Three generations of letterwork.
Brushes, paint, and patience.
Butler Signs began with a brush in one hand and a pencil sketch in the other. Long before vinyl plotters and digital prints, every letter was laid out by eye, pounced into place, and pulled with steady pressure on a sable.
"If you can't measure it twice, paint it once."
c. 1974 · Hand-lettering a GTO
Out in the lot, up on a ladder.
Through the 80s and 90s, Butler took the trade onto the road — painting yard signs, billboards, and shop fronts across Maryland and DC. Wherever a business needed to be seen, we showed up with a ladder and a kit of one-shot enamel.
"The job's not done until the customer's customers can read it from across the street."
c. 1989 · Field install, brick & brush
Working at height, working with care.
Storefronts kept us climbing. Outlet signs, schools, bodegas, barber shops — if it had a roof and faced the road, it was a candidate for paint. Every bracket, panel and pole told us a little more about how to make a sign last.
"A sign that fades in a year isn't a sign — it's an apology."
c. 1993 · Storefront refresh
Same name. Same hands. New tools.
Today the Butler Signs truck still rolls out of Suitland — only now it carries plotters, large-format printers and laminators alongside the brushes and chalk. Three generations on, our name still goes on every sign we deliver.
"Since 1943 — and we're still answering the phone."
Today · The Butler Signs truck
A few frames from the road.
Snapshots from eight decades on the job — clipping in, climbing up, and pulling clean letters across panels, brick, and steel.
'74 · GTO lettering
'89 · Field install
'93 · Storefront refresh
Today · The truckA short history of showing up.
Butler Signs opens its first shop with a wooden bench, two brushes, and a customer list of three local stores.
The shop expands into car, truck and van lettering — a service still core to the business today.
Butler crews start handling full storefront installs across Maryland and DC, climbing every ladder in the metro.
The shop adds plotters, large-format printers and laminators — without setting the brushes down.
The third generation joins the shop, bringing fresh design eyes alongside decades of craft.
83 years on, still independent, still local, still on a first-name basis with our customers.
A small list. Held tightly.
Make it readable.
A sign that doesn't read from across the street isn't doing its job. Letterforms come first, decoration second.
Make it last.
We pick materials and finishes for the weather they'll meet. A Butler sign is meant to look right years in.
Make it local.
We answer our own phones. We meet on site. We know the neighborhoods we work in by their first names.