To celebrate 100 years of letterpress printing on Vandercook presses (1909-2009), printer and press owner, designer, and now publisher Heather Mitchell has spent the last two years of her life putting together the book  The Vandercook 100.

We are extremely pleased to say Caveworks Press joins 99 other printer-artisans featured in this Spring 2012 publication! 

Photo credits: Heather Mitchell

Heather Mitchell  says: “ The Vandercook 100 celebrates 100 years of printing on the Vandercook proof press (19091-2009) and showcases 100 of today’s most significant letterpress printers using the Vandercook press. The selected printers are internationally respected teachers, practitioners, and designers recognized for their diversity of design and printing processes, their passion for letterpress and their love of the Vandercook proof press.”

Caveworks Press makes an appearance in the video trailer.
Hint: There is an ink fairy outside the shop.

Getting a peek into so many shops or studios (there is an ongoing debate on what you call your printing space) will be so interesting to see. Heather says all kinds of tips and tricks for those just learning the art of letterpress will be another bonus, not to mention the historical aspect of the Vandercook proof press model index.

Here’s what’s included:

• 224 pages of insight into the letterpress printing industry
• stories from over 100 artisans, teachers, practitioners, and designers
• over 500 photographs that share a glimpse inside studios, institutions and book art centers throughout the world
• a Vandercook proof press model index
• the best tips + tricks from the 100 participants for maintenance and operation of the Vandercook proof press
• a huge resource section full of useful links to manuals, equipment, museums, supplies, and much more…

Interested? The book can be pre-ordered from Amazon here.

I’m starting to document my involvement in a new project, Book Art Object edition 4, Group 5, title: Throwaway. Follow along in the conceptualization and realization of an artist’s book. Click the link below:

SKETCHBOOK DAYS – Julie – Edition 4, Group 5

This year, with a six year old’s excitement about Christmas surrounding us daily, the bombardment of the commercial messages about gifting, and the need to retrain our eyes to see the magic and the sacredness in the season, nay the whole of life, has directed what I hope will be an annual tradition in our place: the letterpress printing of our Christmas card.

In 1897, a little girl wrote a letter to the editor

The story of the little 8 year old girl who writes a letter to the editor to ask if Santa really exists is still as relevant as it was in 1897, an age the editor calls “skeptical” in his full response to Virginia.

We used portions of the letter to Virginia in our card

If 1897 was skeptical, I hate to think where we are now. It is only the child’s eyes that keep renewing the world; only a child who can truly see how wondrous is creation. So, with remembering our own childhoods, and seeing the hope anew in our children’s eyes, we nurture that sacred spark that no amount of jadedness, or crass commercialization, or holiday busy-ness can extinguish. May you keep it alive in your heart as well. We are trying over here

Here’s a little bit about how the card was made: The first color printed was green. Since the Santa image was a rubber stamp, it would require different treatment than type in printing. I lowered the bed of the Vandercook UNI II (which has an adjustable bed) to accommodate the over 1″ height of the stamp. It required a “kiss” impression so that the rubber would not distort with the pressure applied by the cylinder.

Next the red was printed (on a different day.) It was arranged to print 2-up, working and turning over to print the red on both the cover and inside at the same time.

Red inked type ready to roll

I love these initials!

Next the black was run on the press, in the about the same setup.

Showing how the printed sheet (Lennox 100 machine made paper) is a work and turn operation.

For the Wikipedia entry on this holiday tradition see the story here.

For the full text of the letters, see the Newseum.

A very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you and yours!

Usually I print on larger sizes of paper then cut down. Gives me room and nice clean edges. However, the paper I trim off just gets stacked into nice bookmark sized piles. Perfectly good paper, even great paper, such as this nice gray Stonehenge paper that I used for the “Human Acquisitions” broadsides.

Not wanting to let such soft, impressionable, receptive and fairly expensive material go to waste, I  came up with a solution, or perhaps I remembered something I had read somewhere. Sometimes the lines blur a little. I needed to fix them to a drawsheet. I had used those clear plastic photo corners to mount prints or photographs, and they came to mind now. Double stick tape can work to an extent, but would pull away the fibers of the paper on the back, especially with the amount of pressure the cylinder exerts.

I put corners up on the gripper edge and two more corners at the other end where the paper slips in. It worked very well to hold the paper snug to the cylinder, keeping it straight and on target to hit the type in the right place.

