Print shops are full of danger.
Hands mangled, digits lost, clothes torn right off of bodies... (I better fact-check that last one).
Zeichen Press is no exception.
Behold:
Look if you must. Sometimes it is better to face the painful, it desensitizes the mind.
That's good, right?
Because I am so committed to my craft, I (by "I", I mean "my son") squished the spider, and finished laying out this card:
Mother's Day is coming up but you don't have to get your mom a card.
But I did take French in high school so I know all about magnetephones, l'autobus, et la lunettes pour Luc.
For the foreseeable future, I will stay within a 30 mile radius of the Zeichen Press headquarters and dream of faraway lands.
Feeling the need for a Field Trip, I went to the Other Side Of Minneapolis and visited Rex Mills. I walked through the front door, broke the tenth commandment, (You shall not covet - geez, get your mind out of the gutter) pretended I had something in my eye, snapped some photos, threw a drink in the owner's face, stole five pounds of ink, and left.
That man in the photograph is not the owner — Rex Mills has Press Operators.
I will kidnap him as soon as my taser gun arrives in the mail.
How To Play:
Witch
• Using a neighborhood approved selection method (engine, engine #9 — bubblegum, bubblegum in a dish, etc.) select The Witch.
• Use the same method to select a Guinea Pig.
• The remaining players are Runners.
• The Witch leads The Guinea Pig away. (This should be terrifying.) The Witch hides The Guinea Pig — not on the garage roof. (This might be tempting. Don't do it.)
• The Witch gives (verbally) a list of tasks to The Guinea Pig — things like: A) Run around the house three times singing The Happy Birthday Song. B) Dig a hole, bury one June Bug in it. C) Fill a hat with decorative rocks from the neighbor's garden, etc.
• At this point, The Witch must call out "ready-or-not!" from wherever he/she is waiting/hiding.
• The "tasks" given to the The Guinea Pig are meant to lure the Runners off their safe-base and into the waiting/hiding clutches of The Witch while searching for the hidden Guinea Pig.
• When/if any Runners are caught by The Witch, he or she turns them into Another Guinea Pig. Meaning: They are hidden and given a new list of tasks for The Runners to complete.
• When tasks are completed for a particular Pig, a Runner must free them by tagging. The Guinea Pig must run to the safe-base without being caught by The Witch.
• If The Runners successfully free The Guinea Pig(s), they win the game.
• If The Witch catches all of The Runners, she/he wins the game.
* If someone wets their pants during course of play, a "time-out" should be called and fresh pants should replace wet pants.
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In a bold (not really) and unprecedented (true) move, Zeichen Press will be offereing box sets of greeting cards that are not letterpress printed.
Hold your applause until the end.
We call this our Makeready Collection.
Why?
Letterpress printers (like us) need to test placement, packing, and color when printing something new. The same old piece of paper is printed on over and over again, resulting in an odd (and might I add, paranormal?) mishmash of goodness.
Our Makeready Collection imitates this letterpress printing practice using a computer and some other kind of printing. (Offset)
Here are the three designs: (Available for The New Year)
My retirement plans are needy and demand an Airstream Trailer
and a plot of land in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee — as close as possible to Dollywood.
That would be fine as cream gravy.
Yes, retirement — everyone does it differently. Some like to join communities in Arizona and some like to hoard cats. Hoard cats until one day they have a stroke, can't get to the phone, die of starvation, and their beloved pets eat their face.
But everyone is so different! And as my Grandma Shea used to say, "It takes all kinds."
So wise.
Just when I was starting to feel needy and pitiful, Apartment Therapy remembered how much I love attention. Our "I hope she likes thoughts that count." made their "Best Letterpress Cards 2011."
I would like everyone to bow their heads in silence to fully grasp the seriousness of this achievement.
Thank you, Apartment Therapy. Thank you for saving the world, one room at a time.
Listen, I could break out of this place if I had some sturdy cornhusks, one tablespoon of vaseline, two steel springs, and a puppy.
But do I really want to?
Jen is printing a card
in preparation for the MCBA Festival, not the Mutation Chinchilla Breeders Association—a real thing—but the Minnesota Center for Book Arts festival. It's Saturday, November 19th and if you like celebrating books via buying book-like items (handmade paper, journals, our cards) you should totally go.
My contribution to the show is this lovely display signage I designed:
See you there!
METRO Magazine thinks their readers might like to see a how-to on letterpress printing. Strangely, they asked me to put one together. It should be online in a week or so but I'll post it here first because I'm generous.
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#1) This is called a printer's block or advertising cut. All Zeichen Press cards start with one of these.
#2) These backwards lead letters are called type. Before computers, they were the only way to print anything. We have cases and cases of them and I like to arrange them into words.
#3) Everything is locked into a heavy-metal frame called a chase using furniture (wood and metal blocks) and quoins (expanding metal wedges). This weighs about as much as my firstborn child. (Ten pounds. TEN POUNDS.)
#4) The chase is pinned into the bed of the press where the rollers can roll over it.
#5) This 1,500 pound printing press was made in the 1930's by the Chandler & Price Company in Ohio. That round thing in the upper right is called the ink disc. A little ink is dabbed on it, the rollers ride up the rails and onto the ink disc - get covered in ink and spread it across the forme (the type and printer's block locked into the chase pinned into the bed of the press). I love this press because it is capable of creating beautiful things and crushing your hand.
#6) A blank piece of paper is held onto the platen using little pins. The paper will meet the inked forme when the press closes like a giant evil clam. I always smile like this when I face danger.
#7) Jen will print a bajillion of these and they will be added to our line.
Jen and I often look back on the birth of Zeichen Press the same way any mother looks back on any birth. Sure, there was blood and, yes, there were tears but there was another realization: there is a latex glove filled with crushed ice in my mesh underpants.
The first days of Zeichen Press were spent huddled around our Poco no. 0.
The Poco has a patent date of 1910 and weighs in at a mere 210#. That makes it the oldest and also the lightest press in the shop. It is, to date, the only press that has caused me (bodily) harm.
Ouch! That's a doozy!
Never trip over, and land on, a cast iron press on the floor. I documented the injury because of the lawsuit that I'm going to file against the makers of that monster. I just have to build a time-machine and drive my Model-T to Chicago.
The first thing ever printed on the Poco was this:
I've seen better prints made with a potato.
We outgrew that little baby pretty quickly and moved on to something I'm hoping to one day never catch my hand in.
Or if I do, I hope to have something sharp in my pocket that I can use to cut my mangled hand free.