Adventures in Letterpress

Brandon Mise

• Publisher: Laurence King Publishing
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781780674926
• Topic: Diseño
• Subtopic: Artes decorativas

Tactile, retro and idiosyncratic, hand-printed objects have an undeniable appeal, especially in a digital age. In recent years, the nearly obsolete craft of letterpress has been resurrected by artists and designers who have rescued cast-iron presses from basements and scrap yards. Adventures in Letterpress features over 200 examples of the resulting work: elegant cards, edgy broadsheets and everything in between. Beautiful, humorous and sometimes just plain weird, the projects featured in the book perfectly illustrate the vibrant future of this once-endangered medium.

A.FAVORITE DESIGN (59, 60, 164, 192)

a. favorite design specializes in designing and printing timeless letterpress greeting cards with a classic Americana feel and a focus on typography, catering to high-end gift and stationery retailers and diverse international consumers. The mission at a. favorite design is to encourage long-distance warm fuzzies through snail mail, using classic design, often sweet and sometimes cheeky sentiments. a. favorite design was founded in Chicago, Illinois, in 2005 by graphic designer turned letterpress artist Amber Favorite.

afavoritedesign.com

ANAGRAM PRESS (123)

A graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, Chandler O’Leary is the proprietor of Anagram Press. Her work includes artists’ books, illustration, design, textiles, printmaking, and drawing. She has taught at the Minnesota Center for Book Arts, the Seattle Center for Book Arts, and the School of Visual Concepts in Seattle. Her work is exhibited and collected internationally.

anagram-press.com

ANGEL BOMB PRESS

(72, 73, 102, 104, 106, 107, 142, 143, 146)

In 1997, after getting fed up with working for other people, Todd Thyberg started Angel Bomb. He bought his first 8x12 Chandler & Price and now Angel Bomb has three presses: a Heidelberg Windmill and two Chandler & Prices. They print posters, business cards, press kits, promotions, and, of course, lots of custom wedding invitations. Thyberg appreciates getting away from his computer for a while and getting his hands dirty printing. Running Angel Bomb is the best job he’s ever had!

angelbomb.com

BABYINKTWICE (155, 195, 218, 219, 220)

A MacBook, along with a lasercutter, wood type, a platemaker, and presses from the 1960s are just some of the tools that Dafi Kühne uses in his day job as a graphic designer and letterpress printmaker. Dafi studied at the Visual Communications Department at Zurich University of the Arts. In 2008, an internship with Hatch Showprint in Nashville, Tennessee, one of the oldest still-producing letterpress poster shops in the States, brought him into contact with print technologies from the 19th century. With his bachelor thesis “Woodtype Now!,” Kühne explored the potential of combining digital and lasercutting technologies in the production of printing blocks using diverse materials. In his studio babyinktwice, he uses these new, self-made blocks alongside the old in his designs for commercial posters, flyers, and magazines for music, architecture, art, and film projects.

babyinktwice.ch

BLACKBIRD LETTERPRESS (68)

In 2003, Kathryn Hunter started Blackbird Letterpress in her friend’s house in Lafayette, Louisiana. The press now works out of a mural-clad building in Baton Rouge. The small shop strives for strong craftsmanship and good design, and focuses on custom work, stationery, and other printed ephemera. Hunter is a trained printmaker with a BFA in printmaking from Montana State University, Bozeman, and an MFA in printmaking from Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge.

blackbirdletterpress.com

BLUE BARNHOUSE

(32, 44, 48, 61, 78, 84, 89, 109, 110, 111, 118, 124, 175, 212, 213)

Blue Barnhouse was established in 2002 when Brandon Mise was volunteering as a press monkey at the San Francisco Center for the Book. The press was initially focused on publishing handmade literary journals, but it quickly evolved into a full service custom letterpress studio. In 2004, the press moved to Asheville, North Carolina, and in 2006, they dived into the enterprise of making greeting cards. Their irreverent humor met with astonishing success, and since 2009 their sole focus has been on the production and distribution of their greeting-card line, which is sold in hundreds of stores in the US, Canada, and the UK. In 2011 Blue Barnhouse relocated again to Wilmington, North Carolina, so that the owner could go to film school and surf every day.

bluebarnhouse.org

BOOKWORKS (216, 217)

