I recently purchased a Tin Sign online and when it arrived I found myself faced with a dilemma; How to display it properly. This particular sign was a personal link to my mother's past. It was a recreation of the 1940's Tin Sign of 'Rosie the Riveter', an icon of World War II when, because of the shortage of men, women were encouraged to work in the factories. My mother was one of the thousands who picked up a wrench and went to work. She even had an old photograph showing her and her friends outside a war plant during lunch break. I bought the Tin Sign as an anniversary gift for her and my father but I wanted it to be something special.
I thought of various ways to mount Rosie. I had purchased a round sign recently and decided that it would be perfect as the face of a clock. I went to WalMart and bought an inexpensive round clock that had the same diameter as the Tin Sign. I carefully removed the old backing, and after gluing the sign onto a thin piece of plywood and drilling a hole for the clock hands, I replaced it with the mounted Tin Sign.
My aunt liked the idea so much that she said that if one was available, she would like a clock with an Elvis Presley Tin Sign backing. But when she realized that I would have to drill a hole through Elvis' nose for the hands of the clock, she asked if I could put a picture frame around it instead, so I did.
My neighbor saw the clock and went me one
better: he found a store that was going out of business and bought their square neon lit window sign. He then went online and found a Tin Sign of an old Steam Locomotive and bough it. The sign is now framed in neon, and hanging on the wall behind the model railroad setup he has in his basement.
In fact, Tin Signs are perfect accents for the hobbyist. I once saw a Pez (a small candy that comes in a variety of plastic dispensers) collector use a Tin Sign featuring the candy as a backdrop to highlight a few of his more unique pieces. He took the sign, and glued several small wooden platforms around it. Mounted the sign directly on the wall, placed an accent light above the Tin Sign, and then positioned his pieces onto each platform. The pieces seemed to leap out at the viewer.
Even though each of these methods of using a Tin Sign was intriguing, none of them quite fit what I wanted. And then it hit me! Mom was always talking about your memories as being a 'window into the past', and that gave me an idea.
I borrowed her old faded picture of her and her factory buddies and had it touched up, and an extra copy made to fit the size of a single window pane. I went to the local hardware warehouse and purchased a six paned window frame (without the glass). In the bottom left hand corner pane, I mounted the black and white copy of the old photograph. I then placed Tin Sign of Rosie behind the window frame and used small blocks of wood as spacers to set the sing back some, so that it looked like you were looking through a real window at the wall of a building. I put a small plaque underneath titled: 'A Window to the Past'. I then mounted it on a basement wall.
When my mother came down and saw it she was almost in tears. She loved it! It was perfect!
I thought of various ways to mount Rosie. I had purchased a round sign recently and decided that it would be perfect as the face of a clock. I went to WalMart and bought an inexpensive round clock that had the same diameter as the Tin Sign. I carefully removed the old backing, and after gluing the sign onto a thin piece of plywood and drilling a hole for the clock hands, I replaced it with the mounted Tin Sign.
My aunt liked the idea so much that she said that if one was available, she would like a clock with an Elvis Presley Tin Sign backing. But when she realized that I would have to drill a hole through Elvis' nose for the hands of the clock, she asked if I could put a picture frame around it instead, so I did.
My neighbor saw the clock and went me one
better: he found a store that was going out of business and bought their square neon lit window sign. He then went online and found a Tin Sign of an old Steam Locomotive and bough it. The sign is now framed in neon, and hanging on the wall behind the model railroad setup he has in his basement.
In fact, Tin Signs are perfect accents for the hobbyist. I once saw a Pez (a small candy that comes in a variety of plastic dispensers) collector use a Tin Sign featuring the candy as a backdrop to highlight a few of his more unique pieces. He took the sign, and glued several small wooden platforms around it. Mounted the sign directly on the wall, placed an accent light above the Tin Sign, and then positioned his pieces onto each platform. The pieces seemed to leap out at the viewer.
Even though each of these methods of using a Tin Sign was intriguing, none of them quite fit what I wanted. And then it hit me! Mom was always talking about your memories as being a 'window into the past', and that gave me an idea.
I borrowed her old faded picture of her and her factory buddies and had it touched up, and an extra copy made to fit the size of a single window pane. I went to the local hardware warehouse and purchased a six paned window frame (without the glass). In the bottom left hand corner pane, I mounted the black and white copy of the old photograph. I then placed Tin Sign of Rosie behind the window frame and used small blocks of wood as spacers to set the sing back some, so that it looked like you were looking through a real window at the wall of a building. I put a small plaque underneath titled: 'A Window to the Past'. I then mounted it on a basement wall.
When my mother came down and saw it she was almost in tears. She loved it! It was perfect!