 |
| Kellie Kano photography above |
 |
| image by Axioo |
 |
| image by Axioo |
 |
| photography by Labor of Love |
 |
| photography above by Mike Larson |
 |
| image by Axioo |
 |
| image via house of turquoise |
 |
| photography by Lisa Lefkowitz |
Last month we did some letterpress printing for an inspiration shoot in Cayucos! It was a dreamy, winter wedding with nautical touches. Events Redefined and Ken Kienow made the final product look amazing. Enjoy!
 |
| all images by Ken Kienow Photography Coordinator: Events Redefined Venue: The Cass House Inn, Cayucos Florist: April Flowers Photographer: Ken Kienow Rentals: Unlimited Events Cake: Two Little Birds Bakery Rings: K-Jon's Jewelry Graphic Design and Letterpress Printing : Sugar Plum Invitations |
 |
| photo by Jennifer Young |
We recently finished a letterpress fine art project with San Louie! We had so much fun with the creative ladies behind this magazine. The limited edition print is part of the launch of their 3rd magazine Borders & Beans! If you are a local, there is a launch party today, Thursday from 6-8pm at Sally Loo's, 1804 Osos St., San Luis Obispo.
OK, so everyone knows Monday was Valentine's Day. Typically it's a quite holiday for us, in fact I thought Troy all but forgot about it until he saw something online Monday morning. Troy, Emma and I met for lunch and randomly saw old friends. It was great to catch up. Later that afternoon, our neighbor and oooooold friend Sarah, called and asked if I could babysit their foster baby. She had a last minute meeting with their social worker at the house and just needed Emma and I to hang out with him for about an hour. "Of, course" I said. She asked me to come over at 6pm.
I e-mailed Troy at work about babysitting, and he responded that he wouldn't be home until late 6:45pm.. no problem. So I happily walk Emma over at 6pm. We hang out, and there is a knock at the door????.. and who is there... Troy. Come to kidnap me for dinner! Sweet Sarah and Brian babysat Emma and we went downtown for dinner and frozen yogurt. He can still surprise me:-) Love it!!! I love you honey!!
 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Troy being silly in Disneyland in Oct. |
There are a about a million things in the world I love... but here are just a few of my favorites.. in no particular order...
 |
| photography by Ken Kienow |
sleeping in on a stormy day.... {well sleeping in anytime is great actually}
fresh cut flowers, just because
a Saturday with nothing on the schedule but playing
ice cream on a hot, hot day
random kisses from Emma
having a clean house- quite rare these days
laughing so hard you cry with old friends
snorkeling in a clear warm ocean
hiking to a waterfall
doing a job really well
any day spent in Paris
re-connecting with an old friend
falling asleep with Troy
Hope you have a wonderful Valentine's Day shared with the ones you love!
b
 |
| image by stephanie williams |
to tell my snow bound friends that we spent the weekend in shorts and went swimming for the first time in 2011? So sorry friends.. but this weekend was gorgeous!!!
 |
| photography by Lisa Leonard |
The mustard is out, the plum trees on our street are blooming, it feels like spring is here!
It’s true, letterpress is one of the most expensive printing techniques, but for good reason. You aren't getting a print technique that you can get at Staples. Letterpress printing is only found in small boutique size studios, using printing techniques that date back to 1400's! Good letterpress printers are artisans and use high quality inks and papers. The presses themselves, are often costly antiques (most are over 60+ years old), that are hand operated (read: very time consuming to use). Items printed on letterpress vintage presses have textured lettering / design due to the press actually making an imprint into the paper. Printing comes out crisp, clean, and with wonderful texture.
So I know it's old, but why is it so expensive? For one thing the supplies. We individually price custom orders based on plate size, time it takes to prep and print the order, the number of colors used, the difficulty it is to print, and the availability of supplies required, etc. etc. Each order has to have a custom made plate, for each color used. Plate making is another required step in letterpress printing.
Because the presses have to be manually prepped and set up and torn down for each project.. it's like if you were camping, and you had to buy a new tent and supplies and food and gear and re-set up and tear down camp and move to a new campsite for each project.
Sadly vintage letterpress printing is not like pressing "print" in a word doc and 30 sec later having your inkjet printer have your page printed. Supplies and prepping the press is very labor intensive! Here is a Video of some of the prep needed before printing!
The labor. These presses are manual, which means it's a lot of work! Each print requires someone hand feeding the paper into press for each color used. Think about doing that 150 times for each of the colors and each of the cards in a wedding set. To print a two color invitation, two color reply card and one color envelope set for a typical wedding takes about 900+ individual presses by an actual person (namely me). Did I mention this was a lot of work?
The Press. Letterpress printing is expensive because there are only so many letterpress presses still out there. They have not been in production since the late 60's, early 70's. All letterpress manufactures have gone out of business. Most presses that are turning out art today are between 50-130 years old! Most are very large, our two presses are each bigger than our refrigerator, and each weighs, about 2 tons! They are hard to move, harder to find, extremely difficult to repair and most "on the market" are not up and running! Troy does an amazing job maintaining our presses and welding/ making replacement parts. Maintaining our presses is an art in and of itself! Love you hon!
The Craft: Part of the mystery of letterpress is the craft itself. It's a dying art, that isn't the easiest thing to learn. There is so much troubleshooting for printing and presses! There are so many variables, the temperature, weather affects printing and drying, paper issues, plate issues, inking problems, impression etc. etc. (Oh, yeah and you can't just call the manufacturers help line either!) You are paying for the experience, knowledge and expertise of the letterpress studio. They can advise you as to designs, colors and layouts that yield the best results. You can have all the presses in the world, but if you don't know how to use them, maintain and fix them.. well you are mostly sunk!
all images by Sugar Plum Invitations letterpress studio
I saw this and realized the talent behind it had to be Joyful Weddings and Events. Courtney and I actually know a lot of the same people in "real life" even though we have never met! One day Courtney, it will happen!! I love the kelly green and soft turquoise together!! Perfect!
Posts
