General

Wayfinding Your Way Around

If you have, then you are already acquainted with the spatial problem-solving method of wayfinding. Coined by American architect and urban planner Kevin Lynch in the 1960’s, wayfinding is a traditional design principle of navigation that helps visitors make their way around an unfamiliar place, getting to a desired destination with ease. Lynch calls it the “imageability” of a space, the way people visualize it using clues that help them get from point “A” to point “B,” such as landmarks, paths, edges, intersections and the signs that help to identify them.

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Gifts of Glass and Crystal

In the dream world, glass can represent clarity, perception and wisdom. Dreaming of glass can also represent the presence of a scholar, a wise sage or a person of knowledge in your life. If you receive a gift from anyone in a dream, it denotes that you will be unusually fortunate in speculations or love matters.

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Celebrating 17 Years as a BBB Accredited Business

“I didn’t think it would be possible to get a plaque made and sent in such a short amount of time, but in less than a week the plaque was in my hands. The proof really does not do it justice, they did such an amazing job. It exceeded my expectations. It was a lovely gift to present someone.”-Vannessa F.

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4 Occasions Where A Custom Plaque Makes For The Perfect Gift

The best gift you can give someone is one that comes from the heart and says what you want to say especially if you can't find the right words. One such gift is a personalized plaque.

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Organize a Successful Golf Tournament in 12 Easy Steps

Whether your goal is to hold a fundraising event, host clients or stage an employee outing, a golf tournament could be just the event to delight your guests. If you’ve never planned a golf tournament before, you’ll not only need to work closely with the golf course, you’ll want to enlist the help of your own staff and the media to help ensure that the golf tournament runs successfully. By properly outfitting your golf tournament, you could take advantage of free publicity on other golf courses, get name recognition in the tournament and connect your charity or business with a memorable experience.

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Good in the Kitchen

Besides tasty recipes that feed a hungry, appreciative crowd, what are some of the essential tools of a great home cook? Here’s a partial list:

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Featured Item - Crystal Name Plates

PlaqueMaker lists our most requested items front and center on the home page, so you can click on them quickly for instant customer service online. All of our featured items are likely the most popular with our customers.

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School Sports Trophies & Fundraisers

It also means rewarding everyone involved, from those who excel at the game to Moms in the stands to coaches, sponsors and volunteers working for a win.

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6 Ways to Honor Heroism with a Custom Plaque

Giving a plaque to a local hero is always a gift that is well received. Personalizing the plaque makes it both meaningful and memorable. You can choose from one of several ways to honor a hero - all which distinguish them in a special way.

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Animal Lover’s Clip Art Gallery

Pet owners & animal lovers – this one’s for you.

From cats and dogs, horses and turtles and birds and everything in-between, our animal lover’s clip art galleries feature lifelike line art and illustrations, cartoons and tribal interpretations for use on all of our customizable gifts, trophies, gifts and more.


● Surprise a special animal lover in your life

● Create a memorial for a beloved pet

● Honor a vet or anyone who works with animals, whether in a zoo, wildlife refuge or sanctuary

● Give a trophy award to an equestrian

● Craft a school mascot graphic


Any animal design is possible with a little imagination and PlaqueMaker’s animal lover’s clip art galleries.

Individual clip art galleries feature animals by breed or type in black and white or color, and all of our personalized plaques, signs, awards, trophies and gifts include one free clip art with no set-up fees.

You’re free to upgrade with as many pieces of clip art as your design allows. We also offer free shipping for pet lovers on personalized animal gifts and memorials.

Goatoit!

Get your personalized pet present or memorial today.

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Love a Nurse!

Show your appreciation for that special nurse with a personalized plaque, award or gift from PlaqueMaker.com.

In a year when Ebola and the measles make international headlines … when a young woman from Colorado shares firsthand how her work touches her patients on national television, sparking media coverage, a social media movement, support from other caregivers and people everywhere, the Emergency Nurses Association (ENA) chooses the theme of “Celebrating the Courage of Nurses Worldwide” for Emergency Nurses Week™ October 10-16. This occasion, along with Emergency Nurses Day®, Wednesday, October 12, recognizes nurses who courageously stand at the front line of emergency care every day.


“I am a nurse and that’s my talent, taking care of people and caring about other people. I wanted to give the nurses that don’t have that voice, that voice and that recognition of somebody going up there and just being a little bit different and unique.”

