Brass is very reflective – one of these brass house sign photos was taken on a wall , the other facing the sky. It is very traditional but does need to be kept polished. Maybe that is a good thing – if you see a house with a beautifully polished brass sign – it does tell you something about the person living there! If you are not having a wooden backing board we would suggest using 3mm top quality engravers brass. The font here is  Lucida Caligraphy. ref – 1403.SE.014