There is a big difference between a Hand Painting and Freehand Calligraphy. Although they sound the same, they could be very different, for example, all the items displayed in our Islamic Calligraphy Category are hand crafted using Freehand Calligraphy and not Painted.
This means;

No stencils or spray paints were used.
No pencilled outlines and then painting-in techniques were used.


How to spot the difference between Freehand Calligraphy and a normal Hand Painting:

Hand painted (Paint Brush) - Calligraphy has been outlined by pencil or stencil and then painted in. As a result, the integrity of the calligraphy is lost.

Hand painted (spray) - Calligraphy has been spray painted over a stencil. This type of painting looks very neat but loses the appeal of freehand and almost looks like a print.

Hand Painted (Freehand) - Calligraphy has been done totally freehand with a free flowing brush. This type of Calligraphy is by far the most difficult to achieve as it requires a very skilled and fluent hand. It shows off the brush strokes and you can see where the brush was put on the canvas and where it came off. Each stroke is a piece of art within itself.

We are one of only a few people in the world that offer the combination of both, True Calligraphy, and Totally original and unique Islamic designs - All of our calligraphy designs are completely original and therefore exclusive to us.

Red Applique is a design studio featuring exclusive hand painted designs. It all started when a group of artists came together to converge traditional styles with modern chic colour concepts. They took the industry by surprise with their flare of Originality in infusing unique Oriental and Persian Calligraphy techniques with unconventionally contrasting bold colours. It is this fusion of individuality that has added to the appeal of RED Applique and has helped it become the hugely successful brand everyone's talking about.