Beast Pieces

Bat Mitzvah Letterpress Invitation Star With Clips

It goes without saying, we like unique paper structures. This Bat Mitzvah invitation, designed here at Studio On Fire features two triangles with a hole punch that clips together making a six pointed star shape. The paper triangles unclip to open and reveal the invitation text. The paper is 110lb Crane Lettra Flo White 100% cotton, letterpress printed in hot pink and die cut into the two triangles. It was mailed in a large square Neenah Eames Furniture, Weave Finish, Pacific Blue envelope printed in one color on the flap.

Those little metal clips are something we get asked about a lot. They are called #2 Petite Fasteners, made by GEM Office Products here in the USA. They have a little point that pierces the paper and holds the sheets together. You can buy them wholesale here. ($7 per box of 100 clips, 10 box minimum) They come in two sizes – the #2 is the bigger one, the #0 is smaller. And no, we do not sell the clips. But if you are in need of some top notch Bar Mitzvah or Bat Mitzvah invitations we’d love to hear from you.

Published on February 8, 2010 in Design, Letterpress and Printing Tips and Tricks. 0 Comments Tags: bar, bar mitzvah, bat, bat mitzvah, clip, Design, eames, Fastener, furniture, GEM, invitation, invitations, invite, Letterpress, lettra, metal, office, Petite, printer, printing, products, structure, unique.

Jeremy Gardner Stationery

This is a nifty little letterpress card and a7 envelope designed by Duel Purpose in Austin, Texas. It is printed in three colors, the overlapping bold graphics make unique areas of overprinting ink. The stock is 100% cotton 220lb Crane Lettra, with a matching Lettra envelope. Hand written correspondence on these are sure to any leave digital message in the lurch.

Published on February 4, 2010 in Letterpress. 2 Comments Tags: 220lb, austin, black, blue, bold, card, cards, correspondence, crane, duel purpose, duelpurpose, graphic, ink, Letterpress, lettra, overprinting, printer, printing, red, stationary, stationery, texas, writing.

Chef Business Card – Mini Menu Format

This card designed by 3 Advertising repurposes the folding menu format in miniature as a business card, complete with it’s own mini envelope for presentation.

We custom duplexed Neenah Classic Crest Epic Black 80C together with Neenah Classic Crest Classic Natural White 80C to make a 160lb sheet. Then we letterpress printed silver ink on the black side and gray ink on the natural white side. The cards were die cut with a heavy matrix score for folding such a beefy stock. Neenah Classic Crest Antique Gray 80T paper was printed with transparent white ink and custom converted to the mini envelopes.

Published on February 3, 2010 in Business Cards and Letterpress. 0 Comments Tags: 160lb, 3 advertising, 3advertising, 80lb, Albuquerque, business card, cards, chef, coin envelope, custom, custom converted, Design, die cut, diecut, envelope, epic black, format, gray, Letterpress, matrix, menu, mini, natural white, neenah, New Mexico, pasted, restaurant, score, three advertising, unique.

Forward Blotter Business Cards

We made some new friends in London at a digital agency called Forward. They rebranded themselves recently and designed these cards that feel very undigital and textural, and that is what we do best. They are printed on Ahlstrom Blotter stock with custom duplexing to bring the thickness to about 50pt. This blotter board has an uneven pulp formation that gives the flood of ink a washed, almost denim feel on the soft paper stock. The cards are edge colored in a matching purple. And this was no small task, an office of over forty people is a lot of cards. We ran them 10 cards up on press five press forms.

Published on February 2, 2010 in Business Cards and Letterpress. 4 Comments Tags: 50pt, agency, ahlstrom, blotter, board, business, card, cards, Design, edge color, edge tipping, forward, Letterpress, london, painted, paper, pulp, purple, sheet, stock, texture, UK, United Kingdom.

Heads of State Business Cards

For some illustration inspiration and silk screen goodness check out the Heads of State from Philadelphia. They designed these business cards with an insignia that turns the national USA seal on its ear, adding an extra head and replacing the olive branch and arrows with a pencil and x-acto knife. We letterpress printed in black and dark silver on both sides of Crane Lettra 220lb FLo White and edge colored to match the silver – it’s a card thick enough to plant a listening device inside. And maybe we did that too… maybe.

