Tom's weekly Sign2 event has unexpectedly given me a new photographic project to pursue. I find myself looking at the streets around me a little differently now, searching for remnants of another era: faded shopfront lettering, heritage advertisements, forgotten business names and ghost signs quietly surviving on old brick walls.
This old Webb & Co. ghost sign in Bendigo is exactly the sort of thing I have in mind. Dating back to the nineteenth century, Webb & Co. was associated with Bendigo's once-thriving milling industry. Its flour mill, established in 1878, was reportedly capable of producing thousands of sacks of flour a day. What was once a place of industry and commerce has since found a new life, while traces of its former identity remain on the walls.
There is something rather poetic about these weathered letters. Once painted to attract customers and announce a business to the passing crowds, they now linger long after the original owners and customers have disappeared. They have become accidental historical markers, preserved by time rather than design.
Perhaps this is what makes the project so appealing. I am not simply photographing old signs, but collecting little fragments of lives, businesses and streets that might otherwise slip quietly out of memory. A new pastime, perhaps, but one with plenty of history hiding in plain sight.
Sony A7RV
FE 20-70mm f4 G
Linking Sign2
