that's right folks, another craft fair!

Before the weather becomes too unkind to allow for the outside sale of paper goods, we've decided to fit in one more craft fair! I'm sure Athens will be a hoot, or something along those lines. Fairs are actually almost always fun, as it's a time to see firsthand responses to the cards we print, (sending out all those wholesale orders doesn't quite feel the same). So, wish us a day with no rain and not too many kids of reading age who find the dirty cards!

my blog has abandonment issues

i'm only writing a blog today because i'm putting off design work.

so much has happened since i last blogged - i've been witness to a horrible printing accident, finally sold a card to Paper Source, designed a slew of new cards, and along the way become a pretty decent printer. i've laughed, i've cried, it's been epic.

i'm gonna throw one new card up, one of my favorites from the newest batch....and then i'm gonna get to the designing i should be doing.

blame it on the cats

This is always my solution to time dilemmas. I know that kids, dogs, tropical fish, obsessive video game habits, and baking bread all take more time than cats, but I have to work with what I've got. I wanted to blog yesterday, but the cats needed reassurances that my 3-week trips away would be infrequent.

Also, the only computer I have right now is where I work. I end up spending 12-hour days at my day job just to get this "internetting" thing done. I used to have a computer at home til someone I used to know had a really bad day and decided my computer (along with various other items) should pay the price. I imagine the moment of elation my computer felt as it discovered the feeling of flight, but unfortunately for me and it, that moment was short lived and totally trumped by that old bastard gravity.

Anyway, here's another card from the new batch. This card was made with my dad in mind, as well as many of my other biking friends, and their significant others who live in constant fear of the day they are left for a bicycle. Tomorrow, I'll tell you about the letterpress comic and perhaps some other artists I've seen lately who rock.

as painless as possible

i actually have a lot to say about what's been going on letterpress-wise lately, but the sun is going down and i still have plants that need to be moved from one place to another in my little garden. so, here's a picture of one of my new cards to tide you over til tomorrow, (when i make another excuse for not writing much. tomorrow i think i'll blame it on my cats). the whisk on this card was drawn by the lovely and talented Krystan Bruce. and if i have my choice, she'll be drawing many more Lady Pilot cards to come. (and if you buy this card on etsy, you give her even more fiscal reasons to do so!) enjoy!

where do i begin?

so much has happened, dear blog, since our last meeting, and i must apologize sincerely for my seeming disregard of your charms. oh, if you were someone else's blog, you might have daily attention and feel honored and esteemed, like a pampered cat, or prize-winning orchid. but no, you had to be my blog, which means you will forever have to fight for attention, the red-headed stepchild in a room full of beauty queens. sorry bout that, blog, guess you can't help who started you and we'll just have to work on this relationship a little harder. see ya tomorrow, blog, no really, i mean it, for serious.

xoxo,
emily

another new york sneak peak

Sat at a computer from 5pm til 5 this morning, head buzzy with digital signals, clunking along like a blind lady on illustrator. And now I'm calling the design part done. 11 designs, and I have till Thursday night to get them all printed. Sadly left 2 designs in the idea stage, exhausted from trying to force them to have lines that fit or designs that looked clean. We'll come back to them later. For now, I'm going to watch a movie, take a shower, spend a rainy Sunday living like a normal person who spends rainy Sundays being lazy. For now I'll pretend that I won't wander into my basement print shop and start working, as I've been accused before of being unable to sit still for long.

a preview...

Trying tonight to leave this print shop after about 10 hours. Will most likely go have a couple glasses of wine and retire to my home-based print shop. Who knows how to party? This girl. Not sure yet if I've set myself up for failure, or if this is what is known as being a go-getter, particularly since these two states of being are so closely intertwined. Luckily, I kinda get off on the rush of pressure that cramming too much work into too little time inspires. When I woke up this morning, I felt like my sleeping mind had been traveling down a long dream runway, and as soon as I was conscious, that plane took off. My brain was full of questions about how to do what I'm doing and even more ideas that I'm going to try like hell to ignore until after this trip. Why do ideas always rush in when they know there's just no room for them in the schedule?

