No commercial or public space, be it an office building, hospital, bank or shopping mall, is complete without directional signage to welcome visitors and guide them throughout the facility's maze of offices or stores.

With today's range of wall-mountable signs and frames, any design vision shared by an architect and a building owner can be complemented by blending signs into a facility's overall plan. The following are a few examples of directional sign types.

A single poster frame can feature an entirely graphic sign face without any physical divisions within it, so it has become a common choice for indoor applications. The esthetic advantages are somewhat overshadowed, however, by the need to replace the entire sign face whenever a minor change is required.

In response to this issue, a single poster frame can also be internally divided with separator strips. This configuration, which has become the preferred choice around the world, allows the graphics to be changed out only for the required slots. Movable separation strips enable customization, such that the quantity of strips within a given sign frame can be adjusted based on how a particular wayfinding system needs to be updated going forward.

Several wall-mounted signs can be combined to form a single directory. This is a more challenging option installation-wise, but offers further flexibility and can use wall space more effectively. Again, updates can be handled modularly, as each individual sign within the directory can be swapped out as needed.

Finally, larger multi-panel directories have proven both elegant and functional for shopping centres and other complex facilities. In this case, a few directories are all mounted together under a single header, providing an overall ‘road map’for the building.

By combining modular products with tailor-made design schemes, today's sign systems can easily be adapted to a particular location's esthetics without abandoning functionality.