A novel bilayer resist system consisting of a 3 nm thick titanium (Ti) layer on top of a 65 nm thick poly(methylmethacrylate) (PMMA) layer was developed for mechanical nanolithography with the atomic force microscope. The ultrathin Ti layer allowed 20 nm resolution patterning with conventional silicon cantilevers, provided a proper force-depth calibration was performed before lithography. Techniques of pattern transfer were applied to fabricate chromium nanostructures and silicon nanowires from the patterned Ti/PMMA resist.