Anyway, I'm still struggling with Illustrator, shoving round pegs into square holes, hitting them with mallets til they fit and the floor is covered with multi-colored splinters. But I thought I'd put one preview up. Perhaps I'm jumping the gun here, but since I may be the only one really looking at the pictures I post, it's not like I'm going to ruin the suspense for myself. (Don't worry Ben, I know you're looking.) The text curve isn't quite right yet, but it'll get there, and isn't the little guy cute? And grumpy? Like my cats after I push them over. But I digress. And need wine. More previews to come, and stories of selling cards to famous and glamorous people in New York.

the race to new york

So, in a little less than 2 weeks, I'll be headed to New York to work a booth at the New York Gift Show for my day-job employer, Blue Barnhouse. I've done this once before, (you can actually read about this trip in a guest blog on Blogdammit! the Blue Barnhouse blog). The last trip was fun, as New York is a fantastic place to visit. I feel all lit up with big city energy when I'm there and can't really get enough of hearing different languages on the sidewalks and being able to eat and drink at anytime of the night or day. I live someplace "peaceful" now, which I guess suits some folks. Chicago kinda wrecked me for appreciation of the quiet little places.

Anyway, I know the show itself will once again overflow with the tacky and I do hope to find something new in the neon stream of awful, but our booth will be a safe haven and this time round, it seems I'll be trying to hawk some of my own wares! Together with my good friend Ben McLeod, card ideas have been flowing mightily, but only time will tell, (time and aderol consumption) if I get everything done in time. Join me in this amazing race to the New York Gift Show! Actually, I guess you can't join me unless you want to come to Asheville, North Carolina and help me print late into the night, so join me in spirit.

I will be featuring some of the results of this endeavor over the next couple of weeks, some printed with handset type in my basement, others with the aid of this 21st-century letterpress, the computer. Today, take a gander at a party invitation that started as just playing with some funky borders in my basement. The colors on the actual invite look a whole lot brighter, but I'm still learning how to scan and move images around to make them look good online. Feel free to give me some pointers if you know any!

a playtime print

Another thing I've printed since July, and trying to keep up my rate of blogging, even if it is only one sentence long. Ok, it's two sentences.

Lady Pilot is scrappy as hell.

Yesterday, I said that "tomorrow" I'd post some pictures. and here I'm about to do it, by golly. Quite proud that I'm following that resolution, at least twice. Since July, I've printed many things, even a job for a client I didn't know socially, which was exciting. I've even managed to get some of what I've printed into a book on letterpress that will be published by Mark Batty sometime this spring.

While some of my printing has involved planning, measuring margins, choosing type and paper carefully, most of what I've printed has been done on scrap, often in the middle of the night or after hours of staring at my basement printshop til some idea demanded or at least quietly requested my attention. Don't ask me what the creative process is, I'm still definitely figuring it out and much of my basement time is spent trying to understand just what my aesthetic is, or wants to be. I see so many printed things that inspire me but feel like what I want things to look like is still mysterious, something of an adventure as I watch things come together. It's like I'm giving myself a class in letterpress where sometimes I'm the teacher and other times I'm the student. Well, most of the time I'm a student, with many teachers - books of old posters and websites by great printers, folks I work with and artists I admire. When you're playing with type that's decades old at the youngest and a press made nearly a century ago, everything you make feels steeped in history and the actions of others.

back at it. i swear.

This is the first year, in the 37 I've spent on the planet, that I actually wrote down New Years' resolutions. Not that I'll follow them, but I wrote them down.

To put this in perspective, I write things down constantly. I'm an obsessive list-maker - books I wanna read, movies I wanna see, daily to-do lists that include things like "take a shower" so I can cross something off at the end of the day. So, in reality, writing resolutions is not such a big thing. Just another list.

I wrote resolutions because, to put it mildly, 2009 sucked. Big time. Without going through and major-world tragedies like hurricanes, or civil wars, or generational urban poverty, (all of which make my problems seem utterly banal and comparatively miniscule), 2009 was the worst year I've ever had. There were of course brighter glimmers, moments and people shining like disco-ball facets in a dark ballroom, but overall, I will shed no tears for the passing of 2009.

