pressing matters Our future is in the making
editor’s Libby Tsoi
H
ello, there. You’re probably here because, like us, you have an affinity for letterpress and traditional processes when it comes to printing. Nothing beats the feel of a handscreenprinted poster, or the feel of a just-bound book. The object-quality is the absolute best. Today, we are surrounded by technology, and its affect on us as a society. Screens are everywhere - our phones, our tablets, our laptops, our TVs... When was the last time you sat down and read a book? Or took the time to really appreciate a hand-drawn card for what it is, and how it was made? How much thought went into the design and the making process? Recently, there has been an increased interest in handmade objects as valuable items. They have a personalised feel that is unrivaled by modern technology. A lovely letterpressed card, or a handlettered note is nothing short of beautiful. We are bombarded with adverts and emails everyday, most of it disposable, unnecessary. It’s time we appreciate what our own hands are able to achieve, and realise that the future is in the making.
LETTER
contents
PART ONE: LETTERPRESS
LOVE AFFAIR WITH LETTERS An interview with Helen Ingam 10
PART two: student showcase LIBBY TSOI 22
DAISY MAY SMITH 24
PART THREE: BOOKBINDING
Stitch up, look sharp An interview with Douglas Bevans 28
PART one
love affair with letters An interview with
HELEN INGAM Words
LY D I A B L A G D E N
Photos
DAISY MAY SMI T H
T
ucked away up on the third floor of Central Saint Martins is a small, unassuming room filled nearly floor to ceiling with wooden cabinets, which in turn are filled with hundreds of thousands of blocks of metal and wood type. This is where Helen Ingham, Specialist Technician: Letterpress, spends most of her time. Surrounded by a host of machines
made long before the creators of this magazine were even born, possibly before even Helen herself, she has seen the rise of digital technologies in the University indeed, the sole window in the workshop looks into a computer lab full of PCs - so we sat down to ask her about her work and the importance of print media.
What would you say you do in the design world and within your role at CSM? I’ve got a background in Graphic Design and Print and that’s been me for most of my working career, with a few departures to other things, but most of what I do is design based on letterpress print. I mean, I do use a Mac computer for a magazine job every three months so y’know - I design a small magazine which is more or less all using the Adobe Suite, but it’s design for print again, so it is linked. Do you enjoy the digital work as much? Yeah, I don’t do digital work all the time – if I did it’d drive me mad. I did for a long time which is why I decided to go back into more handmade processes and physical processes really, rather than purely visual. Um, what else do I do…I’ve got my own print workshop, not that I have much time to spend in it. I do jobbing print work for people, small things like business cards if I have time. I do limited edition posters. Sometimes these are illustration commissions - I’ve got an illustration agent that works for me. Sometimes, like I said, I do limited editions that are sold in galleries, so there’s a few strands to what I do but most of it involves letterpress, and I’ve recently branched out into signwriting. I’m learning brush lettering, which is very hard,
very very difficult, which makes me swear even more, but it’s great ‘cause it’s challenging me. It’s teaching me a lot about lettering again, which I love. I’ve just had this love affair with type and lettering for a long time, and it’s put me in the position of a student again, which in my job is a good thing to remember periodically. It’s easy to forget being scared and not wanting to do anything and make a mistake; it’s
good to remind me of that. What would you say your favourite aspect of your job is? Here? I don’t know, there’s lots of aspects I absolutely love, I can’t say there’s any one particular. I like sorting things out and putting them away, I like the mathematical aspect – I’m not really mathematicallyminded, y’know, obviously as I went into art and design, but it’s trained me to become so. There’s a very definite system in here which does involve arithmetic and it’s infallible – if something fits it’s going to work, if it’s high enough it will work. The type is positioned with various spaces, which you can work out; there’s no
mystery to it, it’s going to work. I love that there’s no doubt to it. I also like the fact that there’s a very strict set of rules but I’m in an art school so I get people wanting to learn those rules and once they know then they can be more experimental. In a way it gives you a lot of freedom. Once you know what those rules and boundaries are, you don’t have to worry. Whereas, when I’m sat in front of my Mac, I remember opening Photoshop and I was thinking, “What the heck do I do? What do I choose? I don’t know.” Alan Kitching said, “We live in a very visual world now.” He said that in a film he made recently, but here, yes it’s visual but there’s like a physical aspect to it as well, so you’re physically getting a hold of something and making it. You physically have to work out where it’s going to sit on the paper. I think the danger is, as more and more people are coming through education and have had computers since day one, that’s being lost and it’s a bit of a mystery now. I know when I first started using computers for design work it was bizarre. I thought, “Well I’ve got this screen in front of me - what size is it?” I don’t know what size it is because you can scale it. In the printers, when I was doing paper paste-up, you had the thing in front of
