Fabricating a projecting sign

There’s something cool about a sign that projects from the wall, not hanging from a bracket but somehow attached to the wall on one end. It makes for a very clean look. The sign, of course, needs to be lightweight but with a sturdy frame so that it can be securely mounted to the wall. Here’s a projecting sign that Duncan Wilkie [Comsign Architectural Signage Inc., Edmonton, Alberta, Canada] fabricated recently using a combination of aluminum and PVC board.

“We wanted to fabricate the sign in-house,” says Duncan, “so using router-cut PVC over an aluminum frame was a practical solution. It was a fairly easy sign to build, and the customer was very happy with it.”

The sign is approximately 48-by-30-in. Duncan began by making a simple frame by welding a piece of tubular aluminum to a piece of flat aluminum stock which would serve as the mounting point.