"List Of Store, Business Signs In Chinese?" Topic

Looking for signs for things like this, but in Chinese characters …

General Store
Pharmacy
Dentist
Doctor
Barber
Restaurant
Groceries
Bank
Lawyer
Jail
Laundry

And any others you guys can think of, as long as they are very "generic".

Thanks,

Dan
PS. I'm very afraid to use online translations, given how bad they have proven themselves to be so far.

If you needed Korean, I might be able to help.

You might try an online dictionary, to corroborate the translation.

I´d revert to a dictionary as well. I can give you the following for sure, as we had those in our mandarin basic course

General Store: 商店 (shangdian) or just 店 (dian)
Doctor: 医生 (yisheng) or 医生 (daifu)
Restaurant: 饭店 (fandian) or 饭馆 (fanguan)
Bank: 银行 (yinhang)

The others I´d pick from a dictionary just like you.

Usually there´s more possibilities than those. Please be aware that this is simplified Chinese and only suitable for anything post 1950s. Make sure you look for traditional chinese if you want to use it for anything older than that OR taiwanese.

Cheers!

I use an online dictionary to translate from English to the other language. Then I check it by translating it back from the other language to English. That seems to work okay.

Mike Bunkermeister Creek
Bunker Talk blog

It will be for my own personal use and not for mass production. But I still want to make sure that I'm not making a sign that is obscene to those who could read it.

Thanks for the suggestions so far!

Dan

These are translations in traditional characters.

General Store
百
貨
商
場

Pharmacy
醫
藥
店

Dentist
牙
醫

Doctor
醫
師

or

醫
生

Barber
理
髮
師

Restaurant

餐
館

or

酒
家

Groceries
雜
貨
店

Bank
銀
行

Lawyer
侓
師

Jail
監
牢

Laundry
洗
衣
店

I would suggest copying the signs from the graphic novel "Tintin and the Blue Lotus" by Herge. Set on China in the the 1930's Herge was helped by a Chinese student visiting Belgium named Chang Chong-Chen. The words on the store signs and banners in the book are actually anti-Imperial Japan slogans written by Chang! This was unnoticed by European readers but it delighted the Chinese and infuriated the Japanese! There were even stories of a Japanese hit squad stalking Herge through the streets of Brussels!

LOL. That's incredible!

By the way, BBToys333, those look fantastic! Thanks so much.

1) I may sound really ignorant here but could I make those horizontally as well by placing each subsequent character to the right, or is it more appropriate to line them up vertically?

2) Also, are there any other key businesses or establishments I may have forgotten?

Thanks again,

Dan
TMP link
TMP link

Great story, GG5.

Great thread! Thanks. I'll be keeping a print copy of those translations and the Herge story is great.

Hi,

Traditional signage (say, for 1930s Shanghai) can be vertical top to bottom or horizontal from left to right. I grabbed a random pictorial book on old Shanghai to confirm this just now. Horizontal signage mainly goes on the buildings themselves whereas the vertical ones can fit on columns or were used as hung banners. There are also some banners with horizontal signage as per the photo below but they seem to be rarer than the vertical ones from what I have seen.

Modern/contemporary horizontal signage goes from right to left.

Assuming you are looking for something circa 1930s or before, I have rendered the characters horizontally (left to right) for you below.

Typically though the signs would not be quite so generic (as, say, Saloon, Cafe, General Store, etc.) but would include names of proprietors, brand names or brand messages.

Commercial streets would also have really dense signage, as this photo from a main street (Nanjing Road) in 1930s Shanghai well illustrates:

General Store
百
貨
商
場

場商貨百

Pharmacy
醫
藥
店

店藥醫

Dentist
牙
醫

醫牙

Doctor
醫
師

師醫

or

醫
生

生醫

Barber
理
髮
師

師髮理

Restaurant
餐
館

館餐

or
酒
家

家酒

Groceries
雜
貨
店

店貨雜

Bank
銀
行

行銀

Lawyer
侓
師

師侓

Jail
監
牢

牢監

Laundry
洗
衣
店

店衣洗

The Tin Tin signs are actually quite decent and authentic in fact.

What country and year are you looking to represent? China moved to simplified characters in 1950. Singapore adopted them after independence in 1965. Taiwan and HK use traditional characters to this day. They are quite different if you know what you are looking for. Most Chinatowns I have seen still use traditional type on most shops.

This is simplified for doctor: 医生
This is traditional for doctor: 醫生
Though most signs I see actually read either 醫院 (clinic)， or 中醫 (Chinese medicine), or 西醫 (Western medicine).

If you are after traditional characters, I am in HK right now and can take a bunch of pics for you tomorrow if you like.

Top down or horizontal depends on the shape of the sign as much as anything. Left to right and right to left are still both commonly used for signage

There is one of my favourite on-line Chinese dictionaries and it could be useful for your purposes.

nciku.com

It translates English to Chinese and then gives examples, so it's easier to see context and compound words. It will often also animate the stroke order for you. And sometimes you just can't make a character look right unless you do the strokes in the right order. You can also write a character in Chinese and it will translate that for you.

