Wedding Invitation on Sixties

Over the many years I have been  paper merchant, the trickiest of all projects to be involved with is the graphic designer's own wedding invitation! Generally speaking there are many samples involved and lots of changes in direction in a desire to impress their design savvy friends! Not so, with this invitation, as I didn't know anything about it until I received a lovely email yesterday...

I met designer Sam Moffat this time last year, who had just set up his own practice in London called  Decade Studio. One of the products I showed Sam was our new SIXTIES. Sixties is a new paper (in 60gsm, hence the name!) which has the same type of translucency as a tracing paper, but feels like a normal paper. Unbeknown to me Sam identified this as the perfect stock for his upcoming wedding in November.

Click on images to enlarge

Size of the invitation is 420x297 (A3) folding down to 105x148mm (A6). It is digitally printed by Kestrel Press, white on the front and in black on the reverse.

… you can see the translucency in the images above and below. Photography is by Huy

Digital printing is by Kestrel Press based in Irvine. Kestrel had tested the Sixties on their digital press, including the use of digital white toner, which I wrote about in an article on this blog, which Sam spotted. The end result is absolutely superb. The invitations are sealed with an orange sticker, as you can see below...

Sam moved back to Australia in January and Decade Studio is now based in Hobart, Tasmania. My best wishes to Sam and Hannah on their new life together in Oz and thanks to Sam for taking the time to share this with me, so I could share it with you.

http://www.decade.studio/
http://www.kestrelpress.com/ 
https://www.instagram.com/huy____/

Posted by Justin Hobson 22.07.2020

Laings receipt wallets

Laings is a prestigious family-run jewellers with over 177 years’ experience in the industry. Established in 1840 they are now one of the largest independent jewellery businesses operating six stores across the UK. I wrote about the covers of the brochures here and these are the receipt wallets used throughout the stores.

The 4pp wallets are 148x105mm, portrait with a half height pocket on the inside back cover....

The wallets are digitally printed in white ink plus an all over digital varnish with the L monogram - the result is superb as the white is strong and the varnish subtle.

The receipt wallets are printed on one of our new Colorset shades - Colorset Deep Blue in 270gsm. Print is by Kestrel Press, as with Laings, Kestrel are also a family owned company based in Irvine in Scotland and founded over 40 years ago. My thanks to Graeme Ferguson at Kestrel for sending me these copies.

https://www.laingsuk.com/
http://www.kestrelpress.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 25.07.2019

Laings 2018/19

Just the cover makes the difference! I've written on this blog about many projects where the cover "makes the difference" and this is just one of those projects....

Laings is a prestigious family-run jewellers with over 177 years’ experience in the industry. Established in 1840 they are now one of the largest independent jewellery businesses operating six stores across the UK.

The cover of their latest catalogue is printed on one of our new Colorset shades - Colorset Deep Blue in 350gsm. The size of the catalogue is 250x200mm, portrait and is perfect bound with 102pp text, printed on 'house silk' coated 170gsm paper.

The cover is beautifully hot foil blocked in silver metallic foil...

...and the spine is also foiled

Print is by Kestrel Press, as with Laings, Kestrel are also a family owned company. They are based in Irvine in Scotland and were founded over 40 years ago. My thanks to Graeme Ferguson at Kestrel for sending me these copies.

https://www.laingsuk.com/
http://www.kestrelpress.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 07.06.2019

New papers and new processes

Kestrel Press are a family owned printing company based in Irvine in Scotland which was founded over 40 years ago. However, unlike many established printers, this is a company that continues to innovate and explore new materials. Their work has appeared on this blog before here.

We have recently introduced two new materials which Kestrel Press have embraced as they realised their potential with the design community. The first product is our BlackGold which is our new range of intense black from Gruppo Cordenons.

Kestrel have produced some A4 folders using BlackGold 290gsm and they are printed using their "seeing is believing" strapline which they are applying to their promotions to demonstrate their innovations in digital printing.

