François Chastanet - Philadelphia Graffiti Handstyles

128 pages
Edited by François Chastanet
Text by François Chastanet
Foreword by Sam Meyerson aka CURVE
24 x 16 cm 
Language: English
Hardback
Publisher: Dokument Press
2026

Philadelphia has developed a distinctive form of street penmanship that remains largely overlooked in American graffiti. The city is home to an independent street tagging scene that represents a striking local form of calligraphic tradition thriving within the limits of a major metropolitan area. Philadelphia is one of the few cities that were able to develop their own scriptural “texture”, going beyond individual experiments with the image of the name. Some local wall writers nicknamed Philadelphia “Whip City”. In the same sense as in boxing or dancing, the whip is the energy you instill in letter strokes to achieve speed and consistency simultaneously. It applies to all handstyles, from simple to complex, that have been carefully developed in Philadelphia since the mid-to-late 1960s. Initially called “Gangster Prints”, the old Philly hands later developed into numerous variants.

In the spring of 2023, French graphic designer François Chastanet undertook an in-depth exploration through the streets of Philadelphia. Armed with his camera, he set out to demonstrate how public name-writing in the city, rooted in a rich legacy, continues to flourish through unique styles. At the same time, notebook lettering sessions with writers from different generations offered a rare insight into the preparatory work done on paper before performing in the street. Through photographs and close visual analysis, Chastanet traces the ongoing evolution of handstyles, especially highlighting the condensed and monumental “Tall Hands”, and the remarkable “Wickeds”, elaborate wild-style signatures that require exceptional skill and are found nowhere else. As the land of extreme cursivity, Philadelphia has much to offer to anyone interested in letterforms.