What is a monogram?

What does monogram mean?

Monogram literally means “single letter”, from the Greek mono- (single) and gramma (letter), by way of post-classical Latin monogrammum (Wiktionary).

That is what sets it apart from plain initials: initials sit side by side, a monogram turns them into one sign. Embroidered on linen, pressed into a seal or worn as a pendant, it always says the same thing: this belongs to someone.

Monogram or cipher: what is the difference?

In a monogram, the letters share strokes; in a cipher, whole letters are simply intertwined. In 1906, the designer A. A. Turbayne put it this way:

“A Monogram is a combination of two or more letters, in which one letter forms part of another…”

“A Cipher is merely an interlacing or placing together of two or more letters.”

Strictly speaking, our necklace is a cipher: two whole letters, one passing in front of the other. In everyday English, both are called a monogram.

The most famous cipher is the royal cypher, “a monogram or monogram-like device of a country’s reigning sovereign”: Charles III’s intertwines a C and an R, for Rex, “king” (Wikipedia).

What order do the initials go in?

There is no fixed rule for two letters: place them in the order you want to read them. For one person, that is usually first name then surname, so Anna Lopez becomes A and L.

Three-letter monograms follow a tradition: the surname initial sits in the middle, larger, between the first and middle initials. For a couple, the shared surname initial takes the center, between the two first initials (Leatherology).

Should an initial necklace carry your first or last name? With two letters, you can wear both.

On our necklace, you choose both letters and their order. The second initial passes in front of the first, and “Swap order” reverses them.

Which two initials should you choose?

Choose the two letters of the bond you want to carry with you:

• Your own first name and surname.
• The first initials of a couple.
• A parent and a child, or two children.
• Two sisters, two brothers, two friends.
• Your initial beside that of someone you miss.

To choose your chain length, see our necklace length chart.

Where do monograms come from?

Initials were embroidered long before they were worn. A sampler, marquoir in French, is a cloth stitched with the alphabet and numbers, on which girls once learned to mark the linen of their future home (Wiktionnaire). Our name comes from it.

In 1906, the designer A. A. Turbayne published hundreds of two- and three-letter designs in Monograms & Ciphers. The plates on this site come from that book, now in the public domain, and from two samplers dated 1843 and 1868 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art (CC0).

How do you make a monogram?

To make a monogram, choose two letters and intertwine them into one design.

• Choose your two initials.
• Choose their order: the one you read first.
• Intertwine them so one letter passes in front of the other.
• Look at the result before you wear or engrave it.

Try it in our free live preview: it shows your two initials as one monogram.

How do you see your monogram before ordering?

Twenty-six letters make 676 possible pairs. Whichever pair is yours, our preview shows your two initials in the order you choose, before you order.