David Magee at the Saatchi Gallery

Last week the Saatchi Gallery hosted the seventh edition of START (now STARTnet) with Parallel Contemporary Art, founded by David and Serenella Ciclitira. STARTnet and the Saatchi Gallery share a passion for discovering new art scenes and emerging artists worldwide provide this dynamic environment for artists, curators, collectors and new enthusiasts to engage with new international talent.

So in these uneasy Covid times, I made a visit to the Duke of York's in Chelsea, where the gallery was very well prepared for social distancing.

I specifically went to see the work of David Magee, who is an Irish artist. He published his twenty-five year retrospective, Oustide in 2017 which won international awards in Paris, New York, Tokyo, and London. I wrote about this award winning publication previously HERE.

This new series of pictures is from his ongoing series Atlantic.

The award winning book, Outside, was published by Concentric Editions and printed in Vivid Colour™ by Boss Print in London (with just a little paper supplied by Fenner Paper). A copy of this award winning book was on display...

“For over 30 years, I have been making photographs Outside. My aim is to provide an antidote to the world we now inhabit, a world of excess, over-branding and mass production. My intention is to offer the viewer a point in time to reflect and be drawn into a world of oneness, contemplation and tranquility. To engage the viewer with the experience of being immersed in the landscape and the spirituality of nature. Earth, Water, Air... are the recurring elements that I work with. It is my relationship with and my interpretation of these elements that forms the basis of my photographs, once I am absorbed in the landscape. The location itself is totally secondary to the feeling. The feeling is everything.”

https://davidmageephotography.com/

https://www.concentriceditions.com/
https://www.bossprint.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 26.10.2020

The Ink Art of China

Michael Goedhuis specialises in the best contemporary Asian and Western art. Their collection includes painting, sculpture, ink painting, bronzes and antiquities. They also represent contemporary artists and this catalogue shows the work of Ink Artists.

The size of the publication is 265x216mm, portrait with three hole sewn binding. It has a 4pp cover with 120mm flaps printed on a blue cover board from another well known Hull based paper merchant (!) with a 40pp text printed on Gardapat 13 Kiara 135gsm.

For readers not familiar with GardaPat 13, 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 - some which incorporate the word matt in the name, but aren't! Apart from the high quality matt surface, this paper has an extraordinarily high bulk - this 135gsm text with a thickness of 175mics. If you would like to read more about the bulk, you can read it here.

Click on images to enlarge

Detail of the 3 hole sewing in the centre spread...

The text is digitally printed using an HP Indigo digital press and the results are superb, beautifully showing the artworks. As many readers will know, many materials have to be "Sapphire Treated" to work successfully on HP Indigo presses, however this project has been printed without sapphire treatment. 

Detail showing the three hole sewing on the spine...

The 40pp text flows nicely in the hand, feeling substantial but not overly heavy. 

Click on images to enlarge

Design and Art Direction is by Ornan Rotem at Sylph Editions. Printing and the terrific finishing - which was all achieved in house is by Zone Graphics, based in Paddock Wood in Kent. 

https://www.michaelgoedhuis.com/

http://www.sylpheditions.com/

www.zonegraphics.co.uk 

Posted by Justin Hobson 22.10.2020

Catching Feels online launch

This Thursday, 22nd October at 2pm (BST), you can join us for the PERGRAPHICA® 'Catching Feels' online launch. This is the new lookbook for our PERGRAPHICA® range of uncoated papers manufactured by Mondi

Featuring contributors from the Adobe Stock Premium Collection, Catching Feels takes you on a sensory journey through six feelings, as emotive visuals are enhanced through different printing techniques and finishes on distinctive paper shades, adding depth to a creative vision. 

Learn about PERGRAPHICA®design papers as well as the printing and special finishing techniques applied in the book with the design, special finishing and paper experts that were involved in the project. 

Hear from the following speakers...

• Zoe Truchy - Brand Manager for design papers with the paper making team at Mondi 
• Karen Henderson - Customer Project Development Manager in the UK for Mondi
• Matt Hornby – Sales Director of Foilco, the leading specialists for hot stamping foils. 
• Cos Mingides - Founding Partner who leads the creative department at True. 

Fenner Paper is pleased to be the stockist for PERGRAPHICA® in the UK.

To join us on the online launch, you can register HERE

Posted by Justin Hobson 19.10.2020

Anthropologie in Spring

US fashion and lifestyle brand Anthropologie first opened its doors in Pennsylvania, in 1992 and now operates 229 stores worldwide, 11 of which are in the UK. Last April, they opened a new 2,898 sq ft store in the historic market town of Royal Tunbridge Wells, Kent. Set across four floors, the store is situated on the cobbled High Street just above the world renowned Pantiles.

For the opening of the new store, the Anthropologie windows and interior of the store were dressed in Spring time leaves which were all laser cut. We supplied our Pergraphica Classic White, Rough 240gsm which is our premium range of uncoated from Mondi – which was laser cut by Patternise and then hand-painted by Anthropologie’s window display team and the result is simply amazing - and plastic free!

Pergraphica was chosen after testing the board with the painting techniques at the studio and was selected from a range of other boards tested. Patternise are based in Ewhurst, Surrey, specialising in creative design and laser-cutting services. They work with a wide range of clients across the UK - managing large volume projects for major corporates and visual merchandisers to smaller projects for individuals and weddings. Patternise use state of the art laser cutters and they specialise in cutting “clean” materials such as fine papers, cards, and plastics.

