Why I Love Neon

Signs Speak Louder than Words, An Urban Artist's Journey Into the Neon Trade(PRWEB) August 8, 2005 -- Eileen Thompkins' love for graphics and lettering evolved out of her earliest experiences growing up in a city where graphic imagery was all around her.

Painted signs and neon lights displayed by the businesses in Thompkins' West Philadelphia community, inspired her at a very young age. All along Market Street merchants offered goods and services, from appliances to zucchinis, and just as impressive to Thompkins, were the colorful signs and displays used to help the merchants promote their wares.

In particular she noticed and remembered the signs that were painstakingly hand painted by local sign-men, the Wilson Brothers.

Her first impression of their work was on brightly colored ice cream trucks operated by the Morrone's Water Ice Inc. located near her childhood home at 200 N. 63rd Street.

Thompkins recalls, "The Wilson brother's displays were so vivid that I, a three-year-older, could understand what was being served inside. I couldn't wait to get my hands on an ice cream cone, water ice, or Philly pretzel like the ones displayed in happy images on the side of the truck." As a child she took in every detail while she waited her turn in line.

During her' teen years graffiti came into vogue. Tags got bigger, brighter, and bolder and the most notable names began appearing all across the city. Graffiti artists were aerial acrobats willing to risk their lives for their works to be seen and  she took notice.

Like many young artist growing up in a big city, Thompkins tried her hand at graffiti, but her new vocation was quickly thwarted, thanks to Philadelphia's anti-graffiti campaign. She was one of hundreds of teens arrested during a time when authorities showed zero tolerance for the troublesome vandals.

At the tender age of 15 she was escorted to jail for plying her mark on a gym room wall, and to her own disgust, in pencil, not a more grandiose display like the ones she had seen outdoors. She kept her work on paper from that point on, displaying her best pieces publicly at a local variety store where they could be admired, legally, by her peers.

Thompkins is also a gifted fine artist. She studied sculpture and other art mediums at Moor College of Art in the heart of Philadelphia's breathtaking parkway section. She benefited greatly by the outreach program afforded to inner-city youths and she began to take her art serious at that time.

It was during her employment as a youth instructor at the Germantown YMCA that Thompkins was asked produce professional quality displays of her own. She took great pride in designing colorful bulletins, directories, and event banners, and she realized that there was a viable market for her signs so she wanted to learn more.

Thompkins sought employment at a sign company in Southwest Philadelphia with hopes of serving as an apprentice to a master sign person. She arrived with the expectation of seeing gentlemen adorned in painted overalls, wielding brushes of all shapes and sizes, but she was surprised by what she found instead. There had been a revolution in the sign industry and things would never be the same.

Thanks to the computer, signs were no longer being painted by hand. Letters were cut from vinyl and applied to a surface in one fell swoop. There was no longer a need for the skilled sign painter, so Thompkins tabled her mission to learn how to paint like a master.

Computers had also allowed for the production of an innovative electric sign product called a channel letter.” Channel letters were named for their channel like space behind each detailed letter. These letters called for neon lighting to illuminate them from the inside and the demand for neon could barely be met. Tradesmen who had mastered the art of glassbending were getting too old to work and many had already retired, so the sign company Thompkins ventured into developed a policy of trying all of their new hires at the art of bending glass so Thompkins would learn a sign trade after all.

Thompkins was a natural at glassbending, a skill that takes an incredible amount of control and patience as well as endurance to overcome the heat generated while working glass in a fire. She attributes her ability to bend glass so quickly to her earlier experience in art and sculpture. To date there are very few women in the glass bending trade and even fewer African American Benders working in the US.

Today Thompkins owns and operates Empress Signs LLC., a premier manufacturer of neon signs and lighting serving the Philadelphia and Southern New Jersey region. She has designed, manufactured, and installed well over 700 signs, including signs published in national media outlets such as the Discovery Channel's, Trading Spaces Kids, and Detail Magazine.

Her work is sought by local companies as well as notable glass aficionados in throughout the tri-state area.

One of her most her most prolific Neon clients is Len Davidson, a noted Neon Historian in Philadelphia, and author of Vintage Neon,” a wonderful book displaying the history of commercial signs in America, many of which are displayed among his vast collection at various locations throughout the Philadelphia area, including the upper floor of the famed Jim's steaks.

Her work has also appeared on the set of the popular television show, Discovery Kids, Trading Spaces - Boys VS Girls. and The animal planet's, "Last Chance Highway." 


To learn more about Eileen Thompkins and her company, Empress Signs LLC. visit www.empresssigns.com, or call Empress Signs @ (856) 248-0136.