Going, going, gone!

We sold out the remaining copies of the 2012 Letterpress Calendar at this weekend's Make & Take event! Thanks again to all the wonderful  volunteers who contributed their design talent and time to make this year's calendar. And thanks to everyone who purchased a calendar for supporting this awesome collaborative fundraiser project. I'm looking forward to the 2013 calendar!

Note: For those of you who didn't place your order in time, there might be a handful of copies still available at ArtSpring. I will update this post when I hear back on the actual number. If you're interested in being notified when our 2013 calendar is available, please let me know and I'll add you to the list.

Update 12/6:  Just heard back-- there are two copies of the calendar available at ArtSpring!

Letterpress Calendar Press!

To get our calendar a little more exposure, I posted it on Etsy. Looks like we've got a fan! Rebecca featured our calendar on her site Florence Finds as part of her holiday gift guide (pictured above).

We're also proud to be featured in Paper Crave's and Oh So Beautiful Paper's 2012 calendar round ups and in blog posts on All Things Aimee and Fifi Cheek!

If you haven't already gotten yours, get moving! The calendars will be available at Saturday's Make & Take event and online at Pyramid's sales page.

Letterpress Calendar process

Photo by Miranda Anderson

Just thought I'd share some links to posts that some of our 2012 Calendar printers wrote on their experiences designing and printing their pages!

June printer, Miranda Anderson, shows step-by-step photos of her printing process.

Molly Moran, half of the February duo, posts on her blog about her and Laura McLean's page.

Alyson Hurt (January) walks readers through her process.

For photos and purchase information, see our 2012 Letterpress Calendar page.

2012 Letterpress Calendar for sale!

The 2012 Letterpress Calendar is available for sale! See purchase instructions and photos of the final calendar here.

2012 Calendar Assembly Party!

Last week, a group of calendar printers got together to assemble the final product! Some photos:

All the finished pages, lined up in order:

Three of our official hole-punchers (Erin, Leslie, Kathryn):

Our two official collate-ers (Laura and Lauren):

A group shot of everyone hard at work:

The final product, a set of 118 beautiful calendars:

We should have information on how to purchase the calendars very soon!

2012 Calendar Sneak Peek #5

The last Sneak Peak! All the printers will be getting together tomorrow to assemble the calendars. After that, they'll be available for purchase!

Here are the last few completed pages by Erin Brophy, Tess Sammarco and Tia Blassingame:

And here's Sara Shaffer and Bridget Stoyko's September page along with my last minute November fill in for Beck:

2012 Calendar Sneak Peek #4!

The finished pages are really starting to pile up! I counted 9 piles of finished pages when I was at Pyramid last night. Here's a trio of newly completed pages by Lauren Emeritz (April), Laura McLean and Molly Moran ("Februarius") and Leslie (October):

See Molly's post about printing the February page on her blog.

And a trio of half-way finished pages by Erin Brophy (left), Sara Shaffer and Bridget Stoyko (middle) and Tess Sammarco (right):

We are just a few days away from the print deadline so the calendars should be up and ready to sell soon!

See all the Sneak Peeks here!

2012 Calendar Sneak Peek #3!

Got some new photos some newly finished pages of our 2012 Letterpress Calendar, courtesy of June printer, Miranda Anderson:

The theme for today's Sneak Peek is the letter J....

January (by Alyson Hurt):

June (by Miranda Anderson):

July (by Alison Whitty):

And a couple shots of the completed front and back covers (Kathryn Hoeppel, Sarah Hanks):

So exciting! We've now got 6 completed pages (not counting those that were printing over the weekend). Check out the other Sneak Peeks here.

2012 Calendar Sneak Peek #2!

Another look at the 2012 calendar pages that are coming off the press! (See the first Sneak Peek here!)

Morgan wins the prize for being the first one with all her pages completed:

The clouds turned out beautifully!

Here's a shot of the front and back cover (by Kathryn Hoeppel and Sarah Hanks, respectively) after the first run.

These two smart ladies teamed up to print their pages together so they could use the same colors (and cut their clean up duties in half)!

2012 Calendar Sneak Peek #1!

Calendar pages are starting to appear in the studio! Here are some photos...

Laura and Molly were in the studio this week printing the first run of their awesome February design (I taught them my two-person printing method!):

While I was there, I could see Leslie'd started her October page by printing her lino block that she'd cut:

Also saw Morgan's beautiful May sunrays on the drying rack:

Lastly, a peek at Alyson's test prints for her January page:

Check out her blog post about her trial run here.

