St Bride Foundation 125th Anniversary

As many readers of this blog will know, this month the St Bride Foundation celebrates their 125th anniversary. To coincide with this, they are running a crowdfunding campaign to raise money for the Foundation to fund a year of special events (throughout 2021) and most importantly the beginning of a project to digitise the extensive Library enabling the collections to be shared with the global audience they deserve.

It brought to mind a fantastic project for the St Bride Foundation which I was involved with last year which I never wrote about but now having plagiarised (with permission!) the excellent blog article by Alistair Hall of We Made This, here it is...

Fourteen artists, designers, writers, illustrators and musicians were asked if they would collaborate in pairs to each create a poster designed to celebrate and highlight the rich and varied collections held within the St Bride Library and the building itself. The Collections and Collaborations project culminated in an evening to celebrate their work and the items from the collections that inspired them. The private view, held last May, included a series of short lectures from some of the collaborators about the process behind their work.

The collaborators are: 

Catherine Dixon & Mick Clayton 

Pam Smy & Ness Woo

Bob Richardson & Alistair Hall

Tom Gauld & John L. Walters

David Pearson & Paul Barnes

Anil Aykan & Jonathan Barnbrook (Fragile Self)

Tom Etherington & Keith Houston

There are 7 posters in total, each printed in an edition of 60, all printed on papers supplied by Fenner Paper and all printed Offset Litho by Boss Print ...and what a set it is!

Designer, writer and teacher Catherine Dixon worked with freelance type compositor Mick Clayton, who manages the St Bride Print Workshop. They went the extra mile – well, several extra miles to be honest – and letterpress printed their creation in the print workshops at the library, onto Shiro Echo, White 160gsm. It features a collection of ‘lost words’ from the printing trade.

Click on images to enlarge

Book designer Tom Etherington, from Penguin Press, working with author Keith Houston, who wrote the fantastic books Shady Characters and The Book, created this fantastic print...

Click on images to enlarge

The image above doesn’t really capture the brilliant way it’s been printed though. All the grey text is actually printed in black on the reverse side of the poster, showing through the semi translucent 60gsm Sixties stock, as you can see here:

The type on the above poster is set in Commercial Type’s Thorowgood Grotesque and Caslon Doric Wide.

Anil Aykan & Jonathan Barnbrook from Barnbrook Studio are also musicians and have just released their first self titled Album ‘Fragile Self’. They took a set of song lyrics from a broadside they found in the library, and created this contemporary version, featuring a bespoke typeface...

Click on images to enlarge

I discussed the poster with Jonathan and the concerns about the dark image and how it was important that the reproduction retained it's detail, which is why we decided on using Omnia 150gsm, which would reproduce the image without losing clarity.

Illustrator and teacher Pam Smy teamed up with book designer and lecturer Ness Wood (together with Maisie Paradise Shearring they make up Orange Beak Studio), and created this print based on the work of Beatrice Warde, printed onto Pergraphica Smooth, Natural 120gsm.

Illustrator Tom Gauld was paired with John L. Walters, author, musician, and editor of Eye magazine. John wrote a piece about the experience of visiting St Bride Library, and Tom created this stunning print around it. It’s printed onto Gardapat 13, Klassica 115gsm.

Click on images to enlarge

Here’s a detail...

Book designer David Pearson, worked with type designer Paul Barnes from Commercial Type, showcasing some more types from Commercial Classics. The posters were printed onto different shades from our Colorset range in 120gsm, the below image printed on Colorset Solar...

...and last but by no means least, here is the poster by Alistair Hall and Bob Richardson. After research in the Library, Alistair was inspired by the incredible elongated sans serif typefaces fom the R D DeLittle “Eboracum” Letter Factory. The finished result uses the Colophon Foundry’s recently released Coign type family and was printed on our Creative Print Champagne 170gsm

Click on images to enlarge

The below image shows the set of posters for sale during the launch evening. Some of these posters are still available and you can buy them HERE. Each poster has been produced in a limited edition with all profits going to the St Bride Foundation.

The project would never have been possible if it were not for the support of Boss Print who donated the printing, which was no small thing. Also, I must mention Becky Chilcott, the organiser, without whom this event would never have happened and my thanks again to Alistair Hall for allowing me to use the images and copy from his blog.

During this crowdfunding campaign, what better way to remember why the St Bride Foundation is such a valuable resource? - right in the heart of London and worth YOUR support. At the time of writing, the crowdfunding campaign stands at £36,000 of a £50,000 total with 15 days to go ...so please pledge your support right now! ...and tell your friends - remember many £10 or £20 donations will all help get to the target.

https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/st-bride-library-125th-anniversary https://stbridelibrary.bigcartel.com/category/posters-prints-cards
https://www.sbf.org.uk/
https://www.bossprint.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 29.11.2020

St Bride Virtual Wayzgoose - TODAY!

