara. I received my first machine on my birthday in April of this year. I have many questions most days but usually am able to answer them through some determined research. There is one thing though that keeps cropping up. The transfer paper that you used in this sign and that many others seem to use has a grid on it. The transfer paper I use does as well but it is not the sticky portion, The grid is the backing that I must peel off before putting the sticky portion of the transfer paper on the stencil to pick it up. I would like the grid to be on the sticky portion so that I could use the grid to line up my design during application. What type of transfer paper do you buy and where? I am in Canada. Thanks so much. Staicy
Hi Staicy! I used transfer paper sold by silhouette, and it’s online! Good luck!!