With the pressures of modern life, more and more people are turning to creative outlets in order to have some time to themselves. Calligraphy is a beautiful method to producing art that will be appreciated by anyone with whom you show. Apart from the reason of calligraphy looking beautiful, here are our top six reasons why you should take up calligraphy.
- Calligraphy is relaxing
Calligraphy can feel very much like meditation, with practise being less about achieving anything, but rather about being in the moment with your ink and paper. It can be extremely soothing to practise calligraphy, as you gain a deep connection with your materials. A great way to relax is to prepare your calligraphy session properly- make yourself a nice pot of tea, put on a playlist of your favourite music, arrange your inks and nibs and start filling pages with writing.
- Calligraphy is inexpensive
Calligraphy is very cheap to get started, with all the supplies you need sometimes costing less than £20. Rather than buying pre-made calligraphy kits, you will get more and higher quality materials by buying each piece separately. To assemble your own kit, you can find everything you need online or art supply stores. As you get taken in by calligraphy and want to buy more equipment, you may wish to buy more expensive equipment, but you don’t have to.
- Rediscover the increasingly rare art of handwriting
With the rise of digital technology, a range of handmade crafts are quickly disappearing. Despite this, and maybe because of this, many people are longing for handmade crafts that require attention and skill. Writing in script isn’t really taught in schools anymore and calligraphy is considered a lost art. When modern life is so saturated by mobile devices, speech to text technology and computers, we should definitely try and embrace the skill of beautiful handwriting.
- Your results will be instant
Writing a word doesn’t take much time, so unlike many other craft activities; you’ll have instant gratification having produced something by hand. Writing a word in calligraphy only takes about 15 seconds, complete with flourishes, but knitting and woodworking take a lot longer than this. You will have to practise to get breathtaking results, but this will happen a lot sooner than you think.
- Endless possibilities
Once you’ve discovered and mastered the basic techniques needed in calligraphy, you can have immense fun experimenting with new tools. There’s an entire universe of calligraphic equipment to explore, including obscure nibs, historic inks, exquisite papers and new writing surfaces, such as chalkboard.
- Your cards and invitations will look amazing
Your calligraphic skills will look amazing on handwritten cards and envelopes, and you will only receive great feedback. People will love the fact you took time and effort for them, and feel even more special as they receive a small piece of artwork.