PRESSING MATTERs
you. You knew what size it was, you knew what size your text was, you knew what was going to fit with what. Now, it’s more abstract, which I find very difficult, even now. I know if I’ve got a piece of paper, it’ll fit on that press but not that one, and I know if I’ve got type this size, I put it there and put something else there, whereas if you’re scaling it on screen you’re like “er….” Have you noticed any change in the popularity of print in recent years? Yes. How many emails do you get in a day? How many emails did you get in a day five years ago? There’s a lot more. How many emails do you not have time to read? Probably plenty. If you have a nicely printed item, or a nicely written item - if you’ve got nice handwriting and you develop that, and you put it on somebody’s desk - assuming the postal service is working or you can get over
there to do it - they will read it and they will look after it and it will stick in their memory. Is that change in popularity reflected in your work in the university? Yes, I’m busier now than I’ve ever been. Which is good; it means I’ve got a job. It means they’re not going to put a load of computers in here. It is gaining in popularity, which is great. I mean, I rejected Mac technology for a while when I was doing my MA Course here, but I’m through the other side of it now. I use everything - if it works I use it. This is what I love. It’s just different ways of putting ink on paper. Computers have allowed it to develop even more, they’ve allowed it to evolve. It’s become relevant again, it’s not an obsolete process any more and it’s very good for some things. There are some things in letterpress you can’t do any other way.
The other thing is the world’s changing. I was reading the other day about the internet, the way the Broadband is expanding, y’know we’ve only got about enough – in eight years time it’ll have reached maximum capacity and we’ll have done the power source for Great Britain in about a year or something depressing like that. What is all this crap we get sent? That we don’t read, as I was saying about emails again. It’s junk. Who needs it? It’s just taking up space. Yes, exactly. Why? It’s pixels, it doesn’t really exist. So, there’s a lot of problems with the world, I’ve always said. Some people say depressingly, “If all the power went out, how would we communicate?” Well, look around you. I’ve got machines in here operated by hands and feet, there’s a good way. We wouldn’t have any lights but we could get some candles in I suppose.
What’s been your favourite project you’ve been a part of ? Oh dear. Flippin’ heck. Where do I start? The Illustrators did a pretty good session. I think it’s when it’s quite extended, y’know, I get to know the students better and I understand their work better. It’s good seeing it develop. Particularly if somebody’s having a bit of a battle with it. I get some really shy students that probably, I don’t know, they might come in here because it’s a different atmosphere. I think when I’ve seen somebody really struggle, and they’ve come out the other side, and they start to really get it and know it and the maths isn’t so scary anymore. There was a lad in last week, a first year, and he set a great bit of type, did some lino cutting which, strictly speaking, we don’t do in here, but it was made to go with his type and the whole thing worked really well. I think that was good - I still get this little rush when I’ve got a bit of set type or a block or something and I print it for the first time. He practically moved in, fine by me y’know, I could see him. He was really knackered at the end of it, he’d had very little sleep trying to get this thing finished and it worked really well. There was a few things we had to sort out which was no problem really, but I saw him push through that
work by Andrew Long
PRESSING MATTERs
and go through that pain barrier, do it, and he did a really good job. Brilliant. So, that recently has been one of my favourites. What’s your favourite word? Erm… I like swearing. I like saying ones which aren’t quite so bad – everybody says fuck now, don’t they, it’s nothing new. My friend said “Oh crullocks” the other day. I don’t quite know what it means but it sounded terrible, these combinations of notvery-bad swear words. Or the dreaded ‘C-word’, that’s a good word, especially if you’re a woman and you use that. I printed some cards when I started using letterpress, printed them very nicely, people loved them. I became known as the woman who prints ‘cunt cards.’ Doesn’t matter what book I’ve been in - they’re still travelling in some circles. I thought, “What a great word.” It can be an insult, a compliment - as a woman, mine’s given me years of pleasure, probably would if I’d been a man as well but we won’t go there, and it can be an advert can’t it? It’s purely a word, but how people perceive it is different. These things were like gold, quite exquisitely printed and it was just hilarious seeing the fallout.
