Strong Arm Bindery

Behemoth Rising

It's been over a year since we hauled the big Vandercook into Portland and dropped it unceremoniously onto Reuben's floor.  The logistics of how to put it all together didn't exactly elude us, but they took a back seat to everything else the three of us were preoccupied with---or maybe it's just that giant heavy things take giant heavy time to come to fruition.

Once again, my hat is off to the mechanical genius that resides in both my amazing brother Rich and my fine friend Reuben.  Between long spans on Thursday night and Friday night last week, we managed to elevate the bed with a pallet jack, a couple pallets and much blocking. We introduced the cylinder through similar means, and got the legs under it, too, and then made adjustments to fit the long rods in place between them with the help of this thing my brother uses when he's got a flat tire.

It took alot less time to assemble than any of us expected, and Reuben tells me last Sunday he managed to mount the motor onto the side of the beast.  Much fine tuning will no doubt ensue; the rollers are probably shot and the cylinder needs to be adjusted, but all else seems to be in huge, beautiful working order.

It's a Vandercook Model 223, purchased from Dan Kelleher at Wild Carrot Press last April.  It has the capacity to print on a sheet measuring 22 x 30" and we are all giddy with anticipation.

Quartet & Co., Revisited

 

 

Saturday's East End Holiday Stroll proved to be fertile ground for Quartet & Co., a first-time collaboration of artists Karen Gelardi, Maria Vettese, Christopher Ryan and myself.  It was an experiment to provide custom stationery sets, in real time, to folks walking in off the street, as well as any and all interested parties on the internet.  And provide we did, from the opening bell at 2pm, until we hit the buzzer at 7pm. 

A lovely stream of orders flowed in from friends, family, and random strangers. The day flew by in a blur of ink, paper and tape, and I don't remember an idle moment for any of us.  My thanks to Maria and Chris for  designing, organizing and really making this event happen, Karen for her beautiful work and camaraderie, and the lovely Chloe, for her kick-ass ways on the letterpress.

Quartet & Co. -- One Day Only!

Tomorrow (that'll be Saturday, December 6th) should be a lovely, productive day in the East End of Portland, Maine.  Quartet & Co., a first-time collaboration between 4 of us (Maria Vettese, Karen Gelardi, Christopher Ryan and myself) will be producing custom letterpress-printed stationery sets; made to order, boxed to your liking and beautifully wrapped. 

Come by and visit us at More., 72 India Street, between 2pm and 7pm.  Have a look-see, place your order and enjoy some refreshments while we put it all together for you.  Preview and details can be seen right here.

If you're not able to make it in person, or you live far, far away, you can still be part of the action by simply hitting this word. The event will be happening online, in real time, between 2pm and 7pm.  How cool is that?

It's all part of the East End Holiday Stroll, and while you're out and about, be sure to check out the awesome art sale at 30 Romasco Studios.  Cheers!

Doing the Tighten-up

These days I'm trying very hard to work with what I've got here in the shop.  No new dies and no new letterpress purchases for a bit. This little card is the happy result of rescuing the saw cut from oblivion on a dusty shelf and getting it together with some type I never use.  I threw it up on my Etsy shop a few minutes ago and I'm feeling very pleased with my new frugal ways.

In the next few months we'll be shifting things around a bit at the shop, moving more towards production work and stationery products, and away from the repair work that's kept us busy the last 10 years.  And I have to say nothing makes me happier these days than seeing piles of identical printed matter.  I'll post more work as it happens.

Multilith on the Move

Yesterday was another banner day for moving large pieces of heavy equipment.  The brother and I have been working on restoring a MultiLith 1250 to working order for a couple years now---it's a single color off-set press and it appears to be ready to get back to work.  And in the interest of consolidating all print operations, it was agreed that it should reside in the capable and productive confines of 43rd Parallel Press.

We got it onto the trailer with the assistance of a come-along, some strapping and a custom built dolly (thanks, Rich---for all of that).

 

The trip across town was uneventful; it didn't tip over or anything--I'm sure you would have heard about that.  It just kind of bounced on its dolly in a jaunty fashion.

 

And here's our friend, about to make it's new home in the Bayside Neighborhood.  If all goes well, it should prove to be a sturdy workhorse for both Strong Arm and the 43rd.  Updates to come.

PICNIC in Portland

Next Saturday the first ever PICNIC Music + Arts Festival will take place in Lincoln Park in downtown Portland.  With 70 local artists and vendors hawking their wares and a stunning line-up of Portland bands plying their craft, it promises to be a great day in Maine.

Lincoln Park is that shady green space in front of the courthouse, bounded by Congress, Franklin, Pearl and Federal Streets.  The spectacle begins at 11am and runs til 6pm, rain or shine.  You can check out the bands slated to play, as well as a list of vendors right here.

Strong Arm will be there, sharing a booth with the vivacious talent of 43rd Parallel Press, and along with the usual offering of printed matter, hand-bound books and the odd little box, we'll be using the opportunity to host the first ever Strong Arm Bindery Yard Sale. We'll be unloading an awesome array of bookcloth, binders board, hand-marbled and decorative papers and whatever else you need to bind your own books. We're clearing the shelves and steep, steep discounts will be there for the taking!

