Braille Signs | Sign Customiser Docs

Braille signs are plate-style signs — room signs, wayfinding, and accessibility signage — where the customer types the printed wording and the matching braille row renders underneath it automatically. The braille is derived output: customers never edit it, and the same braille data flows through checkout, product images, order emails, and production files.

This article covers setting up and running a braille customiser. For supported languages, country defaults, grades, and braille sizing, see Braille translation: supported languages and sizing.

You are responsible for reviewing the braille signs you sell. Sign Customiser generates the braille string and manufacturing artwork, but it is not a certified braille proofing service. For review-recommended languages, have output checked by a braille-literate proofreader before fabrication.

Create a braille sign customiser

Open the Sign Customiser admin.
Click Create new customiser.
Choose Braille Signs.
Continue through the wizard. Braille signs always use Frame Fit pricing (priced by plate area), so the pricing-model step is skipped.
Create the customiser.

The new customiser arrives with working demo data — plate shapes, high-contrast colours, a clean sans-serif font, signage-style demo wording, and braille-appropriate sizes — so you can preview the whole flow straight away. Replace the demo setup with your production plates, colours, fonts, and pricing before publishing.

Configure it like your other sign customisers

Backboard shapes, backboard colours, materials, sizes, fonts, and mountings work exactly as they do on your other plate-style customisers — there is no new admin surface to learn. Multi-line wording is supported, and the braille row always sits below all lines.

Two braille-specific notes:

Per-word colour selections never change the braille dots. Dot colour follows the setting below.
The AI sign designer is not available on braille customisers.

Braille settings

Open your braille customiser’s settings and find the Braille section. Three settings live there:

Braille table

Defaults to Automatic (based on your store’s country) — US stores translate with contracted UEB Grade 2, Australian stores with uncontracted UEB Grade 1, and other countries with their market’s standard table. Pick a specific table when a project or market needs a different standard; tables marked (review recommended) should be proofed before fabrication. The full list is in Braille translation: supported languages and sizing.

Braille dots use text colour

Off by default: the dots render in the plate’s material colour — the unpainted raised-dot look most fabricators produce. Turn it on to colour the dots to match the wording instead, for production that paints or prints the dots.

Hides the quote popup described below. It only hides the popup — untranslatable wording still cannot be ordered.

When wording cannot be translated

Some input cannot be turned into braille safely — emoji, and Japanese, Chinese, or Thai text. When that happens the customer sees a popup with a route to your quote process instead of a dead end:

Default message: “Some of your text cannot be turned into braille automatically. Send us your design and we will quote it for you.”
Default button: Get a custom quote, which opens your existing custom design quote form.
Both texts are merchant-editable labels on the customiser, so the popup speaks in your voice.

Add to cart stays blocked until the current wording translates successfully. Suppressing the popup, or the customer dismissing it, never allows a sign with missing or wrong braille to be ordered.

What appears on orders and production files

Review step — the customer sees the translated braille string before ordering.
Cart and order line items — carry the braille string, the source wording, and the braille table and grade alongside the usual sign details.
Order email — includes the braille string, source wording, table and grade, and the numeric dot-geometry spec (dot diameter, dot spacing within a cell, cell spacing, line spacing, and dome height range) so production can verify the artwork before fabricating.
Production files — the SVG contains every braille dot as an exact vector circle at millimetre-accurate positions; EPS and Illustrator-compatible files are derived from that SVG, so every format carries the same dot positions.
Product images — the preview and outline images include the dot row exactly as the customer saw it.

Products keep the braille string, table, and grade they were created with. Translation engine upgrades never change braille on signs that have already been sold.

Plans and availability

Braille signs are included in all current plans. There is no braille surcharge — braille orders count like any other order on your plan. On legacy plans the Braille Signs tile appears in the create flow but is disabled with an Upgrade Your Plan button (the same availability rule as Lightbox signs); upgrading to a current plan unlocks it.