Feel the Ampersand

The special signs on the walls leading down to any of New York City's metro stops has raised lettering that allowed us two quite unique ampersands. The first was a raised type ampersand that was painted white on black. That drew my attention right away and was the only one I thought I was photographing RGBisMe got curious after we got back to Asrai & Ravenboy's apartment as to whether or not any specific Braille character represented an ampersand. We found that indeed one does and I have drawn a red arrow pointing to it in the photo below. It has the same pattern as the graphic to the right.

E. 86th and Lex green line metro stop proudly displaying it's raised Helvetica Thin and our first ampersand in Braille!

THAT'S not an Ampersand!

This will be a fun theme to follow over the years. Apparently people will sometimes use object to represent ampersands. As if the sweet little contraction alone wasn't good enough, occasionally it will be replaced with an object that is not an ampersand at all. Sometimes this is by mistake as is shown by the use of a G Clef in Stephen Gose's ampersand blog.

We were lucky to find one represented by The Eiffel Tower inside the André & Arlette cleaners on 3rd Ave, upper east side in New York City. The front of the building hosted a couple of conventional script font ampersands.

André & Arlette's cleaners on 3rd Ave. They want to play up on their French-ness and added an Eiffel Tower after their names. Ooo la la!

Close up of the main sign's script ampersand.

Looking inside the closed store front, through the locked gate, the Eiffel Tower has migrated to between their names and replaced the ampersand. Hey!! That's not an ampersand!

Neon!

Oh yeah baby! So many cool ampersands within just a block of each other. Taken both in the evening and back out again the next morning, most of these neon ampersands were found along 3rd Ave near E. 89th St. in New York City. They mostly represented food items and were glorious in the evening and charming in the morning light.

Starting with a yellow neon ampersand which was amazingly on the same sign as...

... a red LED ampersand!! Both on the same sign (see below) in the window of a deli.

This sign is in a deli window at what we think of as the nexus of the ampersand universe, E. 89th and 3rd Ave. This shop also had a few different ampersands on it's awning alone and sported even more painted on it's window. We were in ampersand paradise.

Down 3rd Ave just a few blocks from the deli was a seafood shop and a lovely blue neon ampersand.

Currently the last in our upper east side neon ampersands (I know of another pink one I was too tired to photograph). This blue neon ampersand is also on 3rd Ave between 88th and 89th. Amazing.

H&M

One of the tres cool places to shop in NYC, I couldn't leave out H&M.

Has a Coffee Service of Reporter #2 feel to it but I will keep working on it.

An Ampersand Confluence

The ampersand is a symbol evolved from the Latin “et,” meaning “and.” It is one of the oldest alphabetic abbreviations, and it has assumed over the centuries a wonderful variety of forms.

I have come to the conclusion that New York City is an Ampersand Confluence. The focus on space saving and advertising one's worth are so concentrated on Manhattan that it's hard to walk around a block without seeing an ampersand. It is a city contractions; tall buildings that seem truncated from street level that each need to have their say.

Contrary to some people's opinions of us, we are not so ego-centric to think that only what we have experienced first hand represents the entire universe. We imagine cities like Tokyo would be even more likely to embrace the ampersand. We would love to know if it has a hiragana or kanji representation of the ampersand. This is a blog of found ampersands and welcome submission from anywhere. Never the less, we know very few people who might share any they have found on their travels. We are resigned to most of them representing the printed English language photographically represented from the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States of America.

On our last trip into New York City we didn't walk but a few blocks from the intersection of E. 89th St. and 3RD Ave. During those walks we found hundreds of ampersands. At that very intersection there are probably more than a dozen different ones. In my heart, the center of the ampersand universe will always be that upper east side intersection. It will take me some time to post all the photos we took that day. I will take even longer for me to ID them.

Bed Bath & Beyond

A simple piece of junk mail delivered an ampersand into our laps.Bed Bath & Beyond catalog.

Good ol' sans-serif Futura.

Kessie & Co.

This salon across from The Franklin Hotel on 87th St between Lex and 3rd in NYC had at least 3 different ampersands.This was the awning and seemed to be the main logo.

Done in a fun and dated sans serif ITC Bauhaus.


A crude addition to the front window. Stickers advertising a stylist.

In today's fonts it is probably best represented by Abadi Condensed Extra Bold.


A final lovely ampersand was painted on the window. Still working on the font.

Hook & Ladder

Found at a Hook & Ladder in New York City on E. 87Th St near Lexington Ave.

What a cool ampersand with a ball terminal. Unfortunately I cannot identify it at all.

Long shot of the fire house.

Gay City Newspaper

Found in New York City on the corner of E. 87th and Lex. This Gay City newspaper vending machine sported a few fonts but only one ampersand.

The whole vendor.

Close up of the sans-serif Rockwell MT font.

Metropolitan Museum of Art

A poster on 5th Ave. in New York City in front of the Metropolitan Museum of Art advertising their Concerts & Lectures.

The font is closest to a Garamond-Italic or Pavane-Italic but seems to have been manipulated. Maybe even Galliard.