In 2004, Laurie Corral opened Asheville Bookworks with the intent of building a public/private space for print and book arts. It started with a few pieces of equipment and a lease on 2,400 square feet of raw warehouse space. Bookworks continues to grow as a vibrant studio, fostering learning and discourse through classes, exhibits, artistsin-residence, and Corral’s own love of print and books.

ashevillebookworks.com

BOXCAR PRESS (25, 133, 159)

Located in a beautiful, hilly, and often snow-covered part of upstate New York that not many seem to visit, Boxcar Press is a nationally established commercial letterpress shop. With fifty tons of equipment housed in over 25,000 square feet of space, they are one of the largest letterpress print and pre-press shops in the country. But they know it’s not all about heavy machinery—they’re committed to creating the finest handcrafted letterpress printing in the entire universe and to working hard to lessen the environmental impact of their business. Boxcar Press is wind powered via NativeEnergy.

boxcarpress.com

BRACKET PRESS (70, 97, 98, 119, 198)

Founded in 2005 by book designer and typesetter Christian Brett and illustrator Alice Smith, Bracket Press has printed a prolific amount of pamphlets, books, and ephemera using both digital and letterpress production methods, including work by Penny Rimbaud (ex-Crass), Youth (Killing Joke), and posters for Pictures on Walls.

bracketpress.co.uk

BRIGHTWORK PRESS (18, 21, 22, 23, 196, 197)

Founded in 1993 by author, designer, letterpress printer, movie prop designer, and illustrator Ross MacDonald, Brightwork Press prints “promotion” pieces that serve only to mystify his clients and drive away customers; he also uses letterpress to design book covers, display typography, and movie props. As a teenager in the 1970s he worked at Coach House Press, and co-founded Dreadnaught Press, both in Toronto. He left printing behind in the ’80s when he moved to New York, but after working for years as a book and magazine illustrator, he longed for the smell of type wash. What began as a few fonts of lead type and a Poco press soon threatened to overwhelm his little studio, so in 1996 he moved to Newtown, Connecticut, where he began stockpiling letterpress equipment in earnest, filling a small barn to the rafters with obsolete and decrepit gems, including four presses, over 400 fonts of 19thcentury wood type, and twice that of lead.

ross-macdonald.com

CHAPEL PRESS (86, 88)

Founded in 2003, Chapel Press is a modern Melbournebased letterpress print studio filled with design and print professionals. Chapel Press has redefined letterpress in Australia, setting a world-class standard with its quality of work. After 10 years as a specialist letterpress print studio, Chapel Press has crafted a reputation as the go-to people for premium letterpress.

thebeautyofletterpress.com

COLIN FRAZER (150, 156, 210, 211)

Colin Frazer is an adventurer, artist, designer, and educator. He holds a BA in physics and received his MFA from The Rhode Island School of Design. His work has been shown internationally and is held in many collections including the Newberry Library, Chicago, the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. He is a faculty member of the National Outdoor Leadership School and a critic at RISD.

colinfrazer.com

CROOKED LETTER PRESS (173)

Ellen Knudson produces handmade books under the imprint Crooked Letter Press. Knudson has been a book artist for 12 years and a professional graphic designer for more than 20 years, including positions at the Art Institute of Chicago and the Detroit Institute of Arts. She is currently an Associate in Book Arts at the University of Florida; she has previously taught letterpress printing at the University of Alabama, graphic design at Mississippi State University and at Wayne State University, and letterpress and book arts workshops around the country. Her work is in the collections of San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Yale University, Connecticut; Duke University, North Carolina; and many other national and international collections. Her book Wild Girls Redux: An Operator’s Manual (2009) was the recipient of the 2009 Florida Artists’ Book Prize. Her most recent work is Subject Verb Object (2012), a volvelle book about the frustration of academic language.

crookedletterpress.com

DANDY LION PRESS (125, 193)

Founded in 2006 by Maia Karolina de Raat, Dandy Lion Press’s slogan is “No Clip Art.” Located in San Francisco’s Mission District, the press uses only original pen-and-ink drawings or linoleum cuts featuring flora and fauna. The pieces are individually printed on two vintage letterpress machines, a Vandercook SP 25, originally used for proofing newspapers, and a Chand...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Copyright
• Title Page
• Contents
• Introduction
• Press Humor
• Greetings & Ephemera
• Products & Packaging
• Business
• Politics
• Animalia
• Retro & The Weird
• Typography
• Book Structure
• Unique Materials & Tricky Techniques
• Posters & Broadsides
• Acknowledgements
• About The Author
• Press Bios