Questions
Asked, and answered
Last updated 2026-10-07
Painted Sorority by Painted.App. Sold and operated by PaintedApp, LLC. Write support@painted.app.
Can you print our letters or our crest?
No. A sorority’s name, Greek letters, coat of arms and badge are its trademarks, licensed one organization at a time, and we hold no license for any of them. What we make is arms for your line, your big, your little and everyone between, which no national owns; if a word you type belongs to an organization, the maker tells you whose it is.
How Greek-letter licensing worksCan I add our letters myself?
Yes, at home. Tick “a blank ribbon across the shield” in step four and we print the ribbon empty, the same plain scroll on every piece. Once it arrives, what goes on it is yours: paint it, letter it by hand, or iron on a patch or a decal bought from one of your organization’s licensed vendors. We print nothing on the ribbon, because we hold no license to.
How Greek-letter licensing worksWhat does adopting a crest mean?
You choose one of our crests and take it up as your line’s. Each was drawn new by our heraldry engine from the old charges, the star, the laurel, the shell and the lion, and none is any organization’s crest. We left out the charges single sororities are known by, the lamp, the torch, the anchor, the key, the crescent and the fleur-de-lis. Change any part of it, add your words, and it is yours.
Who counts as a line?
Whoever you say: a big and her little, the twins who share a big, a g-big and everyone below her, a whole new member class. Up to four names fit beneath the crest, so one piece can carry the line, or order one for each sister in it.
Is it for every council?
Yes. The maker is built for Panhellenic, NPHC, NALFO, NAPA and NMGC chapters, and for local sororities with no national at all. It refuses every council’s letters and crests the same way, and it draws a line’s own arms for any of them.
Can I paint it myself?
Yes. Choose Engraved and the crest is drawn in ink with the engraver’s code for color, set down by Silvester Petra Sancta in 1638: dots for gold, upright lines for red, level lines for blue, diagonals for green and purple, a clear field for silver. Print it on canvas or paper and paint over it, the way a reveal gift is meant to be made, or frame it as it is.
What can go behind the crest?
Any color, a gradient or a pattern. Choose from 21 colors, blush, pink, lavender and powder blue among them, or pick any color at all; from 4 gradients, a sunset among them; or from 12 patterns, pearls, diamonds, roses and champagne among them, one thing repeated edge to edge. Name a pattern of your own and we paint it, for one painting. It is printed edge to edge on prints, canvas, throws, pillows, totes and mugs; on shirts the crest is printed straight onto the cloth, in your choice of six shirt colors.
How loud can our crest be?
As loud as you like. A motto can be a line your mother would not repeat, and a pattern can be vodka bottles or seltzer cans; we refuse only what is sexist, racist, threatening or violent. Anything sexual prints on shirts, blankets, pillows, mugs, totes and the file, never on prints or canvas, because our wall-art printer refuses it.
Can we add our names or a motto?
Yes: a motto above the crest, a Greek letter or a word across the shield, and up to four names below it, in four typefaces and five inks. The preview shows the letters exactly as they print, and we print nothing until you tick the box that says it is right.
Can the motto be in Greek?
Yes. Choose one of our Greek mottos, each an ancient line or a dictionary word with its translation beside it, or write your own. The maker checks every motto against the ones sororities and fraternities already use, and stops if yours is one of them.
Can I paint my own crest?
Yes. Choose Paint Your Own and start from an archetype, the Queen, the Beauty, the Scholar, the Huntress, the Toast, the Sunset, the Hearth, the Harvest, the Spring, the Victor, the Rainbow or the Dawn; choose the crown and your three colors, and add what the arms should show. An image model paints two versions, one plain and one grand with supporters, and you can ask it to change either. The first 4 paintings are free; after that, 10 more cost $10. It will not paint any organization’s letters, crest or badge, and a painted crest may not keep the herald’s rules, which we say beside it.
How much does it cost?
Prints from $55, shirts from $49, mugs, totes, pillows and throws from $30; digital files $19. Wall pieces come in 12 × 18, 16 × 24, 20 × 30, 24 × 36, 40 × 60 inches; shipping is $12 per order, or $19.95 for each 40 × 60 canvas in it, which goes by freight.
What are they printed on?
Prints are giclée on matte art paper or Hahnemühle cotton rag; canvases are stretched on wooden bars, the sides carrying your background color. Shirts are Bella+Canvas and Gildan, printed direct to the garment; throws, pillows and totes are printed edge to edge, and the mug is white ceramic, printed round the cup.
Where do you ship?
We ship to the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain and Italy. Every piece is printed to order by Prodigi (wall pieces) or Printful (shirts, throws, pillows, mugs and totes).
Can our chapter adopt it as its crest?
Ask your national first: your chapter’s arms belong to it, and most nationals have rules about what a chapter may display. What you make here is assumed arms for your line, and nobody stands behind them but the sisters who made them.
Do you draw crests from every tradition?
From most. We do not draw the sacred or protected marks of living traditions: Northwest Coast crests, Māori, Hawaiian and Anishinaabe designs, adinkra, the Lion of Judah and Garuda. They are not ours to draw, and we would rather say so than paint a guess.
What if it arrives damaged or wrong?
Write to support@painted.app with a photograph and we reprint it or refund it. Because every piece is made to your design, we cannot take back one that arrived as you approved it.
Refunds