Published on February 1, 2010 in Business Cards and Letterpress. 0 Comments Tags: 220lb, Business Cards, crane, edge color, edge coloring, emblem, heads of state, insignia, Letterpress, lettra, national, philadelphia, printing, seal, silk screen, silver.

Bahamas Letterpress Wedding

This massive custom wedding system is exquisitely graphic. It was designed by the groom, Scott Peiffer. More of his design portfolio here. What is especially nice about this invitation set is the uniqueness of each card. Care was taken to bring together lots of different textures and graphics – beautifully combining, flourishes, coral patterns, florals, silhouettes, crests and even a bulldog.

We letterpress printed all the cards on a sheet together in two color on Cordenons Canaletto Grana Grossa Bianco 111lb C . It is a 20% cotton blend stock with a textural finish. The A7 folder is sized to fit inside an A7 envelope. It is letterpress printed in a coral pattern with a tone on tone blue ink and then die cut. The folder stock is a bright color 100lb cover stock from French Paper’s Poptone line. The Save the Date Envelope is also a matching stock color, printed tone on tone.

Published on January 26, 2010 in Letterpress and Wedding. 2 Comments Tags: a7, bahamas, band, blu rasberry, bulldog, canaletto, coral, cotton, crest, Design, destination, envelope, floral, flourish, folder, french paper, graphic, invitations, invite, Letterpress, paper, pattern, scott peiffer, silhouette, stationery, system, tone on tone, Wedding.

Fabien Barral Business Cards & Note Cards

Here is another fantastic project designed by Fabien Barral over at Graphic Exchange. He brought in wonderful organic drips and brush strokes that interpret with a unique sculptural quality under letterpress impression.

We put down a lot of letterpress printing on this sheet. It’s a good way to make a project affordable – - spread the cost over several items all on the same press sheet. The paper stock is Neenah Classic Crest Solar White 165lb Cover. The sheet contains four business cards and three large note cards. We printed a slightly contaminated opaque white ink for the tonal white effect, also a dense black ink. For our white ink, we usually put just a hair of silver in the opaque white to give it a little tone. It also has the benefit of creating a stronger sheen difference between the inked impression and the uncoated paper stock than you would get with a blind (inkless) print.

After printing this project went to live in French customs for a little while. And that should answer another question we get a lot – Yes! we do ship international all the time. Just let us know if you have any specific customs needs for your country.

Published on January 15, 2010 in Business Cards and Letterpress. 1 Comment Tags: 165lb, 2010, afforadable, barral, black, brush, business, business card, card, cards, contaminate, decor, Design, drip, fabien barral, graphic exchange, harmonie interieure, ink, interior decoration, Letterpress, neenah, note, notecard, opaque white, organic, press sheet, printer, printing, solar white, texture.

Help Haiti – Calendar for Unicef

01/20/10 – UPDATE TO POST:

Thanks for your support with our calendar fund raiser over the weekend. Because of your support we are sending over $700 to UNICEF.

THANK YOU!

………………………………………………………………………….

Dear Design and Printing Friends,

As a father of three young children I can not imagine the reality that is Haiti right now. Our studio would like to help. We are donating 100% of our 2010 letterpress calendar sales starting today to the UNICEF fund for Haiti.

You can buy a calendar on our studio site for $30. We’ll direct all accumulated funds, less your shipping cost to Unicef early next week.

Or you can support UNICEF directly at their site.

Thanks for your consideration,

Ben Levitz

Principal, Studio On Fire

Published on January 15, 2010 in Letterpress, News and Studio On Fire Products. 1 Comment Tags: benefit, calendar, earthquake, effort, haiti, Letterpress, product, relief, unicef.

2010 Studio On Fire Letterpress Calendar

The Studio On Fire 2010 Calendar is now available on our new web site. This calendar is a decade marker for us. Established the end of 1999, Studio On Fire began letterpress printing in a cold Minnesota basement. Our first press occupied a spot between the boiler and the litter box, and oh, how the studio has since grown. Now seven presses strong with a fully equipped studio space, we celebrate ten years as a bustling design and print studio.

This Tenfold Edition calendar is letterpress printed with four colors on a cotton-blend stock, each month beautifully illustrated by selected designers the world over.

Contributors:
Jan/Jul_ Studio On Fire
Feb/Aug_Cecilie Ellefsen
Mar/Sept_ Brian Gunderson
Apr/Oct_ The Little Friends of Printmaking
May/Nov_ ghostpatrol
Jun/Dec_ Rilla Alexander (Rinzen)

Published on January 7, 2010 in Design, Letterpress, News and Studio On Fire Products. 3 Comments Tags: 2010, Brian Gunderson, brown, calendar, day-glo, Design, easel stand, edition, florescent, ghostpatrol, green, illustration, Letterpress, little friends of printmaking, months, pink, poptone, printing, rinzen, studio on fire, tenfold.

Optimistic Letterpress Wine Labels

Happy New Year!

The Optimist is a self-promotional holiday wine bottle designed by Greg Bennett for Siquis. Each year Siquis shows their clients how much they care by designing a custom wine bottle label just for them. The label is always created by a different designer in their creative department. This year’s graphic was designed to play on “is the glass half empty or half full” concept. Obviously, once the recipient rotates the bottle to fill their glass, the glass on the label becomes half full. One of Greg’s many beliefs is that a design is only as good as it’s production. What that means is that you can have a great design but if it is produced poorly, the result will be a mediocre piece at best. That being said, this label was letterpress printed at Studio On Fire ensuring this bottle design is sure to delight even the toughest critics.
We printed on Strathmore Ultimate White Label stock with a kiss cut die for finishing that punched out the tiny glass area and gave the whole label a slight arc to compliment the curve of the bottle.

Published on January 4, 2010 in Letterpress. 2 Comments Tags: bottle, Design, die cut, die line, diecut, dieline, greg bennett, Holiday, kiss cut, kisscut, label, labels, Letterpress, new year, premium, printed, printing, simple, sisquis, strathmore, wine.

Iron Beast Poster – Toys In The Attic Show

This is our letterpress poster for the Toys In The Attic show opening at the Soo Visual Arts Center on Dec 4th from 6 to 9PM. The show features both custom toys and toy inspired posters. Proceeds benefit Toys For Tots. Hey, that’s tomorrow night! We hope to see you there.

These beasts are in fact our toys. The graphic beasts are constructed from various press parts and form into a crest that commemorates ten years of printing here at Studio On Fire. The dog latin phrase reads “Iron Beasts Make Great Beauty”. It is printed in fluorescent and dark silver inks on Crane Lettra Flo White 220lbC at 13 x 13 size.

It was ten years ago this month back in 1999 that the first C&P was lowered into the then basement studio. More to come on our own ten year anniversary party soon.

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Published on December 3, 2009 in Design, Letterpress, News and Posters. 0 Comments Tags: 220lb, beast, crane, crest, Design, edition, fluorescent, ink, iron, Letterpress, lettra, minneapolis, poster, press parts, print, printer, silver, soo, soo visual arts center, soovac, studio on fire, ten years, toys for tots, toys in the attic, unique.

Reserve Collection Coffee Package Labels

Jeff Holmberg designed these labels for a new line of coffee from Bull Run Roasting Company to be served and sold at their new retail location inside the Rustica Bakery in Minneapolis. Top notch stuff! Bull Run wholesales their coffee into some of the finer restaurants in the metro. This Reserve Collection is the first offering of their coffee at retail and it had to look tasty. The label is customized by rubber stamping the coffee variety and hole punching the bean and weight information. The ripped edge of the label on the kraft bag balances a raw yet refined look. Nice work Jeff.

We letterpress printed in two color on Strathmore Ultimate White label stock. We kiss cut the labels with a steel rule die with several punches to add the coarse perforated edge when ripped and opened. Yum and Buzz.

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