Above is a detail image of the leaves. The shapes are produced using their "super pulsed" Trotec galvo system (GS1000), which enables extremely high-speed laser cutting and high volume paper finishing. Using this system they are able to cut many 1000's of sheets within very quick time-frames, which would be impossible with conventional lasers.

https://www.anthropologie.com/
https://www.patternise.co.uk/

Posted by Justin Hobson 16.10.2020

Crush 03

Crush is a beer 'zine, which is an ongoing side project for design and branding studio O Street. The project allows the studio to combine a bunch of things they love: illustration, print, design and beer!

The focus of issue 3 is 'women in beer'. Historically, brewers were primarily women, until many were targeted as witches and this subject provides a rich seam of content for illustration ...perfect, as we are only a few weeks from Halloween! 

The size of the zine is 297x105mm, portrait and is saddle stitched. There is a 4pp cover printed on our Colorset (100% Recycled) Amethyst 270gsm with a 32pp text on our Crush Corn 100gsm, which is made using 15% residues from the processing of corn plus recycled and FSC fibres. You can read about it here.

Click on images to enlarge

There are articles about six beers, breweries and women in brewing, all beautifully and wittily illustrated.

Click on images to enlarge

There is also photography but you might have noticed that the images have an unusual look. The reason is that this 'zine is 'Riso' printed as all good zines are! If you aren't familiar with Riso printing, you can read about it here. Image reproduction is quite crude as it is a monotone with a coarse screen but the result is really unique and characterful and the illustrations have a wonderful quality to them. 

The below image shows all the illustration spreads, all printed 2 colour Riso - SUPERB! 

Click on images to enlarge

The project was co-ordinated by Jonny Mowat at O Street and my thanks to him for sending me file copies...

The zine is Riso printed and saddle stitched by Good Press who are based in the centre of Glasgow and they really have made a beautiful job of it.

https://www.ostreet.co.uk/

http://goodpress.co.uk/

Posted by Justin Hobson 13.10.2020

Beau Cacao

This boutique chocolate maker, based in South Eastern France, was founded in 2013 by Bo San Cheung and Thomas Delcour. Beau Cacao craft their full-bodied single-plantation chocolate in Briançon, Hautes-Alpes from cacao which is sourced directly from farmers in Malaysia.

The colours of each of the bars were chosen based on the flavour profiles of the chocolate, red to match smoky tobacco and paprika and yellow for caramel and brioche. 

The board chosen for the wrap/boxes is our Shiro Echo, Bright White 250gsm, from Favini, which is 100% recycled, FSC accredited and carbon balanced. You can read more about Shiro Echo here.

The distinctive mold of the chocolate bar (above) was designed by Adam Gill.

Each of the wraps are printed offset litho in a special colour and superbly hot foil blocked in a gloss metallic foil...

Printing is by Identity, based in Paddock Wood, Kent and they are just gorgeous - colours are bright and solids are superb - the hot foil blocking is perfectly executed (Identity are one of the few printers to have hot foil blocking facilities 'in-house')

https://www.beaucacao.com/

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

Posted by Justin Hobson 08.10.2020

Jobs from the past - Number 131

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 this publication is from 2014. 

67 Tufton Street SW1

Situated in the Smith Square conservation area, this Queen Anne style building was originally a Post Office and subsequently the UK Government’s Cabinet Office and a fine example of London’s architectural legacy. This office building was sympathetically restored and re-modelled to a plan by EPR Architects resulting in 22 luxury apartments.

This is the sales brochure produced to show the development, the surrounding area and the wonderful interiors. 

The size is 290 x 225mm, portrait, having a 4pp cover using a Buckram embossed chocolate brown cover board and is 'swiss bound'. The 56pp text is printed offset litho on our Omnia 150gsm. It is printed CMYK plus a metallic gold special and the result is absolutely superb.

The special pantone gold looks amazing ...really metallic and because Omnia is not smooth, it gives the feeling of something that is really metallic rather than something that is smooth and shiny.

Click on images to enlarge

The striking commissioned photography has reproduced brilliantly on the Omnia whilst not losing the tactility and natural uncoated feel that was required. The look and feel is a confident, beautifully crafted piece of literature, certainly not some "glossy property brochure"!

The swiss binding, still means that this brochure is made up using 'section sewn' signatures and above you can see the threads running across the inside spreads.

Click on images to enlarge

The metallic gold is used both as section dividers but also for the floorplan pages. The quality of reproduction of the interiors is wonderfully impressive with metallic fittings looking metallic and a photographic quality to the images.. 

The above and below images show the floorplans of the penthouse apartments.

The below image shows the Swiss binding. For those that are unfamiliar with this type of binding, it is essentially a section sewn or perfect bound binding method which has a "lip" of about 15/20mm of book-cloth wrapped around the spine. The cloth covered spine is stuck flat on the reverse of the text block with a strip of glue into a 4pp cover with a "freestanding" spine which means that the cover (which can often be very springy with normal adhesive binding) sits totally flat.

Branding for the development and the design of this amazing brochure is by London design agency The Ideas Factory under the leadership of Mark Wilkins. Designer on the brochure was Yafet Bisrat. Print production is by Push and it is superb. Both the "ink on paper" and the finishing/binding is amazing.

http://www.ideasfactory.co.uk/

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

Posted by Justin Hobson 05.10.2020