Neon Design

The business was sold to salesmen Mike Bruno and Pete Schwaba around 1988 and moved into a little storefront on the east side of the 3800 block of north Ashland Ave. By the end of the '90s, Mike moved to New York City and the shop moved across the street to 3722 N. Ashland Ave. After a short temporary stay on Lincoln Ave, in 2019 Neon Design moved from Wrigleyville to our new ideal permanent space on Evanston's southern border, 519 Howard Street, one street away from Chicago.After training at the short lived American School of Neon in Minneapolis, present owner Charlie Evanson came to Chicago in 1990 to gain more glass-bending experience.

Our signs have lit up many places and occasion such as those below, and beyond! Despite neon's longevity, it's also fragile and will break if mishandled. Depending on the issue, we can either repair the broken sign, or remake the sign entirely. As a rule of thumb, red neons (that contains neon gas) are repairable while other colors are not, and the entire section will have to be remade. We also offer professional cleaning service for neon signs, for many people find handling neon glass to be challenging and intimidating.

For neon signs, we do two main kind of installs: on a backing or directly on the wall. For the former, neon signs mounted on a backing are just like any framed pictures, they are easy to move & install by yourself! For the latter, neon signs mounted directly to the wall is cleaner and more permanent; one can also choose to hardwire the sign to a switch.