Artistic Printing

Wow. It's been a while since I last posted. Sorry.
I have a lot of catching up to do!

In March my family took a two week vacation in Florida. Good weather, nice beaches and some downtime. While we were there we met up with Don and Ruth Black for an afternoon and dinner. Don showed us a bunch of new books on letterpress type that he had acquired. For me it was like looking at a book with pictures of all kinds of delicious tempting candy. Beautiful wood type and metal type fonts page after page! I had also brought a book called "The Handy Book of Artistic Printing" to show Don. He had never seen it. It's a paperback whose pages are filled with images of beautiful, densely printed ephemera letterpress done in the late 1800's in a style that was called Artistic Printing. Here is a peek.

The artistically printed style cover.

I'd love to see and try out one of these curving machines for rules!
They created all sorts of images by custom bending rules for clients. Plants, swirls even portraits!!

Look at all the individual pieces used to create this one corner of the image!!!

Love this book!

Lat year I picked up the Volume 2 of the Taschen Edition book on typefaces and graphic styles. It was beautiful. Absolute eye candy for people who love type! Last week for my birthday my husband bought me Volume 1!  Such amazing letterforms, samples of printing, etc. There is even a page that has images of a hunky young letterpress guy without a shirt printing using a hand press! I'll have to try and scan that one to show you!

Workshops

In all my years of teaching adults it is interesting for me to notice that usually females make up the majority of workshop participants. In Letterpress it's a different scene. The balance of male and female students are about equal. I'm not sure why. I just find it interesting...

I taught Julian and Robleh a couple of weeks ago. I really liked their projects. Julian was extra ambitious setting a quote in 12 point metal type with an image! It turned out beautifully. Robleh's positive message broadside also turned out well. I was able to get him to print on some chocolate brown stock that I had ... he was skeptical ... and loved the results! Yay! Too bad I was so excited that I forgot to take a picture of the print on the brown.

Julian at the Platen press printing his hand set type quote.

Robleh's broadside printed an the Vandercook with some of our  wood type.

Robleh pulling a print on the Vandercook  (yes, that is his arm...he was shy).

Julian's hand set quote with vintage "Bathinette" cut.

Hearts, Love and all things pink and red!

For about five years now I have been making gift cards for Soma Chocolatemaker. I've spent the last few days at the studio making their Valentine's Day gift cards. Hearts. Pink. Red. I have never been in love with the whole scheme of Valentine's Day scheme being red, white, pink with hearts and cupids! I'm so thankful that at Soma they like the brown card stock I use for their cards!!  I don't know if I could stand to print Valentine's cards if they all had to be on white or pastel colours. For me, the brown stock makes the subject and colour a little less... ummmmm... dislikable? Perhaps it''s because I like to think of the brown card stock as wonderful chocolate! They could probably even pay me in chocolate...

I tried printing on the Craftsman for the first time. Since these cards are gift card size it's a good size to try out on the Craftsman. The press is not working as smoothly as I think it should be, but it is printing well. One thing I don't have are the pins to hold the paper in place for printing! Oops! I had to fashion some out of layered cardboard. I was impressed! They worked pretty well. I was able to register the red hearts in line with the pink type using them! I won't be keeping my cardboard pins though. On Friday I'll go to see Craig Black at Don Black Linecasting to pick up some brass pins for the press and see if he has any suggestions for getting the press to work a little more smoothly.

Top: The Craftsman press with a locked up heart.
Bottom: My makeshift pins!
Right: Really nice wood type font in quarter cases.

Printed with metal type.

X's and O's printed with metal type.

A bit too much pressure with the small type.

The Rockwell metal type prints so nicely!

LofL Postcard Swap Goodies!

These are a few of the postcards I received for participating in the LofL Postcard Swap! We had to create a "Greetings from..." type of postcard that represented the town we lived in, where we were visiting, etc. There were over 70 participants from North America and a few places further away. The only condition was that an element had to be letterpress printed. Not a problem for me!

What a wonderful assortment of type and images! I really love the ones that use original metal or wood type and found cuts. Even the backs were interesting!!

Top - my postcard submission;metal type and vintage cuts printed in three colours
Bottom - submission from my friends at Pomegranite Letterpress

A few of the great postcards that I received!

I loved looking at the backs as well!

2011: Year of the Press Shuffle

My SP15 won't be alone anymore!

I talked to a friend today about her Vandercook that needs a long term temporary home. So... it looks like we will be adding another press to KOZO Studio family! Yay! Now I just have to clear some space (not as easy as it sounds in my case!) and figure out where to put it! Time for a big studio shuffle ... help! Phil! Albert! Ken! I think I'm going to need your help!!!

I love presents and a mystery!

Sweet peace sign print! Love the colour!

Found this wedged into my studio door! It's a small print of a peace sign on nice watercolour paper ... letterpress from a polymer plate I believe. What a nice holiday surprise! I just wish I knew who printed it and gave it to me so that I could say thank you!! Anyone have any ideas?

PPP

I check out what is up on  "etsy" every once in a while... there are people making some really great work  in there. You just have to sift through it... a lot! The two photos are from Purgatory Pie Press Ink.
They do letterpress!... and not just for cards and invites!!... they actually do creative book projects! Type and book form together! Awesome!! You might think their prices are a bit steep, but they aren't. Not for the amount of technical know how and creativity they have. Their stuff is a little quirky, but I love it!

http://www.etsy.com/listing/38830981/ppp-abc-xyz-grey

Project for my heart.

I spent a while working on this project. Days actually. I created the two heart ornaments for a gift exchange for mother's who have last their infants.  One ornament was for a local mom and the other was sent to a mom in Florida, USA. I hope they like their pieces!

I set the type for the names and dates of the two babies. 

At the last moment I set the butterfly dingbat in.

The names and dates were letterpress printed onto some of my handmade paper. 

The hearts are made of cotton pulp. I cast each half of the heart in a mould and then glued the two halves together. I decorated the heart after the glue had dried.

Papermaking workshop photos.

 

A burst of paper pulp colour! 

Pulp painted and laminated with string and I am sure there are a bunch of spices in there as well!

Sunday was the last day of the four part Papermaking workshop I held at my studio. There were 5 participants and they made some beautiful pieces. This was the inaugural papermaking workshop for the studio and so far all is pretty good. Well, aside from the fact that whoever did the cement floor forgot that the water is supposed to drain towards the floor drain! Participants experimented with laminating, debossing, pulp painting (which was a favourite!), adding inclusions as well as almost anything else they could think of! I really admired the creative freedom that one of the participants had in approaching her paper pieces.

Beating red linen fabric offcuts from my friend Emily Hamill who is a fibre artist.
It took about 6 hours to beat the linen down to a pulp.

I see koi in water!
This is a paper piece by one of my workshop participants. The orange is actually dahlia petals.

Scattered petal and leaves in natural pulp.
The fibre for this pulp is also from linen and cotton fabric offcuts from Emily.

Sheets of damp paper drying between wool blankets sandwiched between two wood boards with weights on top.

Helicopters or maple keys laid onto a newly formed wetleaf.
I can't remember if this was to be a deboss or if she ended up putting pulp on top to laminate the keys in.

Workshop participants wet posts after being in the press.
The next step is to put each newly pressed sheet between dry felts.

Tiny sheets with plant material laminated in it.

My hands couching a new wetleaf on wet felts.

My daughter helping me transfer a post of just pressed wet leaves onto blotters.
The wet leaves get sandwiched between the blotters and then they will go into the air dryer.

Pieces made by workshop participants.