There are 2 main periods of interest for me:

1) Old West settlers:

link

link

2) Firefly/Serenity (SF set in 2517), under a Sino-American interplanetary power:

link

link

Dan

Old West would definitely be traditional characters. I had to check Serenity, and it took a while to find a ‘tell' (most characters are still the same), but they use simplified.

So you will either need two sets, or just use traditional.

You will also want a tea house: 茶廳。or 茶餐廳。 or 茶館。 But most Chinese shops are not simply 'tea shop' or 'hardware store'. They will usually have a name, usually either a family name or something sentimental or lucky.
The Golden Valley Tea House, Or Kee Brothers Hardware Store, or something.
Every morning I pass 老友記茶餐廳 － Old friends remembered tea house, which I have always thought was a very nice name.

Old West- none of the characters in the three images are clearly discernible. The ones on the first one shown in this thread are in fact gibberish not real Chinese characters.

I imagine you'd expect to find only Chinese businesses/concerns geared towards fellow Chinese to have Chinese signage but I am not sure what those would be. Perhaps there would be some kinship associations (social clubs for people who came from the same prefecture/village) that would have signs out this early.

OP's post above is good except that in his last example it should just be "Old Friends Tea Shop" since the first three characters should be taken as a whole in HK Cantonese to mean Old Buddies rather than having us translate the third character using another of its many possible meanings (i.e., to remember).

Serenity-seems to use random (traditional) Chinese characters, an interesting choice given that almost everyone (except in Taiwan and HK) have – regrettably – gone to the simplified script. Now and then a "Serenity" phrase may come across as, perhaps, supposedly meaningful but that's few and far between.

link

This one post above shows a Serenity display with Japanese and Chinese characters, all immediately recognizable as gibberish in that they don't make any sense as phrases or sentences.

If you wish you can go to Taiwanese and HK websites that display traditional characters, copy and paste random phrases and finally mix up the words a bit for good measure in case they actually make any sense to arrive at Serenity Chinese. :-)

BBToys333: "copy and paste random phrases and finally mix up the words a bit for good measure"

I've done something with similar with ancient (now "dead") languages, by combining random examples of characters such as ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs. It's not as if I'll be insulting any still living member of that civilization, really.

However, given how many there are in the gaming community with various degrees of experience with Chinese characters, I was afraid of what I'd end up saying if I made a similar random combination of symbols.

Dan. :)

You might google Chinatown images…

'OP's post above is good except that in his last example it should just be "Old Friends Tea Shop" since the first three characters should be taken as a whole in HK Cantonese to mean Old Buddies rather than having us translate the third character using another of its many possible meanings (i.e., to remember)'

Thank you! I am still learning 中文写, and appreciate all the advice and pointers I can get. Canto still trips me as I am studying 普通话。

For Serenity, I found this: 宁静 It is apparently the logo, and is the simplified form of 寧靜。They may just use both willy-nilly.

link

Here is a page of shop signs, many of which have English translations, which may be helpful. You can always check back here to see what they say and whether they are traditional or simplified.

link

In Hong Kong now, though the vast majority of signs are in traditional, the influx of Chinese business means you see quite a bit of simplified in logos and the like.
There are a lot of branches of the Bank of China for instance, and their logo reads 中国银行, not 中國銀行。

Guys,

Check this out:

PDF link

link

I wish these "Wanted" posters were in both English and Chinese, at least the key words in bold, "Wanted", "The Traitor" and "Reward":

link

Dan

I like this also:

link

link

link

Dan

Hi guys,

For general stalls, shops, you may add a name or word infront, some examples of common ones are : Lee, Chang, Hua, etc.

Some common examples:

Àî¼ÇÔÓ»õ means Lee's Provision Shop

¿ìÀÖ¾Æµê £¨Happiness Hotel) althought ¾Æµê means Hotel in China, it means a nightclub in Taiwan where ¾Æ (Alcohol) can be bought!¡¡so in Taiwan simply replace ¾Æµê with ·¹µê,
i.e. ¿ìÀÖ·¹µê

»ª¼ÇС³Ô (Hua's Dimsum / Eatery)

Âóµ±ÀÍ £¨Macdonalds' ! Yes, some of the chinese signboards still have it, but it's translated, in Hongkong I believe its called Âó¼Ç£¬ or Âóµ±Å«)

The above uses simplified chinese which China uses, and Taiwan / Hongkong still uses traditional chinese if I am correct.

Hope this helps £º£©

In the third post above the signs (aside from Serenity) seem to be based on mock Japanese rather than of Chinese.

You can make you own bilingual wanted poster. "Wanted" in traditional characters (going from left to right) is this:

通緝人士 (= wanted + person)

or in fact just:

通緝 (= wanted)

or just:

緝

See this film poster for the 2012 HK film Nightfall:

link

叛徒 (traitor/rebel)

酬賞 (reward)

Actually – just for laughs -I think you can use bilingual *Engrish* posters to populate your Serenity world! Just google it…

:-)

Wow! That's perfect!!! I'll get started on them tonight.

