Beast Pieces » unique

Target: Design United

admin — Fri, 14 Oct 2011 20:25:24 +0000

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.

AIGA MN Design Camp Event Recap

admin — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 22:12:06 +0000

Yesterday we posted about our involvement printing the materials for AGIA MN’s 2011 Design Camp, but we thought it would be fun to share a peek into the event itself.

Ben (Principal), Selina (Studio Director) and David (Pre-press) were all up north participating as campers and Sam (Designer) was on the committee running the event, so Studio On Fire was well represented over the weekend. We had a booth up at the Friday night Business Expo where people were able to snag a paper airplane and pet assorted samples that we brought to show. Keynote speakers, a networking dinner, a variety of workshops, collaboration lunches and late night bonfires quickly filled the rest of the weekend.

Keynote speakers included Peter Buchanan-Smith (Best Made Company), Jamie Koval (VSA Partners), Michael Osborne (Michael Osborne Design), Jan Wilker (karlssonwilker), and Josh Kenyon and Colby Nichols (Jolby), it was great to meet each of them. Special thanks to the dudes from Jolby for stopping by the studio after camp and going with us to grab patio beers- good times.

Enough chatter, on to the pictures! David took some great shots throughout the weekend (on actual film!) and Phong Tran (of dblthink.com and official AIGA MN photographer) was gracious enough to share some of his photos, since we were too busy playing with wild cats to bust out our cameras most of the time.

Wild Ink Splatter Wedding Invitation

admin — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 18:13:12 +0000

This wedding invitation design by Project o3 channels the lettering stylings of illustrator Ralph Steadman, (think movie logotype for Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas.) There is hardly any text on this invitation, just the most basic info. We thought it was certainly one of the more free spirited invitations we’ve seen and loved it for it’s departure from the more typical ornate weddings.

It is printed on 220lb Crane Lettra Ecru with black, red and light gray ink. The die cut belly band that holds the three cards together is printed with black ink on French Poptone Wild Cherry 100lb cover.

Fantastic Philatelic Wedding Invitations

admin — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 12:30:14 +0000

These invitations were designed by the bride Nichole Tremblay. You can visit her at Coral Pheasant. We worked with her on the letterpress printing of her custom wedding stationery cards. Then we were completely amazed when she sent us finished samples showing how she put them together. What a labor of love. She tied the various sized cards together in a stacked bundle using a textural gauze ribbon with golden string to wrap the pile. She produced her own lined envelopes and outer address labels that are carefully wrapping the edge of a large A10 envelope. Then she painstakingly picked her postage. She made beautiful stamp collages on the envelopes using specially selected vintage postage, different for each invitation, but little works of art unto themselves.

The invitations are printed in gray and pink inks on thick 220lb cover Pearl White Crane Lettra paper. We printed all the cards together on a larger press sheet, saving her money in the letterpress production. Large script type runs across the top of each card with small san serif type across the bottom. We used heavy impression with a lighter ink density on the gray ink so the printing could have a more textural and salty appearance on the cotton paper. These invitations are a tactile treat. And with bowling at the reception dinner, who wouldn’t want to go?

Wild Air Letterpress Poster

admin — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 21:27:40 +0000

This poster was letterpress printed for the Artcrank poster show here in Minneapolis, which opened this last weekend. Since much of this show tends to be image and graphic heavy, we wanted our poster to stand apart with lettering only. It is an excerpt from Ralph Waldo Emerson’s Considerations by the Way, 1860. The full sentence is actually, “Live in the sunshine, swim the sea, drink the wild air’s salubrity.” (But “salubrity” is such an odd word and just didn’t work well in the design.) The lettering started as a hand drawn sketch, then refined in Adobe Illustrator. We printed with a photopolymer plate on Crane Lettra 300gsm Florecent White at 18 x 24 size. They are on display now at One On One in Minneapolis.

They sold well at the opening night and are still available. There was some confusion about them being sold out. They are $30, to be purchased at One On One Bike Shop.

You can also buy one, now for sale on our studio site as well. Cost is $40.