Tag Archive for 'Letterpress'
This print is the result of a collaboration between illustrator/painter/art maker Oliver Jeffers and swissmiss’ Tina Roth Eisenberg. Quirky and fun, this three color poster measures out at 11″ x 14,” printed in our Minneapolis studio on Crane Lettra Flo White 110lb cover stock. Does anybody else think popcorn sounds really good right now?
Available for purchase over on Swiss Miss.
If you haven’t had the pleasure of exploring Jessica Hische’s work, you should really go check it out. Her remarkable talent and wit permeates everything she does, a prime example being this poster she designed last year asking the age old question “should i work for free?” Every designer has asked themselves this at some point and Jessica has taken the time to break it down for you in this FIVE color poster she had us letterpress. Printed on Crane Lettra Flo White 110c (one of our house stocks), each 15″ x 25″ print is signed and editioned. Available for purchase in Jessica’s store.
Another side project Jessica produced is inkerlinker, a site dedicated to finding an awesome printer to fit your needs. We’re pretty pumped about the love people have shown us on the site and always enjoy reading the comments people leave. Go ahead and “like” us… you know you want to.
Hard Graft, it literally means “Hard Work,” and boy does this European company live up to their name. Makers of beautifully designed and handcrafted gadget cases, this duo (one English, one Austrian) has a passion for what they do–and it shows. From designing the products and tracking down the finest italian craftsman (they used to make every single item themselves), to packing each order by hand, they are involved in every aspect of their business. We’re actually surprised they don’t have sheep in their back yard (then again, for all we know, maybe they do). Moral of the story–they care, these are the kind of people we love to work with.
To complement their 100% wool felt and leather goods, they designed noted cards, merchandise cards and labels for us to produce. The note card and angular merchandise cards were printed on 60pt Ahlstrom Blotter, which is what we traditionally recommend for coasters. Though the outcome is beautiful, these items were a challenge to run on press. Whenever you run a flood of color alongside fine type you will constantly have to fight to keep the text crisp while still making the flood of color as solid as possible. This project was especially tricky because the blotter stock is notoriously challenging to run solid areas of color on, there is no avoiding what we call a “salty” result–luckily this was the look they were going for. They were finished with a custom diecut, which helps the cards tuck tightly into felt pockets prior to shipping (see the picture below that Hard Graft was nice enough to send over of the cards in use).
The labels were printed on Strathmore Soft White label stock, receiving a kiss-cut after printing, allowing them to easily peel off the backing sheet.
Still working on your holiday shopping? No worries, we’re here for you. Just this morning we added yet another new item to our shop, the Buzzed & Fuzzed Print Set. Give them as a pair or break them apart to give to your boozy best friend and highly caffeinated little sister.
Printed with three inks (brown, yellow and a tonal warm gray) on Wausau Royal Compliments Natural White 100c, each print measures 12.625″ x 9.625.”
Just want one? Too bad, they only come as a set. Also, be sure to follow us on Twitter for an exclusive discount promo code.
Published on December 14, 2011 in Design, Letterpress, Posters and Studio On Fire Products. 0 Comments
Designed by Priest + Grace for Howler magazine, these oversize business cards are an amazing example of what a good design and a little tonal ink can do. Howler magazine is a quarterly publication for soccer enthusiasts in North America, so it only made sense for these cards to reference the size and color of actual penalty cards used in soccer.
There are several production techniques we used to successfully produce these cards. First, instead of printing all of the information blind we used a tonal ink color (a red ink on the red, yellow on the yellow). When something is printed blind it relies solely on good lighting conditions to be legible. Our solution is to print using a tonal ink, which creates just enough contrast between the artwork and the paper to make your contact information visible. Secondly, these cards were printed with fronts and backs up on the same sheet, duplexing the sheet after printing. This allowed us to run a heavy impression on press but then conceal the impression show through by duplexing the sheet back to itself.
The red cards are printed on Mohawk Via Scarlet Vellum 80C (duplexed to make 160C) and the yellow cards are on French Poptone Lemon Drop 100C (duplexed to make 200C).
Yael Miller, from Miller Creative, designed these gorgeous business cards for Olli Salumeria, a salumeria that makes dry-cured salumi in Virginia. Though the outcome is, dare we say stunning, these cards posed several production challenges along the way.
As a general rule, we don’t suggest using letterpress when the design uses floods of color and require clients to agree to our Solid Areas Disclaimer before we will proceed with their job. To achieve a nice solid coverage of color we had to run the ink heavy across the card, thankfully we had added some additional stroke weight to the artwork in the pre-press stage so the line work would not fill in on press. Another trick we used was lightly wetting the sheet before running- this cuts down on the appearance of saltiness and variation across the color.
Flood aside, take a look at that red. Yael refers to it as “Ferrari red,” and we can’t say that we disagree. The design actually specified a Pantone GOE color, which is not a Pantone book we match to, but since we custom mix all of our colors we were able to match a swatch that was mailed in for reference. We took one of our base red inks and pumped it up with a hit of fluorescent red to really get the color to pop.