Also on offer will the fiduciary stylings of my brother, Rich.  In addition to the inspired work he does heading up the Dept. of Giant Boxmaking, he's been designing and making a righteous line of wallets and checkbook covers using durable English buckram and lined with Italian marbled papers;  these beauties can transform the act of forking over cabbage into a truly elegant gesture.  Come see them for yourself, next Saturday, September 13th at PICNIC.

Into the Woods

I'm heading off to camp in the woods of northern Maine with family and friends.  Every time I do this, I usually come back with a couple of logs, or large pieces of decomposing bark.  I think that collection is near complete, so this time I'm to going to concentrate on smaller, more portable specimens of the native flora.  And in that spirit, I just put together a couple of small field presses for me and my pals.
 

I made a couple stacks of corrugated board and blotter.  This is extra-thick blotter, which is good for the initial pressing of bulkier plant material. 

I marked up the outer piece of corrugated and put down two straps of 1" nylon webbing with a hot-melt glue gun. 

I looped a couple d-rings through the webbing and gave the turn-ins the hot-melt treatment as well.  The ends of the webbing fray easily, so those get melted with a flame.

I've done a few in-house stress tests, and the hot-melt glue seems to be holding up.  These were wicked easy and took about a half hour to make.  And yes, in the background that's a fine specimen from the over-sized bark collection, acquired last summer.

Done & Delivered

I've spent most of my waking hours these past 2 months piling through an edition of 12 fine bindings.  They were delivered last week to an empty office: it was a wee bit anti-climactic, maybe, but I've been sleeping so peacefully these past 3 nights that all disappointment has ceased.

The project was challenging on a couple of big fronts, namely gilt edges and gold tooling (neither of which I've ever done in large quantity), and having come out the other end of it with some success and a tremendous amount of new and practical information, I'm happy for my time in the crucible.

A friend of mine, who faces similar learning curves with his work, wondered if there's ever a point where we stop consoling ourselves with the refrain, "But at least I'm learning alot," and honestly I don't think there is, so I'm willing to further console myself with the thought, "At least I'm not getting bored."

I've got plenty of new-found knowledge from this  project, and when it comes to gold tooling in a production environment, I've got nothing but big love for Vaseline and lighter fluid. 

I'll try to keep this short:  when I got my training for gold tooling it was a more precious method; you'd blind tool the design on the leather, paint the impressions, and only the impressions with glaire, put down a tiny bit of gold to fill the impressions, and go back in with the hot tool. 

This time around I was using the John Mitchell method (and probably every other dude in the Old School).

The entire binding is covered in B.S. Glaire (that stands for British Standard--apparently developed during the 2nd WW when there was a shortage of eggs).  The blind impressions are made with a cool tool.

The binding is then covered with Vaseline---this acts as a mild adhesive that holds the gold leaf (here laid down in a larger and swifter blanketing fashion than cutting small, fussy pieces to fit the tool impressions).

By the way, you're covering the whole binding with glaire and Vaseline to prevent staining

You go back in with a hot tool and hit the impression you've already made.  Then wipe away the excess gold leaf with a Vaseline-infused cotton ball, or soft cloth.  Gold leaf that's embedded in the grain, and excess Vaseline can be wiped away with, you got it, lighter fluid (or naptha).  It all cleaned up so nicely, and the work was phenomenally quick.  But it's good to keep the area you're working in well ventilated and let anything that's been soaking in the lighter fluid evaporate before you toss it in the trash.

It's been a long haul, and I want to thank all family and friends who put up with me and my constant beefing these past two months.  I sure learned alot, and I wasn't bored.

Even Dirty Girl, in the midst of leather prep (and alot of swearing), stepped up just when I needed help holding down the leather while I was shaping the head caps.  Thanks, kitty!

Giant Drop-Spine Boxes

Rich, my amazing brother, makes our boxes.  And he makes them very well.  We've had a standing contract with an institution of better learning for a number of years to build over-sized boxes for their print collection.  The whole library will move in the not-too-distant future and the orders for these behemoths have become larger as the deadline approaches.

Above, witness our technique for adhering the trays to the cover:  cloth-covered bricks...and alot of them.  The presses we have just aren't large enough.  A fence board is placed inside the tray before the bricks are laid in to prevent an impression.

Here's a little over half the present order; I think it's 28 boxes total.  We're using an English Buckram for the cover material, and laser printed labels (on Dove's Gray).  The Buckram comes from Adele Kaufman, Inc. in NY---David Kaufman is wonderful to work with, should you be in market.

So these will make it to their assigned books and portfolios tomorrow, and we'll be that much happier for the freed-up bench space.

3-Ring Chop Shop

We had a project come in last week that required building a new home for the overstuffed documents of one store-bought 3-ring binder.  The ring mechanism itself was up to the task, but the boards were too short and the spine was too narrow; the whole book had taken on the shape a flying-wedge.

The hardware was removed and prepared thusly.

Rich had the brilliant idea to use a section of a giant tube mailer to create the new spine piece.  He also had the table saw and steady hands to cut it.  The piece was cut to accommodate the thickness of the book's innards, and provide  enough room at head and tail for the page dimensions.

We wound up using epoxy and clamps to attach the cardboard and metal (working time 5 minutes; set-up complete in 15!).

The rest of it was just a matter of covering the new spine piece with cloth and building some very big boards.  These were attach on the hinges extending from the spine.

The thing weighs a ton. But now it lies flat and I think it's bullet-proof.