Baby announcements - Part I

I know I haven't posted in a while - I wish I was free to spend more time on my letterpress projects. I was happy to finally start the baby announcement project this weekend. This is my most ambitious project to date because it is large (200 announcements and envelopes) and it is two colors.

I created the layout in two parts in Adobe InDesign:


and


I sent the images via email to Beaver Engraving, and they created magnesium dies:


and


Sarah had decided on green and brown, but I selected the actual shades with the help of my Pantone Color Formula guide:


I started with the green which was 35 parts yellow, 1/4 part blue and 1 part black. I didn't use a scale but just approximated the amounts, and quickly discovered that both blue and black go a long way fast. I ended up having to add a little more yellow because it had gotten darker than I wanted.


One thing I hadn't anticipated was all the fooling around I would have to do with the makeready. Because I had never printed anything of this size before on my Pilot (the finished card will be A6), I did not realize that the printing surface was so uneven - the bottom half printed perfectly while upper half barely made an impression. I spent a frustrating hour building up parts of the makeready with small strips of strategically placed pieces of paper only to take them down again after a practice run revealed the build up affected the immediately adjacent area.

The final results of Part I were pretty but a few were slightly uneven:

Two color linoleum plus foundry type

Things at work are still pretty hectic so I haven't had a lot of time to print. I'm working on a couple of projects that I'm pretty excited about though, including an announcement card for a acquaintance who is adopting a baby. In the mean time, I carved a couple of small linoleum blocks that I had. I plan to use these cards to invite some friends over for poker night - none of them have seen our house since the remodel.

I started with the sky.


Then added our house - we really don't have a front door, we moved it to the side behind the gate.


And then added our names.

Letterpress expenses

Happy New Year!

The last few weeks were so much fun; however, all of the things that I had been putting off because of the holidays can be put off no longer. My real job is demanding right now, and I will probably not have a lot of time to print until the end of the month. Instead, since one of my goals is to offer practical information and advice, I thought I would post a (painfully) frank accounting of my letterpress expenses so far:

Introduction to Letterpress at Otis College of Art and
Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .500

Chandler & Price Pilot letterpress with four chases,
1 set of old rollers, 1 set of new rollers, and
assorted furniture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1200

Transportation of Pilot from SF to LA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100

Assorted reglets, 6 quoins, key, 5 pounds of ink,
half dozen dingbats, box of gauge pins, catalog . . . . . . . . . . . . .110

Black ink, opaque white ink, Super Soap hand cleaner,
two ink knives, brayer, California Wash roller,
cleaner, Putz Pomade roller conditioner, pica
stick . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105

Two California job cases, set of 12 and 18 pt Univers
foundry type, composing stick, leads, quads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .178

Lead/slug cutter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Two reams of card stock (one each of Strathmore
and Crane & Co.) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

Plus I purchased six magnesium dies measuring about 84 square inches on which I received a first time order discount from Beaver Engraving (link at the side) for about $75.