Hand lettering: One of the oldest art forms is also one of the trendiest.

From Mesopotamian Cuneiform and Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics to the guy wearing a beanie in the middle of summer, drawing tall swooping letters on an iPad in the corner of your local cool-coffee-shop, this art form has existed for thousands of years and will likely exist for thousands more. I won’t bore you with some long, colorful history of how glyph-based alphabets carved into stone became Gutenberg’s calligraphy-inspired blackletter type, which became me crying in aisle 5 of a Michael’s arts & crafts because my mom wouldn’t buy me a set of expensive brush pens at age 8-and-a-half. Maybe I’ll tell that story another time. Today, I’m just going to give you a short list of hand letterers who inspire the hell out of me, and will hopefully inspire the hell out of you.

 â a Portland based artist, illustrator and author, known for her colorful paintings and hand lettering.

 â The lettering, illustration, & design studio of Spencer Charles and Kelly Thorn. This Philly based duo is known for their lettering, illustration and type design. 

 â a Salty Lake City based letterer and stop-motion animator, known for her ability to craft letters out of food and food out of letters. 

 â a Philly based illustrator and lettering artist, known for her quirky and whimsical work. 

 â a San Francisco based lettering artist and author, known for her expertly crafted letterforms, letterpress prints, editorial works, and children’s books. 

 â a Milan & New York City based designer and letterer, known for his “fauxsaics,” a series of typographic mosaic illustrations. 

 â a Philly based designer and hand letter, she’s brand new to the hand lettering game but is certainly carving out a space for herself in the community.

 â is a New York City and Philly based contemporary artist and muralist, known for his typographic murals and screenprints. 

Illustration

Graphic Design

Handlettering

In most cases, landing on a broken link is a UX nightmare. The user is moving right along, exploring all that the site has to offer and 

! â¦ A brick wall – an ugly one at that, with “404” graffiti’d right on the front of it. It just feels so abrupt, so intrusive â Like a dead end to your otherwise seamless flow. But does it have to feel like that? If you plan ahead with good UI and empathy for your user, you can turn a bad user experience into a quick smile and encouraged exploration.

Ever hit a 404 page, only to be met with “Go back to exactly where you just were”? … They’re out there. Let me phrase it this way – Would you enjoy getting lost on a trail, only to hit a dead end and be forced to go back the exact way you came? Of course not. The internet is just a different platform for the same problem, except here you have the opportunity to carve out a solution. Users want to feel like they are making progress, it’s your job to help them.

Sidenote: You may even get lucky and have clients that are hilarious enough to pick up a chair and pretend to throw it during a photoshoot and you find that photo later down the road and think “This would be pretty funny to use here, but I don’t know if they’ll go for it â¦” And they totally go for it.

There’s nothing worse than getting an error modal. Ok, yes there is. Getting an error modal with an ambiguous message like “ERROR TYPE: 00000xCVnnn25” â¦ Because we all know what that means, right?

Simple solution here: Explain what went wrong and tell the user what to do next.

Some movement to add a little visual interest doesn’t hurt either.

So, what if the very first interaction a user ever has with your site is the 404 page? Not an ideal start, but see it as a challenge. Make the page enough to keep the user engaged and committed. Functionality still needs to take front-seat over aesthetics but if you can blend the two to create an enjoyable user experience with a concise and sensible flow, well, then you may have just won this battle:

Humor can take you a long way in life. Everyone loves to be happy and everyone loves to laugh. These can often be the fastest methods to putting a band-aid on a UX boo-boo. Deflating user frustration is not easy, but adding a splash of humor or some smoothed out edges to your interface really can go a long way.

Take for example the gem of a mobile micro-interaction that Apple utilizes when you reach the bottom of a page. Instead of an abrupt end, you get a little rubber band-esque snap back. This subtle but ever-so effective technique helps the user feel less frustratedâ¦ As does a duck butt:

Lesson learned: Mistakes happen. No one is perfect and no matter how awesome your site design is, people will inevitably type in a wrong URL from time to time. Instead of clinging onto false hope that this 

 going to happen, go ahead and make that page something you are happy for the user to see.

So go ahead and use that next 404 page of yours as a blank canvas for user engagement, brand awareness and maybe even a chuckle or two. A pleasant surprise beats a major inconvenience every time.

UX / UI

Web Design

Content Strategy

The Internet's Bubble Wrap: Your 404 Page is More Important Than You Think

Branding

Art Direction

Auditing & Roadmapping

Revelry Boutique + Gallery

Research

Ben Sollee

Custom illustration creates a unique, ownable look and feel to your brand - and helps to tell stories and express values that a photograph or block of copy just can’t.  We’re highly capable of creating styles and concepts that engage your audience. We have a number of highly talented artists on our staff that can draw out the best in your brand with inspired illustration.

Illustration

Illustration: Case Studies

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Revelry Boutique + Gallery

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Ben Sollee

Illustration: Blog Posts

Handlettering

The Internet's Bubble Wrap: Your 404 Page is More Important Than You Think