12 inspirational hand lettering books

At the start of the year I made the declaration that 2017 would be the year I’d finally try hand lettering. When I was a kid I’d drag out the old Letraset book and I would practice tracing the different fonts. The second job I had after leaving school was at a sign shop. As a sign designer I worked with hundreds of fonts and I learned a bunch about formatting and white space and how different fonts communicate messages differently. It was at this job that I developed a huge crush on old vintage signs. I so wanted to be able to do freehand work but I just didn’t have the confidence to try. Until now.

Thankfully we are blessed with an internet full of helpful tutorials and practice sheets to help novice hand letterers like me. I’ve also found inspiration in a couple of books about hand lettering. Want to know my favourites?


1. The Ultimate Brush Lettering Guide: A Complete Step-by-Step Creative Workbook to Jump Start Modern Calligraphy Skills – Peggy Dean

2. In Progress: See Inside a Lettering Artist’s Sketchbook and Process, from Pencil to Vector – Jessica Hische

3. Creative Lettering and Beyond: Inspiring tips, techniques, and ideas for hand lettering your way to beautiful works of art – Gabri Joy Kirkendall, Laura Lavender, Julie Manwaring, Shauna Lynn Panczyszyn

4. Hand Lettering 101: An Introduction to the Art of Creative Lettering – Chalkfulloflove

5. Hand-Lettering (An Interactive Guide to the Art of Drawing Letters) – Megan Wells

6. Hand-Lettering for Everyone: A Creative Workbook – Cristina Vanko

7. Little Book of Hand Lettering – Emily Gregory

8. The Joy of Lettering: A creative exploration of contemporary hand lettering, typography & illustrated typeface – Gabri Joy Kirkendall, Jaclyn Escalera

9. Adventures in Lettering – Dawn Nicole Warnaar

10. Hand Lettering: Creative Alphabets for Any Occasion – Thy Doan

11. Scripts: Elegant Lettering from Design’s Golden Age – Steven Heller, Louise Fili

12. Hand-Lettering Ledger: A Practical Guide to Creating Serif, Script, Illustrated, Ornate, and Other Totally Original Hand-Drawn Styles – Mary Kate McDevitt

No Fuss Calligraphy Starter Kit

I’ve always loved the look of calligraphy. I admire the precision and skill a person must have to be proficient at it. I’ve tried it myself over the years but I tend to end up with a neater version of my own scrawling handwriting, which just doesn’t cut it.

If you’re interested in learning how to calligraph perhaps The No Fuss Calligraphy Starter Kit from Printable Wisdom will help? It comes complete with:

  • – One calligraphy brush pen
  • – Two sample alphabets
  • – Instructional pages covering strokes, flourishes, connections, and more
  • – Practice pages
  • – Personal calligraphy exemplar page
  • – Three guided projects
  • – Freestyle project pages

The book looks beautiful and the projects look easy to follow which is great if you’re a beginner. Are you keen to try your hand at calligraphy?

Calligraphy 1

Calligraphy 2

Calligraphy 3