Hull to be UK City of Culture 2017

Many times on this blog, I have referred to that other, well known, "Hull based paper merchant" referring, of course, to GF Smith & Son.

This morning at 8am, Culture Secretary Maria Miller named Hull as the  UK's next City of Culture, to hold the title in 2017. Kingston upon Hull is known for being the home of poet Philip Larkin, the Ferens gallery and the Truck theatre and the home of one of the better known paper merchants in the UK!

Congratulations to Hull, it's inhabitants, companies, arts organisations et al.

www.hullcc.go.uk
www.gfsmith.com

Posted by Justin Hobson 20.11.2013

RBB|Economics - Careers & Insights

RBB Economics is a specialist in the field of economics of competition law. Attracting and employing the best post-graduate level employees is essential to their business. This piece of literature is designed to inform and attract potential candidates to the business.

The size is A5, portrait and is saddle stitched. This brochure cleverly works from both ends, having two front covers. It is made around a 6pp concertina fold cover with each text material saddle stitched into each fold, as you can see from the picture below. This format enables the content to be separated, the more formal text of the 'careers' section with the more informal 'insight' section with images and quotes. Very effective.

The 6pp cover is printed on our StarFine White 350gsm, which is an uncoated text and cover range. The cover is printed CMYK plus two specials (blue and green) and hot foil blocked in matt white foil. Text is printed on our Marazion Ultra 135gsm and is printed in CMYK plus special blue. The 8pp 'Careers' section is just printed in single colour and the 12pp 'Insights' section has colour photography.  This project has a lovely engaging feel, the combination of uncoated and coated materials being just right.

Art direction and design is by Hatton Garden based consultancy, 400. Designer on the project is Liam Bonar. Print is by London printer Push.

www.rbbecon.com
www.400.co.uk
www.push-print.com

Posted by Justin Hobson 18.11.2013

Hatch Show Print

Yesterday evening Jim Sherraden, designer from Hatch Show Print (based in Nashville) gave a talk at the LCC in the Main Lecture Theatre.

The talk was organised by Alex Cooper and Rose Gridneff at the Letterpress Workshop at the LCC. Unfortunately I couldn't attend but they kindly sent me the promotional poster, printed 3 colour Letterpress, printed on our Redeem 100% Recycled 80gsm.(size 835x594mm)

This talk accompanied the first UK exhibition for Hatch Show Print at the Chelsea Space and runs until December.  http://www.chelseaspace.org/archive/hatch-info.html

Here's Hatch Show Print's website:
http://countrymusichalloffame.org/hatch-show-print-is-moving/

Posted by Justin Hobson 14.11.2013

TU Spring |Summer 2013

Here is a series of three lookbooks showing the Summer TU clothing range from Sainsbury's - Womenswear, Menswear and Childrenswear.

Size of each brochure is 210x148mm, portrait, self cover. They are also all stitched with white stitching wire which is a nice touch 

Each of the catalogues is printed on Marazion Ultra 115gsm and is a self cover. Menswear and Childrenswear are 20pp and the Womenswear is 24pp. Transparent plastic wallets were manufactured to hold all three books when sent out as a set, although they were also used individually.

For readers not familiar with Marazion Ultra, it's a fully coated paper but it really does have a dead flat MATT surface. There are many papers on the market which profess to be matt (and some which incorporate the word matt in the name, but aren't!) ...but this really is - and if you don't believe me, please ask for a sample.

Art direction and design is by London based agency Exposure, who specialise in fashion PR. Creative Director at Exposure is Simon Shaw. Hayley Inglis is the producer at Exposure who oversaw the project.

The job was produced by the Inspired Thinking Group (ITG). Print is by Bristol based Apple Litho

http://www.sainsburys-live-well-for-less.co.uk/tu-clothing
www.exposure.net
http://www.inspiredthinkinggroup.com/
www.applecolour.co.uk

Posted by Justin Hobson 11.11.2013



Overgrown Tour 2013

You may have heard in the news last week that singer-songwriter James Blake won the Mercury Prize for the album Overgrown, beating David Bowie.

Well the other bit of good news is that the posters for his Overgrown Tour are printed on our lovely paper!

European Tour

Size of the posters is 670x485mm and they are printed in four colour process plus one special, offset litho. The beautiful illustration by Kate Hiley has a lot of detail, dark colouring and reversed out type with the tour locations, so it was essential to keep a lot of detail. At the same time, in order to work with the illustration a coated paper was not desirable, a more tactile material was looked for. Omnia was chosen because it has all the tactile qualities of an uncoated material but reproduces fine detail and dark colours amazingly. Printed on Omnia White 200gsm. A subtle fifth colour was printed on the outside border which dulled the shade of the paper but which made the comets "pop" out a bit more (thanks for the inside info Ed)

North America

Close up detail



...even closer detail!

