A lettering guide template is a special type of
template used to write uniform characters. It consists of a sheet of plastic or other material with cut-outs of letters, numbers, and other shapes used especially for creating technical drawings. For decades they have been essential for lettering a
drawing nameplate so text and other designs could be made quickly and uniformly.
Although they have been superseded by the use of computers, during the greater part of the last century they were used to relatively ease the lettering process in the creation of technical drawings. They were an indispensable tool for
architect
An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...
s and
technical illustrators in general, for labeling their drawings and plans but also for the description of projects, in which it was good practice to use a lettering template to achieve uniform and well-written text.
A lettering template could also be used by people
illiterate
Literacy in its broadest sense describes "particular ways of thinking about and doing reading and writing" with the purpose of understanding or expressing thoughts or ideas in written form in some specific context of use. In other words, hum ...
or semi-illiterate to learn to type, or improve their handwriting. In the course of political history some politicians, such as
Bettino Craxi, have used them to help people with writing difficulties. They distributed cardboard templates with the sequence of characters of their last name, so they could be easily written during the
voting
Voting is a method by which a group, such as a meeting or an electorate, can engage for the purpose of making a collective decision or expressing an opinion usually following discussions, debates or election campaigns. Democracies elect hol ...
process.
See also
*
Graphic design
*
Technical lettering
*
Pantograph
A pantograph (, from their original use for copying writing) is a mechanical linkage connected in a manner based on parallelograms so that the movement of one pen, in tracing an image, produces identical movements in a second pen. If a line dr ...
References
Design
{{Design-stub