The American Sign Museum in Cincinnati, has announced that its CoSign community-revitalization program, which partners local business owners with artists and sign companies to create new signage, is being replicated in in six cities nationwide.

According to Tod Swormstedt, the museum’s executive director, ASM first introduced the program in 2012 in Cincinnati’s Northside community, in which 10 businesses received free signs while working with a designer and fabricator.

Funding came from the Carol Ann and Ralph V. Haile/U.S. Bank Foundation, as well as an ArtPlace grant. A second iteration of CoSign occurred across the Ohio River in Covington, Kentucky in 2013. That program was additionally supported by an Our Town grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. The ArtPlace grant included the creation of a “toolkit,” so CoSign could be replicated elsewhere.

The six communities the program is expanding to and the local sponsoring organizations are:

- The Alachua, Florida, Chamber of Commerce for its downtown historic district.

- The ArtPop Street Gallery for the Community Arts Organization in Charlotte, North Carolina

- Downtown Evanston, Illinois

- The Historic Valley Junction Foundation in West Des Moines, Iowa

- The Iowa City Downtown District

- The Uptown United Community Economic Development Organization in Chicago

Two-day workshop for the groups will be held at the ASM in February 2017. The six- to seven-month CoSign process will begin in March, with the ultimate unveiling of 10-12 signs in each community.