PART TWO
F
or years now, I have been fascinated by the art of the written word; calligraphy, lettering, script, typefaces, everything. I picked up practising my hand only a few months ago, but it has quickly become a deep interest and key part of my design work. This 2-week-long project was overseen by Marc Wood, a tutor at CSM that specialises in brand identity. The aim of the brief was to choose a ‘design hero’ and to create an identity surrounding them, ignoring any current visual themes they may have today.
by Libby Tsoi 1st year BA Graphic Design I chose Edward Johnston as my ‘hero’; known mostly for the primary design of the London Underground typeface, he is also known as ‘the godfather of modern calligraphy.’ In his prime, he lectured at what is now known as Central Saint Martins, teaching the art of calligraphy to students such as Eric Gill. As my outcome, I designed a calligraphy starter kit, based on the teachings of Johnston from his book Writing, Illumination and Lettering, putting a modern twist into the design and ethos.
PRESSING MATTERs
PRESSING MATTERs
T
esting One, Two’ is a visual journey through the classic microphones which recorded the sounds of modern music. We hear the impact of them everyday, so I wanted to show off their beautiful physical aesthetic as well. The project observes the shapes which make sound, so to ensure that the photographs are simple enough to allow you to focus on these shapes, I chose to shoot with black and white 35mm film using natural light. Keeping the materials analogue was important to me as it allowed the project to reflect on the way the music would have been created in the early days of modern music.
by Daisy May Smith 1st year BA Graphic Design I don’t think I would be as confident in my work as a graphic designer had it not been for using traditional processes such as the letterpress or analogue photography. Being able to handle your tools, type and photographs by hand rather than only on screen, has been essential for finding a grounding in the world of design. Some people can create amazing work digitally, but for me the desire to create is strongest when i’m getting my hands dirty with inks and chemicals, and there is no room for grids and perfection.
PART three
stitch up, look sharp An interview with
D O U G L A S B E VA N S Words
LIBBY TSOI
Photos
DAISY MAY SMI T H
T
ucked away up on the third floor of Central Saint Martins is a small, unassuming room filled nearly floor to ceiling with wooden cabinets, which in turn are filled with hundreds of thousands of blocks of metal and wood type. This is where Helen Ingham, Specialist Technician: Letterpress, spends most of her time. Surrounded by a host of machines made long before the creators of this magazine were even born, possibly before even Helen herself, she has seen the rise of digital technologies in the University indeed, the sole window in the workshop looks into a computer lab full of PCs - so we sat down to ask her about her work and the importance of print media.
What would you say you do in the design world and within your role at CSM? I’ve got a background in Graphic Design and Print and that’s been me for most of my working career, with a few departures to other things, but most of what I do is design based on letterpress print. I mean, I do use a Mac computer for a magazine job every three months so y’know - I design a small magazine which is more or less all using the Adobe Suite, but it’s design for print again, so it is linked. Do you enjoy the digital work as much? Yeah, I don’t do digital work all the time – if I did it’d drive me mad. I did for a long time which is why I decided to go back into more handmade processes and physical processes really, rather than purely visual. Um, what else do I do…I’ve got my own print workshop, not that I have much time to spend in it. I do jobbing print work for people, small things like business cards if I have time. I do limited edition posters. Sometimes these are illustration commissions - I’ve got an illustration agent that works for me. Sometimes, like I said, I do limited editions that are sold in galleries, so there’s a few strands
to what I do but most of it involves letterpress, and I’ve recently branched out into signwriting. I’m learning brush lettering, which is very hard, very very difficult, which makes me swear even more, but it’s great ‘cause it’s challenging me. It’s teaching me a lot about lettering again, which I love. I’ve just had this love affair with type and lettering for a long time, and it’s put me in the position of a student again, which in my job is a good thing to remember periodically. It’s easy to forget being scared and not wanting to do anything and make a mistake; it’s good to remind me of that. What would you say your favourite aspect of your job is? Here? I don’t know, there’s lots of aspects I absolutely love, I can’t say there’s any one particular. I like sorting things out and putting them away, I like the mathematical aspect – I’m not really mathematicallyminded, y’know, obviously as I went into art and design, but it’s trained me to become so. There’s a very definite system in here which does involve arithmetic and it’s infallible – if something fits it’s going to work, if it’s high enough it will work. The type is positioned with various spaces, which you can work out; there’s no
mystery to it, it’s going to work. I love that there’s no doubt to it. I also like the fact that there’s a very strict set of rules but I’m in an art school so I get people wanting to learn those rules and once they know then they can be more experimental. In a way it gives you a lot of freedom. Once you know what those rules and boundaries are, you don’t have to worry. Whereas, when I’m sat in front of my Mac, I remember opening Photoshop and I was thinking, “What the heck do I do? What do I choose? I don’t know.” Alan Kitching said, “We live in a very visual world now.” He said that in a film he made recently, but here, yes it’s visual but there’s like a physical aspect to it as well, so you’re physically getting a hold of something and making it. You physically have to work out where it’s going to sit on the paper. I think the danger is, as more and more people are coming through education and have had computers since day one, that’s being lost and it’s a bit of a mystery now. I know when I first started using computers for design work it was bizarre. I thought, “Well I’ve got this screen in front of me - what size is it?” I don’t know what size it is because you can scale it.