Last month, on 17th May it would have been the 6th annual St Bride Foundation WAYZGOOSE organised by Mick and Gill Clayton. For obvious reasons with the Covid lockdown, it was cancelled. A Wayzgoose is a term (unfamiliar to most people) that used to refer to an annual holiday in a print-works and was often an away-day to the coast or some other sort of day out, more often than not, paid for by the firm. In this instance the St Bride Wayzgoose is a kind of letterpress 'bring and buy' sale.

It was very sad that it was cancelled as every year, it is a chance for quite a large number of people to get together, as you can see from a picture below from a previous year...

Thanks to Becky Chilcott, a stalwart volunteer at St Brides, there is a 'virtual wayzgoose'  - TODAY.  It is made up of many people who would normally attend the Wayzgoose, who have all made 2 minute videos, including yours truly...

All videos will be available to watch on their Vimeo account from 8am today and will be sharing them throughout the day every half an hour on Twitter (with regular cake breaks!) until 8pm.
The video channel is: https://vimeo.com/stbridehttps://

...and the wayzgoose always requires Cake!

Every year I run the Fenner Paper stall, where we sell offcuts and leftovers with the money raised donated to the St Bride Foundation. Last year we raised a record breaking £357! For interest, this is the way my 'non-virtual' stall usually looks...

https://
https://vimeo.com/stbride/
https://www.sbf.org.uk/

Posted by Justin Hobson 06.06.2020

The 5th Wayzgoose at the St Bride Foundation

Yesterday, I had a stall at the St Bride Foundation WAYZGOOSE. This is a term (unfamiliar to most people) that used to refer to an annual holiday in a print-works and was often an awayday to the coast or some other sort of day out, more often than not, paid for by the firm. In this instance the St Bride Wayzgoose is a kind of letterpress 'bring and buy' sale.

Thirty tables displaying and selling many different items - everything from lead type to the Adana tabletop presses from Caslon, to secondhand books and printed examples of work.

Below is the table that I was allocated, where, as with previous years, I adopted a "throw it all on the table" approach! I took lots of offcuts and discontinued paper and board items. All paper and card sold by weight - 30 pence per 100 grams.

I served at my 'paper stall' from 11am to 4pm  ...and by the end of the day I had raised a record breaking £357.00, all donated to the St Bride Foundation.

...and here is my beautifully crafted 'Weigh & Pay' signage.by Helen Ingham from the Hi Artz Press - It's now lasted two wayzgooses!

My thanks to Mick Clayton for organising the event and to all the staff and friends at St Bride's.

http://www.sbf.org.uk/

Posted by Justin Hobson 20.05.2019

The 4th Wayzgoose at the St Bride Foundation

Yesterday, I had a stall at the St Bride Foundation WAYZGOOSE. This is a term (unfamiliar to most people) that used to refer to an annual holiday in a print-works and was often an awayday to the coast or some other sort of day out, more often than not, paid for by the firm.

In this instance the St Bride Wayzgoose is a kind of letterpress 'bring and buy' sale.

Thirty tables displaying and selling many different items - everything from lead type to the Adana tabletop presses from Caslon, to secondhand book and printed examples of work.

Below is the table that I was allocated, where, as with previous years, I adopted a "throw it all on the table" approach! I took lots of offcuts and discontinued paper and board items. All paper and card sold by weight - 30 pence per 100 grams.

...and here is my new, beautifully crafted 'Weigh & Pay' signage 

It was sign-written by Helen Ingham from the Hi Artz Press, pictured below and I am really touched that she kindly produced such an exquisite sign. I am sure it will come in useful for many years to come!

I served at my 'paper stall' from 11am to 4pm  ...and by the end of the day I had raised a record breaking £247.00, all donated to the St Bride Foundation.

My thanks to Mick Clayton for organising the event and to all the staff and friends at St Bride.

http://www.sbf.org.uk/

Posted by Justin Hobson 21.05.2018

Workshop Fun

Last week, I organised for a small group from The Partners to spend the evening in the print workshop at the St Bride Foundation. There were about twenty of us in all and after an introduction and briefing by Michael Clayton the group were encouraged to have a go at setting type, inking up and printing.

For those not familiar with the St Bride Foundation, it was established in 1891 to fulfil social needs in the Fleet Street printing area. Facilities included a library, baths and a swimming pool (as hygiene was poor) and a printing school which was the forerunner of the LCP. Nowadays, this historic building houses a world renowned printing library with a large letterpress collection, a community theatre space, a bar, print workshop, meeting and conference rooms. It is still located in the original building, just off Fleet Street.