The only glitch was when the grippers refused to release the paper without a lot of tugging. I finally accepted each print was going to be like pulling a piece of paper out of clenched teeth. I tested it with three normal sheets and had no problem.

Here are the titles for the handmade journals that I’m planning on making. Typefaces: “Journal” is 24 pt ATF Shadow #859, and “Journals are letters from the soul” is 18 pt Della Robbia.

I’ve liked making the paste paper journals so much, but something was missing….why not print titles for the front?

I have this very cool metal typeface called Shadow, I believe.

I am looking for more info on the origins of this font.

Update

I have learned from my letterpress friends on the Letpress list that this is ATF’s Shadow #589, originally designed by Morris Fuller Benton in 1914. Despite being  nearly 100 years old it is so modern-looking! He designed over 200 typefaces. See more info about Morris Fuller Benton here.

If you have ever read back over your writing from years or months ago, you know it’s like going back in time to the place you wrote from; happy, sad, distracted, joyous… what a gift to be able to put experience and emotion into words to keep the very unique printing that is the voice of your soul!

I’ve made these journals with the handwritten motto to inspire you: “Journals are letters from the soul.” Each journal has a unique hand made paste paper cover over scrapbook quality card stock wrapped in boards.

The covers are constructed with folding, allowing them to open flat for easy writing. The signatures are a vintage laid paper stock and  pamphlet sewn with blue linen thread.

A paste paper velcro closure is decorated with a contrasting button.

 There are 32 pages and 72 page versions, and the overall size is 5.5 by 7 inches.

See more examples at Caveworks Craft
Contact me to purchase

15 craft vendors including Caveworks Press & Studios braved the chilly September day to sell handmade goods at the first annual Mohair Pear DIY Craft & Design Fair. Traffic was brisk, especially around the 11:30 – 2:00 time frame. According to Dave Diebler, co-owner of Mohair Pear, the neighborhood of College Hill really doesn’t get moving till mid-morning. It would seem the traffic flow fit that estimate. We were thrilled with all the attention that the “Pocketbooks” (purses made from books), coffee bag wallets, and book jacket wallets received. Many people also stopped to read a few lines from Out of the Blue, and The Last Portrait. A fairgoer who works at Starbucks simply couldn’t resist the bifold wallet made from a Starbucks coffee bag. We learned quite a bit by what people picked up and handled, and bought. Overall, it was a great experience for my first craft fair.

What was pretty cool about the fair: Mohair Pear’s Vinyl Tent, where they played records on the turntable for our listening pleasure all the day long.

Letterpress printed broadside of poem “Human Acquisitions” by Julie Russell-Steuart.

Originally printed for the 2010 APA poster bundle, with 55  prints reserved for sale. Handset type in gray and linoleum cuts in two colors on gray Stonehenge paper. There are about 45 left.

$45.00 plus shipping. Contact to purchase

The subject matter is a sci-fi inspired, somewhat fantastic account of growing up with hearing loss (based on my experience). It is the story of a boy and a girl, brother and sister, who find the world of reading, particularly sci-fi, much more attractive than the real world, who escape into fantasy as a means of coping with the social alienation of hearing loss. A bit of a surprise ending, too.

It was chosen in 2002 as the winner of the Roberta S. Tamares Sci-Fi
award at the University of Northern Iowa, while I was taking a
single poetry class with Vince Gotera and volunteering at the North
American Review.

It was featured in a Atelier 6000 Broadside Exhibition at Atelier 6000 in November of 2010.

Crazy Eddy on the Judgment Day

by Mary Swander

2004, Edition of 125, Sold Out

Swander writes the roiling river; her language moves with elemental force, unstoppable. Upturned, near familiar phrases momentarily surface like a favorite article of clothing and are submerged again, often with comic results. Humorous stories within stories emerge, like “Samson of Wisconsin,” dwarf Crazy Eddy’s giant nemesis, and how he defeated him. Swander’s rural midwest roots cling tight to her stories and capture their idiosyncratic characters with a close relative’s unflinching eye.

Colophon: Hand set in Garamond and Engraver’s Shaded type and printed on Mohawk Superfine. Bound in Fraser covers with Thai Mango endpapers. Binding assisted by Margaret Whiting and Julie McLaughlin. Printed in an edition of 125, and illustrated with linoleum cuts by Julie Russell-Steuart in one of the coldest summers on record.