Peter Liedberg, 40, is a graphic designer who has carved out a niche for himself as a sign painter based in Tokyo. Working under the name “Letter Boy,” his hand-painted designs adorn the storefronts of buzzy restaurants and bars across the capital.
1. Which came first: graphic design or sign painting? Graphic design. I studied that in Australia before moving back home to Sweden, where I got a pretty regular graphic design job that involved a lot of time on the computer doing things like magazine layouts.
2. How long were you at that company for? I quit after four years. It’s so easy to get stuck at those places, and this was something my boss had actually pointed out to me, using herself as an example. She was in her 60s at the time, and she’d been working her way up the ranks there since she was 19.