Posted by Red | January 24, 2010, 14:19 (EST) | 4 Comments
Category: TV Series

A long time ago – back in episode 4, “Family Ties” – there was a Vampire Diaries set piece featured that had Vee and I pretty excited. It was the document that the Founders Council all signed upon the attendance of the first Founders party, and our bookish fan selves were delighted to see shout-outs to Honoria Fell and Mayor Jacob Lockwood (aka Smallwood, though interestingly Elena reads out “Benjamin Lockwood” in the episode) on there. We’ve since discovered that the document also includes the signatures of Giuseppe Salvatore and Thomas Keeping Fell, which fills us with even more glee.

Maren Nicholas is the talented calligraphy artist who was asked to create both the Founders Council document and the placards that were used for displaying other items in the collection of family heirlooms. She was kind enough to take some time out to answer some questions for us, and to provide us with some images of the document so that everyone can get a closer look at the signatures and appreciate the detail and work that went into the project. Read on to find out about how the document was made, and click on the thumbnails to view the larger images.

 
How did you get into calligraphy?

I started doing calligraphy when I was 13 years old and had my first paying job at the age of 14. I was an Art major (among other things…) in college at an all-women’s college where I did a fair amount of calligraphy for formal dinners, teas, etc. My most recent job before staying home when my children were born was at Party City where I sold wedding invitations. When asked if I knew anyone who did calligraphy, I told them I did which is where I got the idea to start my calligraphy business. I have now been doing this as a professional business for about 8 years.

How did you come to be involved with this project for The Vampire Diaries?

I was contacted my the prop designer to see if I would be interested in creating the Founding Fathers document. He found my website online. The first thing I had to do was supply five signature samples of how I thought both Damon and Stefan would have written their names in the 1860s. From there, he showed that to the show’s producers so they could decide which ones they liked best.

What were the specifications you were given for the document? What were the names you were provided to include?

As far as the document was concerned, their basic specifications to start were something that had a Declaration of Independence kind of feel to it, that started out with an Old English style of calligraphy and then had space at the bottom for all of the signatures.

I met the prop master at Sam Flax, a local art supply store in Atlanta where he and his assistant picked out the paper for me to use both for the document, as well as all of the placecards for the items that were on display in the house at the Founder’s Ball. The names on the document that had to be around Damon and Stefan’s names were Jacob and Nancy Lockwood, Honoria Fell, Thomas Fell, Sheriff William Forbes and Giuseppe Salvatore. After that, it didn’t really matter what names were on there because, as you can see from the show, they didn’t show up on television anyhow. So some of the names were suggestions from them and others were names I made up as long as they had an “English settler” kind of feel to them (including my maiden name as well as my brother’s name and my babysitter, another huge Vampire Diaries fan).

What’s involved in producing something like this? Did you research signatures of the period, or did you use artistic license?

Because of my calligraphy background and knowledge of font styles, when choosing the fonts for the brother’s signatures, I based them on writing styles that would have been popular or traditional at that time. Because their signatures were chosen by the show’s producers, that was actually the easy part. The hard part is that I designed individual signatures for every single person who “signed” the document and they all were different. Previous to doing this, I had done a “re-creation” of a local church’s faded inaugural celebration document so I had had some experience in rewriting a huge number of signatures and drew from that experience to do the Founding Fathers document

Were you aware of the Vampire Diaries as either a series of books or a TV show before this project?

I was aware of the Vampire Diaries as a book series before being contacted to create this document. I had not read it though, although my sitter had told me a lot about it.

Did you watch “Family Ties” to catch a glimpse of your work?

Not only did I watch the episode my work was on but I started from the beginning of the show so I would know all I could know about it, especially because I had gotten to go on a “behind the scenes” tour of the studio where they filmed the show, so I wanted to see everything I had seen on my tour. When the Founding Fathers episode was on, my family and I sat glued to the television to wait for my stuff to come on. My two sons, ages 6 and 8, were screaming when they saw the first placecard show up on the screen all the way through the stars having the entire conversation in front of my document. I recorded it on my DVR and took pictures of the television screen paused when my work was showing on the screen so I had real pictures of my work on television. Also it is still taped so just in case someone comes to our house who didn’t see the episode, we can fast forward directly to where my work shows up on screen!

 
You can see more of Maren Nicholas’ beautiful work over on her website, Dreamweaver Calligraphy. She takes custom orders for a variety of projects, including logos, certificates and wedding invitations, matching any font and blending ink colours to give the customer exactly what they want. If you’re interested in Maren’s services, please be sure to visit her website for pricing and ordering information.

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