Thanks so, so much.

Dan

That looks like Japanese characters, not Chinese. The column on the far left is katakana, and the middle column on the right side is also katakana.

I don't know about Chinese, but Japanese family names translated into English read like Native American surnames. Midorigawa = Green River, for example.

"…I was afraid of what I'd end up saying if I made a similar random combination of symbols."

Fez, after playing a kiss song backwards
(which cant be good for the record):

YouTube link

Lol!!!

I sense you know what I mean.

Dan
PS. Frankietanch, looks like the characters you typed didn't translate properly.

Is this Chinese then?

link

I'm getting this for, I hope, some sort of business entrance (with a round red door, or window?):

"SIZE: 33mm X 40mm"

auction

auction

TMP link

I hope it ends up looking something like this:

Not sure if that little brass piece would work for 15mm though. The other option would be to make it out of card or styrene:

link

Thoughts?

Dan

I've even bought this for some of the interior walls and windows:

What do you guys think? Worth the try?

Dan

I searched for "movie serenity beaumonde" and found this:

kaywinnetlee.tumblr.com

link

link

firefly.wikia.com/wiki/Beaumonde

Dan

Check this out:

link

Dan

That punch thingy would be great for ship interior walls as well, and those brass pendents would make for nice doorways as well

The punch would be workable for other things as well, even in older periods for making a stencil for a paper wall or even possibly a more interesting path pattern.

It seems like the guests at Fiorina 161 (the prison in Alien 3) had a lot of bilingual signs all over the old foundry-turned-prison facility:

link

I guess my question is … Is it Chinese?

Dan

Here's another Asian character (Chinese?) in the background:

link

link

Dan

wow, so much useful stuff in this thread. bookmarked for when I start my chinese quarter buildings.

Guys,

I can't find anywhere what these characters say:

link

They appear also in the center of the sun in the background here:

PDF link

link

What does it say?

Thanks,

Dan
PS. That would make some really nice but faded graffiti, don't you think?

Never mind. I tried looking up the obvious … Alliance and, guess what I found:

同盟

Tong Meng

link

So, I guess, the Browncoats would use this as their graffiti:

独立

Du Li

link
link

Dan

Everyone,

For the Chinese (and Japanese, etc.) in Firefly/Serenity, check out this FAQ:

link

link

Dan

So, I guess, the Browncoats would use this as their graffiti…

Inside a urinal…

I'm wondering about the punch; are you planning on just slapped against a wall, or free standing? Perhaps part of a framed screen?

With a bit of work, you can use the punch on thin styrene. I'm oft looking at [Edit:non-foam] take out food containers to see if they have the '6' symbol. ;->=

I was actually thinking about a swirl pattern to make engravings on a toy gun; last person I mentioned it to said 'but they usually only inscribe lines'. I didn't point out I was intending to sand the interior pieces to put back in…

Doug

Beast: "I'm wondering about the punch; are you planning on just slapped against a wall, or free standing? Perhaps part of a framed screen?"

I was thinking of trying both and see which works best. And yes, I've used punches of that type on thin styrene (actually cheap for sale signs).

Dan
PS. I guess I better consider making some of the signs as neon signs:
link
link
link

Here's another bilingual sign you see in the background on some Firefly episodes (TG Freight – "Space Freight"?):

link

link

link

pcwranglers.com/serenity.htm

This is simply too funny:

fireflychinese.com/page/3

Dan
PS. I'm watching the entire series once again, and then the movie, just to spot and capture the cool signs and such they have in the background of scenes.

Guys,

Just a quick update …

The hole puncher makes a perforated pattern that is about 27mm tall:

I think it would be perfect to spice up any building by adding a little "Asian" flavor. Even these awesome buildings could benefit:

link

Dan

Dan,

Many buildings in Hawaii have a combined East/West aesthetic, including ordinary houses. Lots of open-beam ceilings, exposed timber-ends, flared hips, etc. Image search "hawaii asian roof".

Also, I thought you might enjoy the design aesthetic behind this:

link

and this:

link

Might make sense in your seaport/spaceport scenario or give a little international exotic flair to your interstellar frontier Kung Fu-meets-Wild Wild West milieu. A teahouse on a series of islands in a pond? Required element!

"Hawaii Asian Roofs"

Wow. That has turned some really amazing photos. Many, many thanks!

Dan

No worries. Glad you enjoyed it!

Wow, such a mine of knowledge in TMP. 20 years ago I was doing Boxer Uprising games and just cutting Chinese words out of Restaurant section of yellow pages. Got by pretty well until Chinese speaker told me they were upside down.

Guys,

I may have found my roof template, for a few store fronts:

PDF link

link

link

Dan

This is cute:

link

A few solar panels here and there, and some neon signs, and it could pass for a Firefly-esque destination.

Perhaps one of those could even be a Federation-friendly bar to visit on U-Day?

link

Dan
TMP link