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John Sennitt commenced making ice-cream in Melbourne around 1904 in a factory near the south bank of the Yarra River next to Queen’s Bridge.
Employed by the Victorian Cold Accululator Company Ltd. (an accumulator was like some sort of large freezer brick), Sennitt bought the company in 1899, renaming it as Sennitt’s Ice Works, which made cool chambers, ice chests, accumulators and ice-cream under the brand name M.I.M. (Melbourne Ice Cream Manufactory), eventually known as Sennitt’s Ice Cream. Sennitt’s son John, introduced the trademark bear in the early 1930s.
The Sennitt’s brand was retired after Unillever acquired the company in 1961, preferring to continue ice-cream production under their ‘Streets’ brand name.
I constructed my sign from laset-cut 3mm plywood. As the cutting area of my Creality Falcon 2 lasercutter is limited to 400 x 400mm, I had to design the sign to be cut in sections, drawing it up in Adobe Illustrator. Seen here from Illustrator, the file drawing layers look like a bit of a mess, but I was trying to shuffle elements around to make the most economical use of the 400 x 400mm cutting space.
The lasercutter is driven by Lightburn software, which can import native Adobe Illustrator drawing files. Seen here on the laptop screen, in Lightburn I assigned the linework as red (for cutting) and blue (for engraving).
Cut lettering and bear. The engraving served as a guide for placing the next layer of plywood on top. Even with a couple of coats of spray paint, the engraving was visible enough to facilitate accurate placement of the next layer of wood.
Layering the plywood gave the sign a bit of a 3D look – the lettering, bear and drop shadows had depth to them – top row: what will be white lettering and bear, bottom row: drop shadows.
Sections could be no larger than the lasercutter’s maximum work area of 400 x 400mm.
Everything was progressively stuck together with PVA glue.
The paint was acrylic enamel, applied with a brush. The sign was finished with three coats of clear.
