Unburnable book set to be auctioned

Today an article appeared in Printweek written by Jo Francis about Penguin Random House, who have  created a one-off ‘unburnable’ edition of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale that will be auctioned for charity on 7th June.

The article is reproduced below...

PRINTWEEK

Jo Francis 

Friday, May 27, 2022 

Penguin Random House has created a one-off ‘unburnable’ edition of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale that will be auctioned for charity.

The publisher said the volume had been printed and bound using “fireproof materials” and described the edition as “completely unburnable”. 

“Across the United States and around the world, books are being challenged, banned, and even burned. So we created a special edition of a book that’s been challenged and banned for decades,” the publisher stated. 

The print specification involved: a black Cinefoil dust jacket, white heat shield foil pages, section sewn with nickel wire, phenolic hard cover, stainless steel head and tail bands, and Kapton high temperature adhesive. 

“Printed and bound using fireproof materials, this edition of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale was made to be completely unburnable. It is designed to protect this vital story and stand as a powerful symbol against censorship,” Penguin Random House said. 

The book will be presented for auction by Sotheby’s New York from 23 May to 7 June with all proceeds going to benefit PEN America’s work in support of free expression. 

At the time of writing the current bid was $70.000 (£55,447). 

In a YouTube video about the project, Atwood uses a flamethrower to show the book’s resilience.

My thanks to Printweek for reporting this. You can read the whole article here: 

https://www.printweek.com/news/article/unburnable-book-set-to-be-auctioned

https://unburnablebook.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 27.05.2022

The annual Wayzgoose at the St Bride Foundation

Last Sunday, 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 (see below picture) 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 - 40 pence per 100 grams.

I served at my 'paper stall' from 11am to 4pm  ...and by the end of the day I had raised £206, 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 three wayzgooses!

My thanks to all the staff and friends at St Bride's who organised the event.
https://sbf.org.uk/

Posted by Justin Hobson 26.05.2022

The Bristol Hotel

The Doyle Collection is a carefully curated collection of eight Irish family-owned luxury and urban hotels. Each hotel has a strong identity that is closely connected to its location. Set in the city's vibrant harbourside, The Bristol’s contemporary exterior overlooks the busy harbour. With 187 well appointed guest rooms and suites, this is a wonderfully luxurious hotel.

Branding agency, Brave New World  undertook an extensive re-branding exercise of the parent brand and of each individual hotel. The work included everything from strategy to interior design, website, high-profile advertising campaigns and the literature for each hotel.

Click on images to enlarge

The size of the brochure is 260x185mm, portrait and is saddle stitched. The cover is printed on an uncoated 300gsm board. 

The brochure is saddle stitched using three stitches:

The text material chosen was our Omnia, which would beautifully reproduce the photography with the rich interiors and exteriors superbly  ...and it looks wonderful! The 20pp text is on Omnia White 150gsm, printed offset litho in CMYK throughout.

Click on images to enlarge

Image reproduction is paramount but it was also important that the publication also projected the tactility of the interiors and in the image below the detail of the wedding venue and the reproduction of the fine voile used on the chairs. An ordinary feeling silk or gloss coated paper wasn't an option, so Omnia fitted the bill perfectly.

Omnia is a very bulky paper but with a 20pp text and the saddle stitching, it lays nice and flat allowing each spread to be enjoyed without 'fighting' against the binding.

Branding and creative direction is by Brave New World. The designer on this project is Caroline King. 

https://www.doylecollection.com/hotels/the-bristol-hotel
https://bravenewworldgroup.com/
http://www.carolinelking.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 24.05.2022

The Modern House - postcard set

Established by Albert Hill and Matt Gibberd, The Modern House is the UK’s foremost estate agency, only selling modernist and contemporary architecture for over a decade.

This is their most recent promotional mailer titled "Selling Britain's Finest Modern Architecture" showing four properties in the format of a concertina postcard book.

  

The format is a 12pp A6 concertina. Flat size is 148x634mm, folding to 148x105mm. The concertina folds into a pre-creased 3mm spine. Printed CMYK offset litho and the cards are perforated.

Click on images to enlarge

The concertina is printed on Redeem 100% Recycled 315gsm, which prints beautifully and fits with the modernist, utilitarian architecture.

showing how the concertina folds into the spine

The superbly creased 3mm spine. It's touches such as this - good creasing - that make all the difference to a project like this:

Click on image to enlarge & see perforation

...and the other thing that shouldn't be overlooked is the perforations. As you can see from this picture, perforations can look great, even beautiful. These perfs. only look this good because the designer took the time to explain what he wanted to the printer. There are a selection of different perforation "bars" available at print finishers - so do ask a printer to get samples and to show you different types. If you don't convey your expectations to the printer, then they'll generally use the perforating bar that's on the machine and you may be disappointed.


