Woodblock Letterpress printing - 4

Our final woodblock letterpress class at the Dawson Printshop was a couple weeks ago and I never finished my blog posts to show the final results! Better late than never. I was using the Kelsey parlor press to make notebook covers. I printed them in two colours, first "My Analog" in dark brown then "Blog" in dark red. Another night, I was waiting to use the proof press and passed the time by using the parlor press again, printing a few more notebook covers that have a silver "ME" on them. I really like this font. The final project that I did in class was assembling and printing this collage of many woodblock fonts. It is just a jumble, don't try to make it say anything clever, it is just letters A to Z and numbers 1 to 9 and a few punctuation blocks, arranged on the bed and printed all in one colour. I might use these as decorative papers in bookbinding; that's the plan right now, although I haven't done anything with them yet. Thanks Niko, for a great introduction to letterpress!

Woodblock Letterpress printing - 3

Someone mentioned that I never showed a picture of those Christmas cards after printing the second colour. "Merry" was printed first in black, then "Christmas" was printed on top in silver. So here's how they turned out - some were printed on red and some on white...obviously.


After those were done, I started another project using a different kind of press. Here is one of the Dawson Printshop's parlor presses, all inked up with red right now.


This is a Kelsey parlour press; it is a table top press and it is entirely manual. Using this was much different than the comparably gigantic proof press that I was using before. Niko was explaining to me that these small parlor presses were really common in Victorian times when printing was a popular hobby and people just wanted to have one in their home, and of course they kept it in the parlor. So I used this press to print a cover for a notebook. I printed the second colour on them last night so now they are just drying and I'll make them into notebooks and show off a finished one here soon. We have one class left - I've already started something to keep me busy during those last three hours.

Woodblock Letterpress printing - 2

Last night I went to my second class of woodblock letterpress printing at the Dawson Printshop. The first project is a simple greeting card and last night I was able to print the first colour on mine. We were using a Vandercook Universal 1 proof press.


Definitely a big part of the fun is looking through the drawers of type, selecting fonts and designing the layout and all that. So, here is the wooden type that I picked out and arranged, set on the bed of the printer and ready to go. ("Bed"? Is that the right word? Still not overly confident with the lingo!) I do like how the extra wooden blocks for spacing are called furniture. (So maybe it is a bed.)


I was the first one to start printing so Niko was using my session as a demo for the class so she is here helping me get started.


In the end, I have the first colour down on the cards. Here are a couple of the test prints -


Another member of the class was taking lots of pictures for me, thanks Radhika!

Woodblock Letterpress printing - 1

Earlier this week, I started a woodblock letterpress class at NSCAD. So for the next six weeks, I'll be playing with wood type. NSCAD is now the home of the Dawson Printshop which used to be at Dalhousie University when I was studying there. So even though it is a new location, it's still familiar. The Dawson Printshop has, literally, tons and tons and tons of equipment and type, both metal and wood. Several antique presses and dozens of huge of cabinets full of type. The instructor is Niko, of White Raven Arts, a fellow member of BEST and an experienced letterpress printer and Dawson Printshop maven. Rows and rows and rooms full of cabinets of type...