How Much Does Calligraphy Cost? ~

The price for custom calligraphy varies by each piece. It’s like asking me: “how much does a dress cost?” As you know, it can be anything from $2 to $2 million dollars depending on a lot of different factors! I promise, my calligraphy is NOT going to cost you two million dollars.

There are many moving parts to determine the prices so that I can give you an estimate for your calligraphy! Much of it depends on the length of the text and how many lines there are to write. The background is important, and how much work I have to do with Photoshop to fix either your photo, or make the text visible on a background of your choice. And there are other considerations as well.

I know that many people want to frame their own artwork, and would like the text to fit in a standard size frame. Unfortunately, I cannot always make your finished quote fit into a standard size. Calligraphy has to find its own dimensions. Calligraphy text has a shape, and that must be part of the consideration of the final size, whether small, medium or large.

Minimum Fee & Text Size

Although you may have a very short quote, the estimate for your price will not be below $150 which is my minimum fee. Calligraphy takes time for me to write out and design your text in calligraphy. You can see from the quote above that designing a quote to bring out its meaning takes thought and practice. It’s not like I just put my pen to paper and write it out one just time, and viola, it's done.  There are concerns about line spacing, where the calligraphy will fit when you have a photo, getting flourishing perfect, fixing the photo so it looks great, and SO MUCH more!

I’m not a newbie at calligraphy. I’ve been taking classes to improve my skills over decades. (yes, I am old – but not yet shaky! )

Sometimes a piece with fewer words can cost more than a longer text. That’s because there’s more design element with a short quote. I love solving the riddle of a good design to make sure I'm emphasizing the meaning in the quote. That's the most important and artistic part of calligraphy.

Why I Ask For Your Budget

If you want to purchase a Hyundai but have Ferrari tastes, it’s important for me to know before I can give you an estimate. I don’t want to waste your time or mine. That being said, I will try to make suggestions that can work within your budget if possible. But if you're asking for a huge amount of text and have a very small budget I want to be honest with you. But... 

Large Pieces & Digital Media

If you are choosing a photograph from existing pictures, there’s no extra charge. But if you are choosing a new photograph from Adobe stock photography there’s a small charge for using the photo, dependent on the size necessary to accompany the calligraphy. But I can tell you it is definitely worth it. They have gorgeous artwork as well as photographs.

There are wonderful FREE photographs available at www.Pixabay.com. Make sure you use filters to go through the photos and save the identifying information about the photo you like or you may never find it again!

Very large pieces necessitate more time, and have an additional charge. Smaller pieces can be achieved by reducing, but I can’t enlarge lettering or it gets very blurry. With smaller pieces printing charges are lower.

Framing