When the internet was just a nerdy pass time and the depository for poorly rendered 3d rotating logos, print still rulled the roost but those with an eye on the future could see that prints’ day in the sun was over and the new frontier was going to be a wholly digital affair. Just look at out film interpretations of the future. From 2001: A Space Odyssey to Minority Report, the future we imagine has little of nothing to do with print in any meaningful way and in Fahrenheit 451 it positively is out for its blood. The thing with predicting the future though is that it’s tricky at best and tends to make fools out of the best of us (we’re still waiting for flying cars, invisibility cloaks, teleportation, even cheap energy!).
So, it should come as no surprise that in our internet based, always on, fully connected digital world that print is coming back in a big way. And not just any typ of print, but letterpress print. Old technology, almost Dickensian, mechanical, clunking, unmistakeable and beautiful.
Print, unlike anything on a screen (at the moment) has a few things going for it that are still impossible (currently) to replicate in any other way; the sensual, physical feedback of touch and when it comes to print that demands touchiness, Letterpress printing makes the biggest impression – literally. At it’s basic level it’s as simple as inking a reversed metal letter and pushing it into the surface of some sort of paper. Doesn’t sound too special, sounds a bit old hat but this simple explanation can never do justice to a print form that creates a look and feel that is unmistakeable.
This resurgence in Letterpress, like a lot of current trends has come from our American cousins. Their small, boutique design agencies and print shops and collectives have driven an old technology back into the mainstream. What caused this, I don’t know. Maybe Apple’s ‘Skeuomorphic’ UI design and website designers obsessed with Photoshop® filters (emboss et al) stoked the flames, maybe it was enthusiasts getting their hand on print presses that had been ditched in preference to digital print machines, maybe it’s some sort of underground cult – a new world order of printers and masons. Possibly though it’s just we all yearned for something real, something solid, something mechanical, beautiful and pure. A reminder of how a simple technology can make you feel special somehow.
Want to know more? Have a look on DeeplyImpressed – a great UK site that’s flying the Letterpress flag with loads of great examples or BeastPieces – the blog of ‘Studio On Fire’, an American print and design shop that creates truly awesome Letterpress designs.