Wedding Letterpress

This weekend my cousin married a fabulous guy. To commemorate the date I created this letterpress print using wood block type and a rainbow roll in her wedding colors. Congratulations Ivy and Trevor. I love you guys!

Pepsi-Cola Print

After experimenting with the printing blocks and wood type earlier this week, I chose the Pepsi-Cola symbol to create a new print. Its broad strokes of type fit well with the 96 point wooden type I have access to. I had fun designing and arranging the placement of the symbols, numbers, letters and logo. Woven throughout is the year Pepsi was founded as well as round shapes suggesting carbonation bubbles. Comments and suggestions are welcome!

Just for fun, for now

I had fun playing around tonight with the blocks I mentioned in an earlier post. For now I am testing impressions and experimenting with these logos and seals, but as I worked tonight a few ideas started to sprout. I'm going to pursue them and hope something wonderful comes of it! Here are the "Just for fun" prints I got tonight. Thanks again to my fab dad who supplied the vintage blocks!

 

  

  

  

 

Experimentation Continues

 

  

More letterpress experimentation. Larger impressions this time. Bold typeface.

The Birds by William Blake

 

I am continuing my letterpress experimentation by creating a series of bird themed works. The next piece I hand set is The Birds. Here is a photo of the galley. I found one spelling error (A 'b' instead of a 'd'. It is easy to mix these up since everything is backwards!), but other than that it is ready to be printed. This piece was a great deal easier to set since it did not incorporate a curved margin!

Thread + Ink

After multiple prints, much adjusting and tightening to the type set in the galley and more printing, I got a decent print. From there a bird design was stitched into the print with embroidery floss. I may still add more detail to the bird, but for now, here are up-close views to give you an idea of the materiality.

 

  

 

  

Thank You Gutenberg

 

I think we should all take a moment and thank Mr. Gutenberg for the time and pain he put in to the craft of letterpress. I never knew how much I admired this guy, until I spent 5 hours bent over a case of 10 point Stymie Light and a galley. It wears you down, but it is rewarding to see that you've built a body of text (in reverse) with all your effort. The photo above shows 32 lines of type set against a curved piece of cedar. I am hoping to finish securing the sorts tomorrow and try a print. Stay tuned!

Letterpress on the Horizon

 

For an upcoming project I will be experimenting with letterpress typesetting. I have done no letterpress printing so far in my life so everything will be new. My completely cool dad has given me permission to try out these blocks, which he came across in his wanderings. I'll post results... if I can figure out the process! (The blocks above include: Rolls Royce, Greenville Country Club, FTD, Virginia Military Institute, Mack, The Greenville News, Pontiac, the South Carolina State Seal, American Legion, Pepsi-Cola and the US National League.)

Preservation through Production: An Evening with Hatch Show Print

Tonight I had the exciting opportunity to attend Jim Sherraden’s lecture on the history and process of Hatch Show Print at the Westin Poinsett Hotel in Greenville, SC. Hatch is a non-profit working museum affiliated with the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, Tennessee. The shop, founded in 1879, has adopted a motto: “Preservation through production”. This historic shop continues to use only the original wood block type in their designs, supplemented here and there with current woodblock or linoleum cut designs. Hatch Show Print does not strive to recreate historic posters that are now rare or completely lost, nor does it search out vintage copies of printed show posters on Ebay or antique outlets. Rather, they are interested in keeping history alive by using the Hatch brothers original hand carved block in today’s context. Originally typesetting traveling tour posters for Grand Ole Opry stars, Hatch’s more recent clientele consists of Pearl Jam, the Beastie Boys, REM, Coldplay, Mylie Cyrus and many other contemporary artists. Currently B.B. King and Willie Nelson are Hatch’s largest clients. Companies such as Pixar and CNN have also commissioned work with Hatch. Below are some images from the evening: the presentation, the beautiful historic Poinsett Hotel, tasty food, posters I secured at the beginning of the evening and my charming companions! (See more Hatch posters.)

Mr. Sherraden stressed that with these prints the Designer is the Printer and the Printer is the Designer.
If you can't make it to Nashville, then catch the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition.