Monthly Archives: May 2009

‘What Face Wednesday’ No.6

May 27, 2009 – 10:00 am

Welcome to the sixth ‘What Face Wednesday’ metal typeface identification competition! This week’s prize is a choice of any two hand-printed letterpress greeting cards (including free International p&p) from the selection on my Typoretum website. All correct answers will be placed in a hat and one winner will be randomly drawn. To enter the prize […]

By Justin Knopp | Posted in letterpress, typography, What Face Wednesday | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments (0)

New North Press – Wilton’s 150th Anniversary poster

May 26, 2009 – 9:13 pm

Richard Ardagh of Elephants Graveyard directed me to this delightful short movie showing him printing – ably assisted by Graham Bignell of New North Press – some letterpress posters, on an Albion Press. This poster, to commemorate the 150th Aniversary of Wilton’s Music Hall, is available for purchase along with other letterpress printed items via […]

By Justin Knopp | Posted in Hand Presses, letterpress, pressmanship, printing | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Comments (0)

‘What Face Wednesday’ No.5

May 20, 2009 – 12:00 pm

Welcome to the fifth ‘What Face Wednesday’ metal typeface identification competition! This week’s prize is a choice of any two hand-printed letterpress greeting cards (including free International p&p) from the selection on my Typoretum website. All correct answers will be placed in a hat and one winner will be randomly drawn. To enter the prize […]

By Justin Knopp | Posted in letterpress, typography, What Face Wednesday | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments (0)

The highly ornamented Columbian Press

May 17, 2009 – 9:17 pm

The Columbian is by far the most lavishly decorated of all iron handpresses, although it must be noted that many of the embellishments function perfectly well as the working parts of the Press. The English writer T. C. Hansard once commented (shortly after the first Columbian Presses appeared in London) that: “If the merits of […]

By Justin Knopp | Posted in Hand Presses, press, Printing Presses | Tagged , , , , , | Comments (9)

‘What Face Wednesday’ No.4

May 13, 2009 – 12:05 pm

Welcome to the fourth ‘What Face Wednesday’ metal typeface identification competition! This week’s prize is a choice of any two hand-printed letterpress greeting cards (including free International p&p) from the selection on my Typoretum website. As before, answers must be posted on this Blog (as a comment) and the first correct identification of the typeface […]

By Justin Knopp | Posted in letterpress, typography, What Face Wednesday | Tagged , , , , | Comments (1)

Old English type body sizes

May 11, 2009 – 8:43 pm

Prior to 1737, little standardisation existed in the sizes of printing types and typefounders cast types to their own sizes and dimensions. In this year, the Parisian typefounder Pierre Simon Fournier introduced a new system that he derived from dividing two inches of the pre-metric French foot into one hundred and forty-four equal parts. Fournier […]

By Justin Knopp | Posted in letterpress, typecasting, Typesetting, typography | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments (4)

‘What Face Wednesday’ No.3

May 6, 2009 – 10:54 am

Welcome to the third ‘What Face Wednesday’ metal typeface identification competition! This week I am offering the prize of a pastiche Victorian letterpress poster (including free International p&p), hand-typeset and printed by myself on a mid-nineteenth century Columbian handpress. The prize can be viewed here. This week I need you to correctly identify the typeface […]

By Justin Knopp | Posted in letterpress, typography, What Face Wednesday | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Comments (7)

Grafica Fildalga – Letterpress printers in São Paulo, Brazil

May 4, 2009 – 8:55 pm

Widely shared on Twitter, this movie is just too wonderful not to feature on my Blog. Filmed by Cool Hunting Video, it shows Grafica Fidalga, a trio of letterpress printers in São Paulo, Brazil, who print wood type posters on a 1929 German cylinder printing press.

By Justin Knopp | Posted in letterpress, printing, typography, wood type, woodletter | Tagged , , , , , , , | Comments (0)