Write to your MP

Now you might or might not be interested in this but basically this article is about choice.

Businesses are increasingly restricting access to paper bills and switching customers to e-billing. This issue affects everyone, and particularly the vulnerable in our society.

My attention was drawn to this by the Two Sides campaign, which is an initiative by companies in the Graphic Communications Supply Chain including forestry, pulp, paper, inks, publishing and printing -the common goal is to promote the responsible production and use of print and paper. www.twosides.info

Two sides are supporting the Keep Me Posted Campaign which is trying to persuade government and large organisations to ensure they are giving customers the right to choose how they receive important information. Here's a video:

If you would like to support this campaign, please visit the site and use the letter template to send to your local MP. 

 

http://www.twosides.info/UK/Keep-Me-Posted-Campaign?n=&m=1042
www.twosides.info

Posted by Justin Hobson 28.10.2013

UEL Fashion 2013

This is the show catalogue produced this summer for the graduating students of the University of East London, fashion courses and is a really lovely piece of literature. The new head of fashion at UEL is Dorota Watson. This is her first year in the position and she had a high level of involvement in the production of this piece of work.

  

The desired effect was that it should be layered with slightly transparent "voile" effect, so our Offenbach Bible was chosen as the text paper.

 

Size is 275x200mm, portrait and the text is a 76pp self cover printed four colour throughout on our Offenbach Bible 60gsm. The outside has a tracing paper wrap, printed in one colour.

Particular care has been taken over the print reproduction of these images - subtle detail, weave and textures which need to be seen and appreciated, so the reproduction achieved on the Offenbach Bible is of prime importance.

Needless to say, just the type on the Offenbach Bible looks great ...but then it should, as it's designed for type, both sides  ...as in a Bible!

Design and production is by Vicki Fong, who is a senior lecturer at UEL. Print is by Lefa Print who are based in Sidcup, Kent.

 

Thanks to Joe Hunter, Senior lecturer in Fashion Futures at UEL, for asking me to go and discuss the project in the first place.

www.uel.ac.uk/adi
www.vickifong.co.uk
http://www.designagainstcrime.com/team/joe-hunter/
http://www.lefaprint.co.uk/

Posted by Justin Hobson 24.10.2013

Cardpress Launch

Last Thursday I was invited to the launch of the new Cardpress project by Print Club and Urban Cottage Industries (UCI). Cardpress combines Print Club London's original silkscreen printed artworks with UCI's letterpress printing which starts with hot metal casting on their newly restored Linotype type casting machines.

The evening began with a screening of Linotype:The Film which was held at the atmospheric Rio cinema on Kingsland High Street, Dalston.

I have reviewed the film in a previous blog post and I can only add that it was even better the second time around! http://justinsamazingworldatfennerpaper.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/linotype-film.html

Me in Millers Avenue

After the film, we simply crossed the road and into Millers Avenue to the party venue at MC Motors, which is next door to Print Club. But this was a lot more than a groovy party at a great location for over 800 people! Guests were plied with mojitos, beer and freshly cooked pizza together with a DJ and a great party atmosphere ...and most importantly there was a working Linotype hot metal casting machine working. Phil, Dave,Stan and other UCI technicians demonstrated the Linotype. Partygoers were transfixed watching these beatifully crafted machines clicking, whirring and creating lead type. The following pics should give you a flavour of the evening:

Beer

Linotype Machine



Stanley Wilson founder of UCI, showing the lead ingots used for casting



Guests were invited to get their fingers inky by having their own line of linotype text, produced in front of their eyes, and then printing that line themselves on an Adana hand press.

Cardpress is a personalised greetings card business with a difference - it combines Print Club's original silkscreen printed artworks with UCI's type-casting and letterpress printing to create a retro take on the modern concept of online personalised cards. The first designs are by Pure Evil, Alice Stallard, James Joyce, Margaux Carpentier, Anthony Peters and Rose Stallard.

Kate Newbold-Higginson, director of Print Club London, said: "UCI's manual ethos is close to the way we work. It’s really exciting to combine contemporary illustrators with traditional machines. Because we work with layered files too, the process we go through translates well to their machines. Though there’s still a bit of a learning curve - they are learning our way and we are learning theirs."Cardpress customers input their line of text on the website when ordering the card; the text is then cast on a linotype machine in Metro Medium 18pt and letterpress printed to the inside of their chosen card.