These cards are printed on Crane Lettra 110lb cover that we custom duplexed after printing to make 220lb. By duplexing after printing we were able to run the flood without completely flattening the text on the other side of the card (not to mention we love any excuse to make a business card thicker). A custom diecut, shaped to reference a ticket or label, finished off the cards in an unexpected, yet refined way.
This project can also be found on FPO, DesignWorkLife, and Miller Creative.
Published on December 6, 2011 in Business Cards, Letterpress and Printing Tips and Tricks. 3 Comments
Local Minneapolis designers Ned Wright and Laura Belle were married a couple months back in a small backyard ceremony. Both being designers, it makes sense that they started their journey as man and wife by collaboratively designing the invitations for their big day.
Comprised of a main invitation card and an additional information card, this wedding suite combines unusual materials and several print processes. The main invitation is an oversized card (7.5″ x 10.5″) of 145 lb French Packing Board we custom duplexed to 100 lb Wausau Royal Complements Eclipse black cover stock. Studio On Fire letterpress printed the text on one side and then sent the piece off for foiling (white and black) on both sides.
The information card was also oversized (10.5″ x 15″) printed on one of our house stocks, Crane Lettra Pearl White 110C. Black ink is used on both sides, with an additional tonal ink used to create visual texture on the outside of the card. Once the card had completed printing it received several score and perforation lines, allowing the RSVP to be separated and returned.
As a special bonus, the couple had a great video made of their wedding weekend that they agreed to share.
You may have noticed on your way to purchase a 2012 Studio On Fire Letterpress Calendar that studioonfire.com has a completely overhauled look! We’re pretty proud of the new site and have plans to add more features in the coming weeks.
Being the paper-oriented people that we are, our friends over at westwerk design handled the creation of the site for us. Not only were they were great to work with, but their studio is conveniently located just upstairs from our basement workspace.
Along with the new site is additional merchandise for the store! All of our classic items are still available, as well as the 2012 calendar and several new posters.
Above: Artisan Activist Poster, Crane Lettra Flo White 110C, 13″ x 19″, 2 Color Split Fountain on 2 Separate Plates + 1 Tonal Varnish
Above: Sunshine Poster, Crane Lettra Flo White 110c, 12″ x 16″, 3 Color Split Fountain
Above: Matter Into Spirit Poster, Crane Lettra Flo White 110c, 13″ x 20″, 2 Color Split Fountain + Blind Impression
Perky Bros recently sent this gem of a stationery system our way. You may remember the gorgeous typographic and woodgrain wedding invitations we printed for Jeff a couple years back and we’re happy to share another one of his projects that’s fresh off the press.
This stationery system for BEDROC is a great example of how a designer can curate a combination of materials to support the overall design aesthetic of their project. The business cards are printed on Neenah Classic Crest Slate 80lb cover custom duplexed to Neenah Classic Crest Recycled Natural White 100lb cover. A subtle tonal letterpress varnish graces both sides of the card with an additional ink for the contact information. A zing of copper metallic on all 4 edges incorporates an element of elegance. Notecards are printed on Neenah Classic Crest Recycled 100 Natural White 80C, custom duplexed to make 160C, share the same ink colors and also show off that metallic edge. The letterhead, on Neenah Classic Crest Recycled Natural White 80lb text, and envelope, on Neenah Classic Crest Antique Gray 24W, round out the system using 2 inks that are common to the rest of the materials.
We were lucky to once again work with the kind folks over at Martha Stewart Weddings. For their Fall 2011 issue (on newsstands now!) we were asked to create a wedding suite with a distinctly geometric flair.
One of our more masculine suites, you won’t see any cursive fonts or extraneous illustration announcing the celebration of this union. The sleeve, made out of French Construction Nightshift Blue, has a custom peek-a-boo diecut that reveals wedding details as the card slides out the top. Navy blue and warm gray inks overprint each other on 110 lb Crane Lettra Ecru stock. Custom envelopes with delicate line work complete the suite.
Earlier this year we were asked to participate in Target’s Design United campaign. Target made use of the massive street level windows of their corporate location to showcase their bullseye logo as interpreted by 51 local artists. We were thrilled to be included and submitted a dozen prints for them to choose from. The display was up from April to October in downtown Minneapolis.
Our process started with a hand drawn mehndi inspired pattern that we scanned in and cleaned up to create a photopolymer plate. We also created a plate of the solid Target logo which we used to lay down some background colors, allowing us to utilize the transparent nature of the inks and achieve some great overprinting. Our pressman went to town and applied most of the inks by hand directly to the plates or paper, resulting in dozens of completely unique pieces. Some of our favorites are below, along with some shots of the installation that we took while it was up this summer.
Published on October 14, 2011 in Client Focus, Completely Unrelated, Design and Letterpress. 1 Comment
