ROB WALKER
Rob Walker is, without doubt, one of the United Kingdom’s most highly skilled sign writers. Muralist, educator and master typographer, he’s a proud Yorkshire lad, whose award-winning career started with 140 quid in the bank and three paint brushes. Under the moniker, ByUmberto (more about that later), his portfolio spans shopfronts and fancy royal commissions – he’s definitely no one-trick pony. We travelled up to West Yorkshire to see the master at work and have a snoop around in his studio.
A former postman-come-senior-lecturer at a prestigious art institute in Leeds, Rob ran the BA Hons in Graphic Design. He describes his decision to leave “I resigned to pursue my love for hand-painted lettering at a time when a resurgence in the craft was at an exploding point. Naturally, the number of potential clients at your disposal in London far outweighs the number round these parts. But when I set up, I accidentally created a niche. Sign writers are few and far between in Yorkshire – and luckily that means there’s enough work for all of us to thrive, either as individual painters or gilders.”
Locally, there’s a rich legacy of manufacturing and of making. Rob explained, “I grew up in a small village between Bradford and Halifax. Back then, it was where the largest carpet mill in the world [Dean Clough] was thriving, well into the 1980s – it’s now a centre of commerce and thriving art spaces. Macintosh toffee (also in Halifax) became Rowntree Mackintosh – again a centre of excellence in confectionery, known all across the world.” The heritage runs deep: old mills,
confectioneries, textile dynasties. He continued, “That history bleeds into everything I paint. And the businesses still making things here? They get it. They choose me to paint their message because they know I’m rooted in craft, too.”
Tracing back, Rob has local sign writer, ‘Brian the Brush’ to thank for his creative spark. As a kid, he’d marvel at the glorious hand-painted Brian the Brush logo, emblazoned on the rear-end and bonnet of Brian’s trusty vehicle. “I’d stand there, staring at his van! Marveling at the fact this amazing text was all painted by hand. I started absorbing all things hand painted as the bus passed by businesses when I was on the way to school, or college. I’d scrutinise shop fascia’s in the area, searching for the signature of 'Brian the Brush'.
Alongside legendary van-driving Brian, was Rob’s cousin Jake. A graphic design student whose collection of retractable pencils set Rob’s pulse racing. With a smile he said, “The early years of my teens were shaped by a gravitational pull towards analogue lettering. Halifax in the 1990s had an explosive graffiti culture. I’d travel around Calderdale on buses with my dad's 35mm camera to take photos of the pieces that were popping up. I suppose you could say this was my first 'exposure' to large scale lettering – and I was hooked!”
“This early bond with typography wasn’t obvious to me then, but I used to practice writing 'tags' on paper at home.” Armed with his favourite chisel-tipped, solvent-based marker pen, he’d get to work on the buses, travelling to and from art college, writing tags in reverse on the top deck windows, so that passersby could read what he’d written. His era as a serial tagger was, thankfully brief. Conscious that his mum (also a frequent bus-user) might not be able to enjoy her ride to town thanks to the limited views from the window soon put an end to his scribing-on-the-move.
Funny then, that a fleeting moment of misspent youth has positively informed his practice. Grinning, he said, “All these decades later, when I find myself gilding glass, I think back to the bus window and the chisel tip marker pen. The definition of Verre Églomisé is to apply a design to the rear surface of glass using gold and paint. To be able to do this, my brain switches the processes into layers – similar to the way graphic designers use Adobe programs like illustrator or Photoshop. I had no idea that the brain that could write backwards on bus windows would be using the same muscle memory and skill set to gild glass panels for Fortnum & Mason.” Funny old world, eh?
The quiet ByUmberto analogue revolution flicks the Vs to today’s digital chokehold. Rooted, sensory and articulate, Rob’s work speaks, really, about the luxury of time. There’s no such thing as express next-day delivery on a hand-painted sign. This stuff needs to be done at a pace that supports precision. When we asked him to tell us more about his choice of tools, he described, “The first part of painting anything is picking up the brush. I begin by running the bristles through my fingers, which sends a signal to my brain of how clean that brush is (or not!) and how well that brush will pull a line of paint. It's a deeply sensory craft. Once the brush is chosen, then I pour the paint into the 'dipper cup' – which is a combination of paint with white spirit (or water). I work with a traditional Mahl stick, given to me by a retired signwriter called David, who’s now in his 80s. He’d made it from a rifle cleaning rod and passed it onto me. The kit box he passed onto me houses the Mahl stick, which comes apart in three sections. I take it to each and every project. I’m carrying legacy, then painting legacy, which is informed by the legacy of all who painted before me. It's a deeply satisfying way to work.”
He prides himself on working to a mantra of ‘no tape, no spray, hand-painted all the way’, Carefully considered brush strokes. Clearly an absolute captain, overlord or bossman of the craft, Umberto (a childhood nickname from his dad) likes to keep it real. Prodded for one final chunk of wisdom, he shared, “Real time, not Reel time. I don't believe in speeding up my actions for social media. I prefer to pin myself to the consideration of the actual time it takes to perfect the craft of gilding or painting typography.” Word up. The lover of letters hath spoken.