Art direction and design is by Field Projects. Print production is by Michael Keyworth at Keyprint Printers.

https://www.themodernhouse.com/

http://field-projects.com/

sales@keyprinters.co.uk

Posted by Justin Hobson 19.05.2022

St Bride Wayzgoose this coming Sunday

This coming weekend on Sunday 22nd May it will be the 6th LIVE annual St Bride Foundation WAYZGOOSE (during Covid there have been virtual events). 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 is a chance for a large number of people who love printing, letterpress, type (and of course, paper!) to get together, as you can see from a picture below from a previous year...

Every year I run the Fenner Paper stall, where we sell offcuts and leftovers with the money raised donated to the St Bride Foundation. In 2019  we raised a record breaking £357! For interest, this is the way my stall usually looks like...

https://It's open from 11am until 4pm - I look forward to seeing you there!

The poster is printed on our Colorset Lemon 270gsm by the Chapel at the St Bride workshop. 

https://www.sbf.org.uk/

Posted by Justin Hobson 16.05.2022

Amazing Cocktail Menu!

Today is World Cocktail Day! ...so what better day than to show you this amazing cocktail menu, which is a stunning piece of paper engineering:

This menu for Scarfes Bar is a highly memorable and interactive piece, featuring 14 music-inspired cocktails.

The menu was illustrated by Gerald Scarfe and based around a Victorian toy theatre with a back drop and moveable wings depicting an empty Scarfes bar. Different types of music are listed on tabs on both sides.

As you pull a tab that relates to a particular genres, so a musician or exponent of that genre glides across the stage into the bar – and the appropriate cocktails are revealed, as you can see below...

The size of the menu is 175x230mm (plus the 10mm tab). The menu is constructed from paper covered over board and each of the menu cards is paper mounted onto our Sumo Black 1mm thick board and the menu pages are held by just four brass binding posts which move along punched slots.

Designed is by Rivington Bye who work with many premium brands, principally in the hospitality sector.

Printing and production is by Fenton Smith at PrintSmith and I can't stress just how well produced this construction is, it really is superb.

What a great day for a cocktail...! https://www.daysoftheyear.com/days/world-cocktail-day/

https://scarfesbar.com/

https://rivingtonbye.com/

https://printsmith.uk/

Posted by Justin Hobson 13.05.2022

Stardream - print processes book

Stardream is a market leading pearlescent and metallic paper range produced by the Cordenons paper mill in Italy. Many designers and printers have become fans of the light irridescent finishes and the dual sided deep metallic finishes which do truly shimmer. Stardream is used for a wide range of applications, including cover, presentation folders, invitations, greetings cards and luxury packaging.

This is the new "Print Processes book" which demonstrates the wide variety of print processes that you can achieve using this paper range.

The cover image is printed offset litho in CMYK on Stardream Copper 285gsm and the result is stunning - just look how good a CMYK image can look, even on a relatively deep shade such as the Copper. What many people forget is the litho inks are transparent, what this means is that if you print on a colour, the colour will come through and it also means that if you print on a pearlescent/metallic substrate, the printed result will be pearlescent/metallic and take on the shimmer of the surface printed on.

The size of the presenter is 230x220mm and the wiro-bound inserts are 210mm square. The first page is hot foil blocked using Foilco Ref 6815 copper foil on Stardream Anthracite 285gsm.

Click on images to enlarge

Page two is is printed using Thermographic printing (thermography) in red and black.

Thermo (as it is commonly called) is a great process and can produce a gloss or matt raised surface. In this instance, the result is a gloss finish, printed on Stardream Rose Quartz 120gsm

Stardream is also suitable for digital print processes and the below rainbow image is printed on Stradream Crystal Digital 240gsm on an HP Indigo Press

The next page is french folded and is lasercut...

Click on images to enlarge

The sample printed on the Stardream Silver (above & below) is just the most simple and yet effective sample. It is printed in just 1 colour offset litho as a halftone (or some people refer to it as a montone) and as mentioned before, because litho inks are transparent, the printed result is pearlescent/metallic and takes on the shimmer of the Stardream surface.

and the grand finale of the book, really is amazing at is is the simplest, yet crazily effective process. The below watchface is digitally printed in white using a dry toner press (this was a Ricoh)

...and here is a detail image

...and below shows the deep blue colour (Stardream Lapislazuli 285gsm) that it was printed on.

Digital white (toner) is an incredibly stunning effect and a very economical price, so it's definitely worth looking into.

My thanks to the paper mill, Gruppo Cordenons for supplying us with the tools to show the Stardream range in the very best light. If you would like one of these new books, please email me: justin@fennerpaper.co.uk

http://www.cordenons.co.uk/
http://www.gruppocordenons.com/en/

Posted by Justin Hobson 11.05.2022