This is my favorite phase of the calendar project.... Going to the studio and seeing that new pages have appeared! Stay tuned for Sneak Peek #2!

2012 Letterpress Calendar critique

This year I decided to include a critique as a part of the process of creating the 2012 Letterpress Calendar. I figured this would be a great way for this year's calendar crew to get some feedback on ideas and also just have another excuse to get together and get to know one another a little better. Here are some photos of the critique which took place last week (including a few mock ups and draft designs!):



Can't wait to see the final designs in print!

2012 letterpress calendar printers!

Just a list of our 2012 letterpress calendar printers!

Cover: Kathryn Grill Hoeppel
January: Alyson Hurt
February: Laura McLean & Molly Moran
March: Erin Brophy
April: Lauren Emeritz
May: Morgan M. Ward
June: Miranda Anderson
July: Alison Whitty
August: Tia Blassingame
September: Sara Shaffer & Bridget Stoyko
October: Leslie Smith
November: Beck Levy
December: Tess Sammarco
Back Cover: Sarah Hanks

I'll be getting a peek at everyone's designs next week.... Can't wait!

Happy Hour 8.22.11

Photos from Monday night's Happy Hour!

Chase Clement, who took one of my workshops back in March, stopped by to check out the studio. He brought a copy of his book that he'd printed on an SP-20 with all handset type at Smith College back in 1972. Here are some photos. Amazing...

Alyson Hurt came to play around with some type to get ideas for the January page of the 2012 Letterpress Calendar:

Kathryn Hoeppel set some type to print onto watercolored cards:

She didn't really get to printing but I'm sure they'll look great when she's done.

Erin Brophy played around with making a pattern of ornaments. Maybe inspired by Chase's book?

Molly Moran printed the type she'd set at the last Happy Hour:

Curious to see what she ends up doing with these? Folded cards?

Lauren Emeritz also set some type for a birthday card (also serving as a prototype for her April page of the 2012 calendar):

I love how everything is all planned out on the graph paper.

Alison Whitty also came by to play around with some type for the July page of the calendar and to share some design ideas (sadly, I didn't get photos of these!)

The next Happy Hour will also be a critique of everyone's preliminary calendar page designs. Can't wait to see everyone's ideas!

Call for Volunteers: 2012 PA Letterpress Calendar!

We're getting ready to start planning out our annual fundraising project, the PA Letterpress Calendar! We're going to need 13-14 volunteers to design and print a page (one for each month + the front/back covers) . See info below:

In 2010, former Letterpress Associate Moira McCauley started this calendar fundraising project. Each month (plus the cover) was designed and printed by a different Pyramid letterpresser. The assembled calendars were then sold with all proceeds going directly to Pyramid. It was such a great project that we've started doing it annually! Photos of the previous calendars:

2011 Calendar (photos courtesy of Alyson Hurt):



2010 Calendar (photos courtesy of Melanie Karlins):



Now we're putting out the call for volunteers for the 2012 calendar! Please see the info below:

 

Dates:
-Sign up: Friday August 12.
See instructions to sign up below. If we have more than 14 people volunteer, we'll use a weighted lottery system to determine who will be participating (giving preference to people who haven't done the calendar before and/or active volunteers). Shortly after this date, I'll email you your assigned months and specs.

-Critique: Wednesday September 7 (tentative).
This year, we're requiring that all participants take part in an informal critique. It's not necessary to have a final design at this point--just enough to show what you're planning on doing and how (via setting type/photopolymer/linocut etc.) Sketches/computer printouts are fine.

-Final due date: Friday October 14.
All printing should be done by this date. We'll take the following week to assemble all the calendars.

Other info:
-Print run: TBD (in the range of 100-125)
-# colors: Due to the crunch on the studio, we're limiting all pages to 2 colors.
-Size: TBD
-Studio time for this project will be free.
-Pyramid will provide the paper and ink.
-Any other materials (photopolymer plates, linoleum blocks) will not be covered.
-Each participant will receive 2 copies of the final calendar to keep + volunteer hours.

Eligibility:
-You must be certified to print in the letterpress studio independently. If you are not currently certified - you still have time!
-You must be willing/available to meet the deadlines for the critique and the final print deadline.

Sign up:
-To sign up, email Julia by August 12.
-Include your first and second choice for which page you'd like to do (which month and/or cover)

Please let us know if you have any questions! I hope you'll all consider participating!