The size of the 4pp folder is 300x215mm, portrait and is printed using clear digital print, which looks like a cross between varnish and clear foil blocking and works brilliantly on the BlackGold.

Click on images to enlarge

The inside of the folder is printed in white, again printed digitally and the result is really crisp and sharp. Both of these processes have been printed on their Ricoh digital press with the special attachments which make white and clear printing possible. Because these are processes which are produced in the normal pass through the press and not an "after" process, it means they are much more cost effective than traditional processes such as foil blocking or UV varnish.

The 4pp folder has a glued flap with a 140mm pocket and slits for a business card. The business cards are also printed on BlackGold but are triplexed with our Colorset Magenta 270gsm as the middle layer. 

Click on images to enlarge

The business cards are also clear printed on the reverse.

The second material used for experimentation is our new SIXTIES paper, which is 60gsm. These sheets are 320x450mm and is also surprisingly printed in white....

The white is printed on the front, but as you can see from the image below, even though it is printed white, you can still see the show through

This new SIXTIES is 60gsm and is a fine quality, similar to our Offenbach Bible in many ways but with one major difference - unlike a genuine bible paper which has a high opacity, this new paper has the same translucency as a tracing paper - but it feels like a normal paper! ...as I hope you can see from the picture below:

...and this further sheet which is printed in black (and a small amount of red) on both sides of sixties making an image out of type.

The results are truly superb and it is great when a printer takes the time and trouble to examine and experiment with new materials that they then show to their customers.

My thanks to Graeme Ferguson at Kestrel for sending me these samples and for taking the time to experiment with their new processes on these new materials.

http://www.kestrelpress.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 27.03.2018

2016 Christmas Card by S-T

Thank you to everyone who has kindly sent me cards this festive season. I've received a wide selection of really lovely designs and beautifully produced cards, not all on our paper, of course! ...but many are.

Click on images to enlarge

This one particular card, I did think I would write about, because not only is it printed on our Colorset Crimson 270gsm (100% Recycled) but it is printed in an unconventional way. The card is designed by London based studio, Design by St. Titled "Who will you be this Christmas?" it is an infographic flow diagram which is very funny and well written. 

The finished size of the card is A6 (105x148mm) and it is an 8pp concertina format.
 The card is printed in just one colour - white. The result is fantastically effective and I looked at it to see how it has been achieved:

 Was it matt hot foil blocking? Silkscreen? HP Indigo digital white?
...Nope, none of the above!
In fact, it is printed by a Scottish printer called Kestrel Press based in Irvine. They have a digital press which is toner based and this is the result - in just one pass! The result is truly superb and as I discovered from speaking to Graeme Ferguson at Kestrel, achieved at a much more economical price in comparison with the processes I listed above.

Click on images to enlarge

Creative Partners at Design by St are Steve Fenn and Tom Pollard.

http://www.designbyst.com/
http://www.kestrelpress.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 29.12.2016

Christmas card by S-T

Thank you to everyone who has kindly sent me cards this Christmas. I've received a wide selection of really lovely designs and beautifully produced cards, not all on our paper, of course! ...but many are.

 

This one particular card, I did think I would write about, because not only is it printed on our Colorset Bright Red 270gsm (100% Recycled) but it is printed in an unconventional way. The card is designed by London based studio, Design by St. The size of the card is A6 (105x148mm) landscape format and is hinged at the top of the card.

Click on images to enlarge

The card is printed in just one colour - white. The result is fantastically effective and I looked at it to see how it has been achieved:

Was it matt hot foil blocking? Silkscreen? HP Indigo digital white?
...Nope, none of the above!
In fact, it was printed by a Scottish printer called Kestrel Press based in Irvine. They have a digital press which is toner based and this is the result - in just one pass! The result is truly superb and as I discovered from speaking to Graeme Ferguson at Kestrel, achieved at a much more economical price in comparison with the processes I listed above.

Creative Partners at Design by St are Steve Fenn and Tom Pollard.

http://www.designbyst.com/
http://www.kestrelpress.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 28.12.2015