-Miss Colorado and Nurse Kelley Johnson


Since 1989, the Emergency Nurses Association has recognized the second Wednesday in October as Emergency Nurses Day, an occasion honoring emergency nurses for their commitment to patient care. In 2001, ENA expanded the celebration to devote an entire week to honoring emergency nurses, because one day is simply not enough to recognize all contributions made by emergency nurses. This year, the organization also celebrating 45 years as an authority, advocate, lobbyist and voice for emergency nursing, with 40,000+ members representing over 35 countries around the world.


Beautiful Recognition

PlaqueMaker offers full color printed plaques that include a coated wood board with keyhole slot and a sublimated aluminum plate. Upgrade to solid wood or glass boards or choose a brass, bronze, copper, stainless steel or titanium metal that is laser engraved with laser fused pigment in a process known as Thermal Bonded Laser Engraving. It combines precise lasers and pigmented marking material to permanently fuse black images on our solid metals. The marking material, or ink, consists of traditional ceramic glazing material, with the addition of a thermal absorber. The ceramic glazing material is a mixture of glass frit – small particles of partially fused glass designed to melt at a much lower temperature than ordinary window glass – with pigments for coloring. The traditional use of such glazing material requires it to be applied to the surface of a ceramic object, and then baked in a very hot kiln for more than an hour. Once fired, the glass frit and pigments combine to form a thin layer of colored glass that is further fused onto the surface of the ceramic object. The patented method uses a laser as the heat source to fuse the ceramic glaze instead of a kiln. All this happens in microseconds as opposed to hours, consuming far less “energy” and, consequently, without compromising or damaging the material being marked. It is the thermal absorber within the marking materials that enhances and speeds the heat absorption from the laser beam, improving the transfer to the glaze for a permanent mark.


Design a personalized plaque, award, gift and more for that perfect expression of thanks to a special nurse you know on Emergency Nurses Day October 12.




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Athletes Inspiring Greatness

As Coach Taylor tells his team in the (shall we say epic) television series, Friday Night Lights, “Clear Eyes, Full Hearts, Can’t Lose!” Football players, cheerleaders, even coaches and referees. They’re all out there on the field for endless workout and practice sessions –and certainly on game day- getting the job done. Play by play. Game by game.

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Student of the Year Awards

Usually awarded at the end of a school year, the Student of the Year award recognizes outstanding students who use their natural talents for good – achieving top academic marks while giving back to their school and their community.

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Honor Favorite Teachers with Personalized Gifts

Custom Paperweights are beloved by our customers for their beauty and ease of display, especially by teachers, who are known to wrangle a certain kind of paperwork: student tests! A thoughtful gift for most any occasion, our paperweights are individually packaged in white boxes – perfect for giving that parting present to a teacher on the last day of school. Here are just a few style selections.

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Personalized LED Signs Light it Up!

“I ordered a custom LED sign for my fiancée’s graduation and it was delivered to a wrong house. PlaqueMaker was amazing and made me a new one in under 2 hours and had it shipped the same day so it would be here for his graduation! The sign was exactly what I expected and we cannot wait to hang it in the man cave!! Highly recommend to others!!”

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Spruce Up for Spring

Even though National Clean Out Your Garage Day* isn’t until the weekend after Labor Day, the First Day of Spring is March 20, only 10 days away … and we all know what that means: spring cleaning.

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Gardeners Ultimate Plant List

Eager to get outdoors and grow something, gardeners are continuously looking for the best varieties of plants for their gardens. Here’s a list of the top 100 plants every garden should have, according to the garden experts, florists, landscape architects and horticulturalists writing for the UK’s venerable Telegraph. Broken down by season, it’s a selection of the very best, most desirable flowers and shrubs for your garden.

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Youth Sports Popular Summer Fun

So many kids play competitive sports in America that serious sports organizations like the Sports and Fitness Industry Association (SFIA), the Women’s Sports Foundation and others are studying the numbers. For instance, EPSN reports that just nine years ago, roughly 75% of boys and 69% of girls from ages eight to 17 take part in organized sports, playing at least one sport per year. And these totals don’t take into account the kids who start playing before age eight! A growing number of kids are playing sports even before they start going to school. The surprising find is that girls start an average of half a year later than boys, although kids who don’t exercise start later than those who do.

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Custom Plaques for Birthdays

Our personalized for birthday gifts are lively for grandparents, parents, spouses, children and other relatives – perfect for anyone who’s celebrating a birthday … and that’s everyone, pretty much!

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The Rich History of Paperweights

According to the Glass Paperweight Foundation however, (yes, there is such a thing), paperweights are one of the world’s best-kept secrets.

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