Calligraphy Tips and Tricks for Beginners

Posted on October 8, 2019 by Linnea Holgersson from Creative Fabrica

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Designer Grace Frösen from GraceCalliDesigns is a font lover and master of calligraphy! A quick browse of her Instagram can quickly turn into hours of watching her beautiful lettering and creative doodles in all the colors of the sky. We reached out to Grace to learn the secret recipe behind being a skilled calligrapher. Apart from watching some of her amazing videos, you can pick up some invaluable tips and tricks to learn how to write calligraphy!

What is your best advice for a beginner of calligraphy?

My best advice I think is to just start! It can be intimidating sometimes when you want to learn a new skill like calligraphy or lettering. You see all the pretty videos and photos on Instagram and you think “I’ll never be that good!” So, first, get over that fear of not being good enough by putting any pen to paper and just start! There are a lot of free resources for beginners and googling “Lettering for beginners” should bring up many amazing guides!

Is there a particular trick to learning how to be good at calligraphy?

A lot of it is practice! Once you make it a habit, and you get used to writing, you train your hand muscles to move in a certain way. It becomes second nature after a while and making the letter strokes becomes much easier.

How did you get into calligraphy and how long have you been doing it?

I’ve been doing it for three years now. I started out of the blue one day, because I just moved to a new country and had a difficult time finding a job. So I filled my days with this new hobby. Eventually, I didn’t need to find a job anymore because art became my job!

Where do you get your inspiration from?

I get inspiration from book covers, wine labels, conversations I hear, lyrics I love and artists I follow on Instagram!

Which pens are your favorite?

I love pretty much all pens! But some of my favourites are the Uniball Eye Pens, Chameleon Fineliners, Pentel Fude Brush Pens, Micron Sakura Pigma Fineliners, Sakura Gelly Roll Pens, Ecoline Talens Brush Pens, Zig Kuretake Brushable Pens.