As well as printing, Andrew Long demonstrated lino-cutting and most people had a go. As the name suggests, this technique is actually engraving into a piece of floor linoleum, which is then inked and used to print from. The results can be amazing! ...you can see the concentration at the lino cutting bench below:

Andrew, selected one of Stanley Donwood’s London Flood prints. The engraving which was divided into 15 pieces which were then individually cut by different people over the course of the evening. I even had a go and this was my section (as you can see, I initialled it with a cheeky J!)

At the end of the evening the pieces were assembled and below, you can see Marc Spicer printing the result: 

...and here he is holding up the finished result:

Below is the comparison with the original on the right hand side

You might have spotted there is a head floating in the river which looks like me! Thanks to Nick Eagleton's lino cutting skills, he used his piece of lino to produce a likeness of me, which he also used to print me a card below

You can read a far more erudite version of the evening on The Partners blog written by Marc: http://www.the-partners.com/blog/2017/8/11/letter-heads

It was a really fun evening, where everyone got a chance to have a go and join in. We had some food and a few drinks laid on at St Bride's and a few of us even made it to The Old Bell on Fleet Street afterwards!

My thanks to all the staff and friends at the St Bride Foundation with special thanks to Mick Clayton, Andrew Long and Bob Richardson who made the evening really good fun.

I just wanted to note that Peter Smith who is resident wood engraver at St Bride was unable to join us as he is recovering after an operation but I want to wish him well and a speedy recovery.

www.sbf.org.uk

http://www.the-partners.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 16.08.2017

The 3rd St Bride Foundation Wayzgoose

Yesterday, I had a table at the St Bride Foundation WAYZGOOSE. This is a term (unfamiliar to most people) that used to refer to an annual holiday in a printworks and was often an awayday to the coast or some other sort of day out, more often than not, paid for by the firm.

In this instance the St Bride Wayzgoose is a kind of letterpress 'bring and buy' sale.

Over twenty five different tables displaying and selling everything from lead type to tabletop presses and printed examples of work.

Here is the table that I was allocated, where, as previous years, I adopted a "throw it all on the table" approach! I took lots of offcuts and discontinued paper and board items. All paper, cards sold by weight - 25 pence per 100 grams.

I'm pictured with the very helpful Andrew Long, a final year student at Central St Martin's who kindly helped me unload the van and set up the stall - he's looking for placements and work - I recommend him, he's a hard worker - you can find him at and.long@me.com

I served at my 'paper stall' from 11am to 4pm  ...and by the end of the day I had raised £210, all donated to the St Bride Foundation.

My neighbours on the table next to me were Caslon. Many readers will be familiar with the typeface, Caslon, first cast by William Caslon in the 16th century. The firm is still run by the Caslon family and today, they supply machinery, inks, powders and the ever popular Adana printing press.

They letterpress printed some cards on our exuberant So ..Silk, Beauty Pink 350gsm and they look amazing.

My thanks to Mick Clayton for inviting me and to all the staff and friends at St Bride.

http://www.sbf.org.uk/
http://www.caslon.co.uk/html/_adana_letterpress___.html

Posted by Justin Hobson 22.05.2017

The annual St Bride Foundation Wayzgoose

On Sunday I had a table at the St Bride Foundation WAYZGOOSE. This is a term (unfamiliar to most people) that used to refer to an annual holiday in a printworks and was often an awayday to the coast or some other sort of day out, more often than not, paid for by the firm. In this instance the St Bride's Wayzgoose was a kind of letterpress 'bring a buy' sale.

There were over twenty different tables displaying and selling everything from lead type to tabletop presses, books and printed examples of work.

Here is the table that I was allocated, where, as last year, I adopted a "throw it all on the table" approach! I took lots of offcuts and discontinued paper and board items. All paper, cards sold by weight - 20 pence per 100 grams.

I served at my 'paper stall' from 11am to 4pm  ...and by the end of the day I had raised £140, all donated to the St Bride Foundation

My neighbours on the table opposite was Caslon. Many readers will be familiar with the typeface, Caslon, first cast by William Caslon in the 16th century. The firm is still run by the Caslon family and there were three generations represented at St Brides on Sunday, pictured below. Today, they supply machinery, inks, powders and the ever popular Adana printing press.

One of the amazing presses on their display is this 'business card' size printing press which is absolutely delightful

My thanks to Mick Clayton for inviting me and to all the staff and friends of St Brides.

http://www.sbf.org.uk/

http://www.caslon.co.uk/html/_adana_letterpress___.html

Posted by Justin Hobson 17.05.2016