Deptford was our work of art, it’s stories, and scars, the people and the streets, the shops and the meets. It all came together so perfectly just on it’s own. Rather than make anything ‘new’ we wanted to document and present what was already here, and in some cases was being lost, painted over, or evicted.

Letters from Deptford is the start of our project collecting and collating stories, messages, and shop fronts from Lewisham. Creating a full typeface from the unique and diverse shop signage that lines the mile long street we then asked friends, residents, local business owners to send us anonymous messages to be displayed in the typeface and then to be displayed in the studio as part of the show.

We printed a map and type spec to give away over the duration of the show. The project lives on and is growing across the borough of Lewisham, documenting and in some ways protecting the heritage of these high streets for generations to come.

Deptford High Street: a half a mile of buildings packed side by side, a physical timeline of trade, trend, triumph and failure. How many lives does a High Street have? How many feet will pass over it? How many families have moved to form businesses, how many chance meetings or planned conversations have taken place down them?

Having lived, worked and engaged with and in Deptford for over four years we found ourselves taking up residence in a studio just off Resolution Way. For our first opening as part of the SLAM last Friday’s we wanted to do something a little different.

Deptford was our work of art, it’s stories, and scars, the people and the streets, the shops and the meets. It all came together so perfectly just on it’s own. Rather than make anything ‘new’ we wanted to document and present what was already here, and in some cases was being lost, painted over, or evicted.

Letters from Deptford is the start of our project collecting and collating stories, messages, and shop fronts from Lewisham. Creating a full typeface from the unique and diverse shop signage that lines the mile long street we then asked friends, residents, local business owners to send us anonymous messages to be displayed in the typeface and then to be displayed in the studio as part of the show.

We printed a map and type spec to give away over the duration of the show. The project lives on and is growing across the borough of Lewisham, documenting and in some ways protecting the heritage of these high streets for generations to come.