Design is by Burgess Studio. Creative Director is Alexis Burgess, designer on the project is Ed Cornish. Illustration is by Kate Hiley.

Print is by London based Jigsaw Colour. This poster was printed with no coating (sealer) the result is beautifully flat, matt and tactile -  just how it should be.

http://jamesblakemusic.com/
http://burgess-studio.co.uk/
www.katehiley.com
http://www.jigsawcolour.co.uk/

Posted by Justin Hobson 07.11.2013

Sad demise of The Colourhouse

On Friday, Printweek reported that The Colourhouse, a London based printing company, has gone into liquidation (in laymans terms that means they've gone bankrupt).

http://www.printweek.com/print-week/news/1140263/runs-colourhouse

It's very sad news as they have been an excellent quality print company in the design and corporate sector. Over the years, they won many printing awards and accolades, including many PrintWeek and Printing World awards as well as a fair share of the various paper company awards that used to take place in the 90's

The Colourhouse was started in 1993 and it's beginnings, certainly were colourful! In the  1980/1990's there was a printer called Litho-Tech based in Bermondsey Street and they were among the printing elite, along with such names as CTD, Oakley Press, Balding & Mansell, Summerhall Press, Westerham Press etc. that were producing really excellent print for the corporate print market, notably design lead, Annual Report & Accounts.

In 1993 a vacant unit opposite Litho-Tech came up for lease and there was much speculation as to who would be moving in. The power was connected, there were rumours that a printers was moving in, but little did Paul Watson (MD of Litho-Tech) realise that it was some of his staff that would walk across the yard and set up The Colourhouse from a standing start!

Scotty (Malcolm Cooper), the owner of repro company Scott Colour (which produced Litho-Tech's repro, film and plates) production director Terry Rudd and salesman David May formed the backbone of the new company which started printing virtually immediately. The Colourhouse quickly gained a reputation for high quality print and produced many annual reports. Litho-Tech who were not happy with their new neighbours, moved to Kennington Park and The Colourhouse ruled Bermondsey for the remainder of the 90's.

David May was ousted in 1997 with Mike Roberts and David Arkell taking over responsibility for sales. Having outgrown the factory in Bermondsey they moved to Deptford in 2002 and expanded with more presses, finishing equipment and a bigger sales force.

In the late 2000's, they commissioned a new identity by Sea with photography by Simon Phipps. Further investments in press technology culminated at the end of last year with a brand new  Heidelberg Speedmaster XL106 being installed. In line with many commercial printers, they have seen tough times in recent years and also had the misfortune of having taken a sizeable bad debt last year with the collapse of a charity marketing agency, CSDM.

Nearly one hundred jobs have been lost which is terrible for all those involved and there will be a long list of creditors who will never be paid. It marks the sad demise of one of the last, large, London based printers.

http://www.printweek.com/print-week/news/1140263/runs-colourhouse

 

Posted by Justin Hobson 04.11.2013

Jobs from the past - Number 49



Regular followers of this blog will know that my first post of every month is a "job from the past" so that I can show some of the really good work from years gone by and here's one from 2003.

Ossie Clark at the V&A 2003

 

This is a beautifully simple piece of print produced to accompany the Ossie Clark exhibition that ran at the V&A from 2003-2004.  From the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s Ossie Clark dressed the famous and fashionable. The exhibition shows work from his most productive period which coincided with London's optimistic, rule-breaking decade in which fashion, photography, music and the cult of personality converged.

Ossie Clark was first recognised as a design talent at the age of 23 when British Vogue singled him out in their August 1965 issue. Throughout the next decade his designs represented the best of London fashion.

This publication is a facsimile of pages from the sketchbooks of Ossie Clarke to inspire creativity by being coloured in or used to appreciate the free flowing style of the original line drawings.

The finished size is of the 123mmx175mm, the format being a 5 panel (10pp) long concertina. Printed offset litho in just 2 colours, magenta and black. The material chosen is our Neptune Unique SoftWhite 250gsm and as I recall it was chosen because white would have made the line-work of the illustrations look far too harsh.

Design was in house at the V&A. Print was by Graham Fisher at Ashford based printer Gros Monti, who sadly have since gone bust.

http://www.vam.ac.uk/vastatic/microsites/1250_ossieclark/

Posted by Justin Hobson 01.11.2013