Healeys Calendar 2023

Healeys Printers in Ipswich produce a desk calendar every year and is produced on a variety of environmentally friendly stocks. This month is printed on our Colorset (100% Recycled) Bright Red 350gsm

Design by Ruben Quental - East Norfolk Sixth Form College

The month of August is digitally printed in CMYK and digital white ink, which looks excellent.

Healeys are based in Ipswich and are one of a handful of printers who are registered as a 'Carbon Balanced Printer' by the World Land Trust and can offer a totally carbon balanced printing service including the paper and all aspects of production and delivery.

Design by Willow Diwell - East Norfolk Sixth Form College

The size of each of the calendar leaves is 165x180mm (with wave die cut) and each month is printed on a different board - each is a recycled or environmentally friendly grade. Not all the papers used are from Fenner Paper, but we are fortunate enough to have our paper used for March too (on Alga Carta) which is debossed and clear foiled too

The calendar is designed by students from East Norfolk Sixth Form College, Gorleston On Sea. It's a great opportunity for students to get involved at an early stage is design for printing and to learn about the printing process.

https://healeys-printers.co.uk/

https://www.eastnorfolk.ac.uk/

https://www.worldlandtrust.org/

Sex Pistols - Filthy Lucre

Today it was announced that Jamie Reid, artist of the Sex Pistols record covers and their anarchic graphical style has died, aged 76. Very sad news for his family and friends.

It reminded me of this souvenir concert programme that we supplied the paper for back in the nineties. In those days we supplied paper to a printer called Lithosphere who did many concert programmes for the Mean Fiddler group, one of which was for the Sex Pistols and their 'Filthy Lucre Tour' in June 1996 and their show in Finsbury Park.

Size of this souvenir programme is 320 x 245mm portrait with a 4pp cover and 16pp text and is saddle stitched.

The programme was printed on our Lightning Silk 240gsm cover and 135gsm text and I believe it was printed CMYK plus a Fluorescent special (pink).

Although the catalogue was not designed by Jamie Reid, it certainly used the style he created for the band and his imagery. It was designed by Simon Collett and printed offset litho by Lithosphere.

You can read the obituary for Jamie Reid here...

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2023/aug/09/jamie-reid-artist-of-sex-pistols-record-covers-dies-aged-76

Posted by Justin Hobson 09.08.2023

Jobs from the past - Number 165

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 one is from 2014...

Sopianae Brand Book - 2014

This project is a brandbook for Sopianae, which is the most well known cigarette brand in Hungary. This book covers the history and culture of the brand whilst explaining the relationship with the Rountable Agency who are their brand communication consultancy.

It is a very large book at 415mmx260mm! It comes with a slipcase and the whole print package is superb and made extra special by the binding.

Click on images to enlarge

This is generally described as 'Japanese Binding' as it is in the Size|Format|Stock pamphlet that I wrote, although as I've pointed out in the same publication, terminology is certainly not universal - I doubt if they call this Japanese binding in Japan!

The cover is formed by a 2mm greyboard which is silkscreened in three colours and mounted on the cover. The 64pp text is on a mixture of an uncoated ivory coloured paper (unknown) and our Stardream Crystal 120gsm from Cordenons in Italy.

Now what has made this project particularly worthy of note is that there were not that many copies produced, so in the main, this job was produced on a digital press (HP Indigo). However because of some of the 'throw outs' - such as below, some of the pages had to be printed offset litho as the format of the digital press (in this case SRA3) wasn't large enough.

So the clever thing, from a print point of view, was to get the litho and digital sheets to match! not that easy to do but the end result is superb - as you can see below digital meets litho on the same spread.

Click on images to enlarge

The other thing that makes it slightly less complicated is that Stardream is kept in stock as HP Indigo ready, as well as the sheets for offset litho.

Stardream is a pearlescent and metallic range which shimmers and the pic below may give some idea of how it looks:

Design is by the Roundtable Agency by Head of Art, Franco Reda.

Printing and the terrific binding (at their own Bindery - Wayte Binding) all achieved in house is by Identity Printers in Paddock Wood. They truly have excelled.

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

Posted by Justin Hobson 03.08.2023

100,000 page views per month on this blog!

Most people reading this blog realise that I'm not writing this so I can be some kind of social media star, after all I'm not even on TikTok! However, I'm very gratified to see on my blog statistics that last month (July) I had over 100,000 page views! ...which really is amazing, so thank you.

I've been writing this blog for over 10 years and there are over 1730 articles, mostly about beautifully printed jobs, different finishing, three hole sewing, singer sewing, hot foil blocking and of course the state of the paper making industry too.

Many thanks for the support and the nice emails and encouragement I receive from you, it is much appreciated.

Posted by Justin Hobson 01.08.2023 

McQ Women

McQ, is the contemporary brand from Alexander McQueen which takes inspiration from street culture "evoking the varied and ever-evolving style tribes that spring up around Britain’s rich music and art scenes. Drawing on references from uniform and the military, core staples of the British wardrobe are re-imagined each season in new guises. Traditional techniques are used in contemporary ways, creating pieces that are both functional and beautiful"

Creative Director of Alexander McQueen and McQ is Sarah Burton. This is the season's lookbook for women.

The size of the publication is 450x320mm, portrait and is a 12pp self cover. It is printed on our lightweight Offenbach Bible 60gsm and is a beautifully designed piece of literature.

The lookbook is printed in four colour offset litho and is a superb example of printing on Offenbach Bible - superb solid coverage and deep monochrome images reproduced in CMYK.

Click on images to enlarge

Due to the lightweight nature of the paper it just flops beautifully, with a bewitching feel.

Design and art direction is by Rupert Smith who is a freelance art director based in London. This is an elegant and splendidly produced publication. To get these dark images to look this good on an uncoated paper is a real achievement. Print is by Rob Squires at Pureprint.

https://my.mcq.com

https://www.pureprint.com/

Posted by Justin Hobson 28.07.2023

UPM plans to close its Plattling Mill in Germany.

 

More sad news for the paper industry. This move would take out 380,000 tonnes of uncoated publication paper and 215,000 tonnes of coated publication paper. Around 400 jobs would go in this latest graphic paper capacity reduction by Finnish based UPM.

You can read the full article on Pritweek here...

https://www.printweek.com/news/article/german-energy-supply-uncertainty-a-factor-in-upm-mill-closure-plan

Posted by Justin Hobson 25.07.2023

Garden Scenes by James Ellis

Here are two beautiful new notecards published by James Ellis in a handy wallet pack containing eight cards.

Garden Bird House by Matt Johnson

The notecard designs are titled 'Garden Fork' and 'Garden Bird House' illustrated by Matt Johnson who lives and works in Cornwall. 

Garden Fork by Matt Johnson

Full images of the notecards are also displayed when the wallet is opened, along with information about the artist. The wallet measures 134 x 134 x 16mm. The cards are 120mm square, and the envelopes are 130mm square. 

The two designs are printed on the front and back of the wallet and each wallet contains four of each notecard together with envelopes.

The cards and the wallets are both printed on our Starfine, Natural 300gsm, which is an natural white, uncoated board with a lovely feel and great surface for printing. It is FSC accredited and also free from OBA's (optical brightening agents). The cards and wallets are printed offset litho by Alpha Colour in Gloucester.

The whole package is plastic free and 100% recyclable, which you can see from the handy information illustration on their website.

https://www.jamesellis.com/collections/notecard-wallets/products/garden-scenes-wallet-of-eight-notecards-by-james-ellis

https://www.jamesellis.com/ 

https://mattillustration.uk/

Posted by Justin Hobson 21.07.2023