Last year Mark Holewinski—a location photographer and owner of MJH Digital Images—and his wife, Peggy, began collecting images of  St. Bernard’s Church that looked like letters—a round window was an O, stonework formed an N, a cross became a T. The next step was piecing the letters together to spell words like Faith and Hope.

People loved what they saw, and before long the Holewinskis were turning their Willow Drive dining room into an assembly line to complete orders. Most people selected their names, but some chose meaningful words like Peace.

The Holewinskis then expanded the project to all of Mt. Lebanon—the clock outside La Pomponnée is a perfect O; a Y was found in a fire hydrant. They combed the community—the high school, the fire department, the library and municipal building—collecting letters.

You can look at some finished pictures and place an order at www.wordographie.com. You select a frame and mat and provide the word you want. Request letters from a certain building or community (yes, if they don’t already have letters from other Pittsburgh neighborhoods, they will soon) or select images from the gallery of alphabet photography. However, the gallery images may not be labeled.

“Mark wants people to hunt to find where the letters came from,” says Peggy. “That’s part of the game.” She does add that if you give up, just send them an email and they’ll spill the beans.

For more information, mjhimages@verizon.net or  412-571-9510.