PRESSING MATTERs
In the printers, when I was doing paper paste-up, you had the thing in front of you. You knew what size it was, you knew what size your text was, you knew what was going to fit with what. Now, it’s more abstract, which I find very difficult, even now. I know if I’ve got a piece of paper, it’ll fit on that press but not that one, and I know if I’ve got type this size, I put it there and put something else there, whereas if you’re scaling it on screen you’re like “er….” Have you noticed any change in the popularity of print in recent years? Yes. How many emails do you get in a day? How many emails did you get in a day five years ago? There’s a lot more. How many emails do you not have time to read? Probably plenty. If you have a nicely printed item, or a nicely written item - if you’ve got nice handwriting and you develop that, and you put it on somebody’s desk - assuming the postal service is working or you can get over there to do it - they will read it and they will look after it and it will stick in their memory. Is that change in popularity reflected in your work in the university? Yes, I’m busier now than I’ve ever been. Which is good; it means I’ve got a job. It means they’re not going to put a
PRESSING MATTERs
load of computers in here. It is gaining in popularity, which is great. I mean, I rejected Mac technology for a while when I was doing my MA Course here, but I’m through the other side of it now. I use everything - if it works I use it. This is what I love. It’s just different ways of putting ink on paper. Computers have allowed it to develop even more, they’ve allowed it to evolve. It’s become relevant again, it’s not an obsolete process any more and it’s very good for some things. There are some things in letterpress you can’t do any other way. The other thing is the world’s changing. I was reading the other day about the internet, the way the Broadband is expanding, y’know we’ve only got about enough – in eight years time it’ll have reached maximum capacity and we’ll have done the power source for Great Britain in about a year or something depressing like that. What is all this crap we get sent? That we don’t read, as I was saying about emails again. It’s junk. Who needs it? It’s just taking up space. Yes, exactly. Why? It’s pixels, it doesn’t really exist. So, there’s a lot of problems with the world, I’ve always said. Some people say depressingly, “If all the power went out, how would we communicate?” Well, look around you. I’ve got machines in here operated by hands and feet, there’s a good way. We wouldn’t have any lights but we could get some candles in I suppose. What’s been your favourite project you’ve been a part of ? Oh dear. Flippin’ heck. Where do I start? The Illustrators did a pretty good session. I think it’s when it’s quite extended, y’know, I get to know the students better and I understand their work better. It’s good seeing it develop. Particularly if somebody’s having a bit of a battle with it. I get some really shy students that probably, I don’t know, they might come in here because it’s a different atmosphere. I think when I’ve seen somebody really struggle, and
they’ve come out the other side, and they start to really get it and know it and the maths isn’t so scary anymore. There was a lad in last week, a first year, and he set a great bit of type, did some lino cutting which, strictly speaking, we don’t do in here, but it was made to go with his type and the whole thing worked really well. I think that was good - I still get this little rush when I’ve got a bit of set type or a block or something and I print it for the first time. He practically moved in, fine by me y’know, I could see him. He was really knackered at the end of it, he’d had very little sleep trying to get this thing finished and it worked really well. There was a few things we had to sort out which was no problem really, but I saw him push through that and go through that pain barrier, do it, and he did a really good job. Brilliant. So, that recently has been one of my favourites. What’s your favourite word? Erm… I like swearing. I like saying ones which aren’t quite so bad – everybody says fuck now, don’t they, it’s nothing new. My friend said “Oh crullocks” the other day. I don’t quite know what it means but it sounded terrible, these combinations of notvery-bad swear words. Or the dreaded ‘C-word’, that’s a good word, especially if you’re a woman and you use that. I printed some cards when I started using letterpress, printed them very nicely, people loved them. I became known as the woman who prints ‘cunt cards.’ Doesn’t matter what book I’ve been in - they’re still travelling in some circles. I thought, “What a great word.” It can be an insult, a compliment - as a woman, mine’s given me years of pleasure, probably would if I’d been a man as well but we won’t go there, and it can be an advert can’t it? It’s purely a word, but how people perceive it is different. These things were like gold, quite exquisitely printed and it was just hilarious seeing the fallout.