Thanks for the invitation to a great party and I wish Print Club and Urban Cottage Industries the best of luck with their new Cardpress venture.

www.urbancottageindustries.com

www.printclublondon.com

Posted by Justin Hobson 22.10.2013

Graphic Masterworks

Graphic Masterworks: A Century of Design is a landmark exhibition held at Christie's in London of highlights from the archive of poster collector and connoisseur, Martijn Le Coultre. Exploring developments in graphic design between 1894 and 1988, it features artists selected for their revolutionary use of typography, layout, production and colour, and for their influence and synthesis with avant-garde movements such as De Stijl, Bauhaus, Constructivism and Expressionism. 

 

This is the beautifully produced private view invitation which features a section of a lithograph by Joost Schmidt from 1923. Size is A5, portrait and is a single card (2pp) made by printing and then duplexing our Omnia 320gsm  to make 640gsm - which is 900micron thick - a truly substantial invitation! The front of the invitation is printed CMYK. 

Another point to mention about the front of the invite is that solid area printed red is over-printed with a gloss UV varnish. (...just worth pointing out that Omnia is one of the very few papers with an uncoated look and feel that you can successfully UV varnish on to with one pass and it looks excellent). The reverse of the invitation is printed in CMYK also:

This invitation is about the short educational course run by Christie's Education. The auction itself was held on October 2nd.

 

Design is by the in house team at Christie's. The superb print, varnishing and duplex finishing is by Identity, based in Paddock Wood, Kent.

 

A truly excellent example of a beautifully designed and executed invitation.

www.christies.com

www.christies.edu

http://www.identityprint.co.uk/10



Posted by Justin Hobson 17.10.2013

Minecraft meets real life

For those not in the know Minecraft is a computer game (and phenomenon) which allows you to build and create your own places and spaces. Having only been released in 2011, it has been amazingly successful with over 33 million copies in circulation. Minecraft is a creative platform allowing players to build constructions out of textured cubes in a 3D world. Activities in the game include exploration, gathering resources, crafting, and combat.


However, as great as virtual worlds are, we live in the real world!

In a bid to get kids off their screens for a couple of hours, Pigeon Pop Ups hosted a children's workshop called Minecrafting  as part of a series of community workshops in June. Kids were given the opportunity to build their own character heads based on the key characters in the game - and they used some of the very best materials available - our Colorset 100% recycled 120gsm.

The final pixelated creations, in a real world environment - I can spot Colorset Solar, Tuscan Brown, Sandstone, Mango...

Pigeon Pop Ups are run by Kirsty Thomas from Lovely Pigeon and the pop up shop and work-shopping space is based in the seaside town of Anstruther on the East coast of Scotland. It looks like it was great fun and quite messy! Thanks to Kirsty for sending the pictures of our paper in action.

http://lovelypigeon.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 15.10.2013

Victoria Beckham Denim 2013/14

Here's a project that's worth a look at because it uses paper to increase the quality and feel of the whole project. This is the lookbook for the Victoria Beckham denim collection. The size of the job is 240x170mm portrait. What makes this job particularly special is the cover which is produced using our Plexus 350gsm. This brown "kraft" type board has a durable, utilitarian, feel - perfect for the denim range. The 8pp cover is simply hot foil blocked in gloss black foil - beautiful type beautifully foiled.

The cover and hot foil blocking, gives the publication a quality feel and keeps it miles away from the overly "glossy" brochure which is often produced for this type of publication. Having said that, the text paper is on a gloss art which works well with the images but the cover has already set the tone and feel.

60pp text on 150gsm "house" gloss coated paper:

This is an excellent example of using a material for a part of a project which can just lift the whole look and feel and make a piece of literature special.

Art direction and design is by London based art director, Jonny Lu. Print production, including the beautifully crisp foiling, was handled by Push Print in London.

 

www.victoriabeckham.com

www.jonny-lu.com

http://www.push-print.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 11.10.2013

Tangerine goes blue!



We are Tangerine are a design and communications consultancy based in Maidstone who have a wide range of clients from property and leisure to the Church of England ( ...having the Almighty as a client, must be hard!)

 

As part of their recent re-brand, they have produced some swanky new business cards, which incorporates our Colorset 100% recycled papers!

The cards are produced using our Colorset Nero 350gsm, which has been duplexed by the printer to make 700gsm. The logo and web address have been hot foil blocked in gloss black foil. The address and contact details have been die-stamped (engraved) in a special pantone blue. The cards have been edge painted in a matching blue.

 

Design is by Claire Hobbs, Design Director at We are Tangerine.

These items were duplexed, die-stamped and hot foiled and edge painted by Downey. All beautifully done - and all done in house at Downey's factory in Great Yarmouth.

It's worth making the point that although we (at Fenner Paper) don't offer a duplexing service (as another well known paper merchant based in Hull does) ...there are some printers and many trade finishers that offer this service.

www.wearetangerine.co.uk

www.downey.co.uk

Posted by Justin Hobson 09.10.2013