Template Studies is a sculptural exploration of the semiotic space between the symbol and the object—between architectural abstraction and tangible form. Using vintage architectural templates originally designed to represent three-dimensional fixtures such as bathtubs, sinks, fireplaces, and furniture, this series interrogates how meaning is encoded, simplified, and communicated through visual systems. Architectural templates are tools of efficiency, reducing the complexity of form into clean silhouettes—meant to conjure volumetric space through suggestion alone. In this work, I reverse that process: by selectively extruding or physically manipulating the negative space of the template, I allow the once-flat signifier to gain dimension, ambiguity, and agency. As Ferdinand de Saussure noted, the relationship between signifier and signified is fundamentally arbitrary. In Template Studies, that dislocation is made visible. Some forms emerge fully sculpted from their outlines, others hover between absence and presence—creating a surreal tension where the symbol no longer merely refers but becomes. By treating templates as both relic and artifact, I invite viewers to question the visual language that underpins design, architecture, and representation itself. Template Studies proposes that even the most utilitarian symbols can, when recontextualized, reveal a layered poetics—where object, image, and interpretation collapse into one another.