And now that you've heard the rather lengthy, meandering explanation - one of my resolutions was to write on this blog more often, or at least more than 5 times a year, my approximate 2009 rate. I find this no easy task, still feeling like a blog is so much shouting into space, or more jadedly, a narcistic exercise, like a 4-year-old barking, "look at me! look at me!" when what they've done is poop on a rock (see Paul Auster's stories of fatherhood), or stuck a piece of wood up their nose, (no offense to the astute 4-year-olds out there). But hell, it's a resolution.

I may say nothing of import in 2010, but by god, I'm gonna say it. If you choose to read after today, be forewarned...this blog will not make you rich, famous, or more attractive. It will not cure boils, bad breath, or baldness. It will not help you to "come to terms" with anything. However, this blog may be a tour-de-force, a good-natured romp, or a charming coming of age tale. It may become the tractor pull of blogs, spraying you with mud and grease as you grip the edge of your chair in suspense. So, fasten your seat belts folks, as I blog like never before. And happy new year, here's hoping 2010 banishes any bad taste left in your mouth by 2009 and builds on every bright moment of the past year.

Tomorrow: See some pictures of stuff I've actually printed since July!

why my blog is super easy to follow

So, I'm a procrastinator of the first order. I've got an advanced degree in putting things off. If you wanna call a professional, my number should be the one you dial. I'm world-class, first-rate, A-number-one, top of my game, a serious contender in the world of "I'll totally do that tomorrow." And this is why my blog is so easy to follow. It's not like I require a lot of your time, I mean, if you're looking for constant updates, check out twitter or CNN. I've moved to the South, which only means I'm gonna get slower. (And I'm also pretty good at long-winded explanations of why I just haven't written anything here for a while.)

And now we come to today's blog question... What is the best thing you can print to break in a new press? I've been stumped for a few days now. There are many things, when you get a press, that you need to check on, parts to get, lighting to afix to dark basement ceilings, spiderwebs to clear from printing areas, but once all this is done, it's time to get printing. I've thought of a bunch of things I could print, but none of them seems gripping enough. So, I'm turning to you, invisible audience, for some advice...if you could have something printed on a beautiful turn-of-the-century press, what would it be? And no Gutenberg Bibles please, let's keep it simple. I look forward to the brilliant ideas I'm sure will begin pouring in, as soon as I hit the post button...

in a name?

Guess I'm feeling pretty thankful these days, cause I'm gonna have to give props to a couple more people before I can go on with new stuff...

Before I even bought my press, there came the question of naming it. There are lots of great press names out there, but stealing another press name is generally frowned upon, and hoo boy, watch out if you anger a letterpresser with arms thick from lifting trays of type. So, I began to stir some things in the organic stew I call a brain, and here's what came out...

1. The first press I bought is called a Pilot. I got mine at a pretty skeazy flea market in Ypsilanti, Michigan. Most of the place was full of 8-track tapes and old video cassettes, knives, used records by unheard-of boy bands from the 50s, temporary tattoos, and strangely, baby clothes. But there in the back of the market was a skinny old guy who collected letter press stuff when he saw it. I also bought a bucket of type from him which ended up only causing me hours of confusion and resulted in nothing too usable.

2. My first name is Emily, which is close enough to Amelia.

3. I'm a chick. Sometimes chicks are called ladies.

4. There's a great song by Neko Case called Lady Pilot.

5. There's another great song by the Handsome Family called, "Amelia Earhart vs. the Dancing Bear."

6. My great friend Ben suggested calling my press Lady Pilot.

And so the name is stuck, and thanks to Ben, and to Neko Case and the Handsome Family for writing such cool songs, and to Amelia Earhart for being such an inspiring chick. If the greatness of any of these folks rubs off just a little on my press, the world is soon to be my ink-stained oyster.

props

Featured here: Farrell and Brandon, hard at work trading jokes while the rest of us slave away over hot, dirty presses.


When I moved here from Chicago, I never expected to be doing letterpress. Although I started collecting letterpress type when I was 19 and stopped at a backwoods barn sale, my printing experience in Chicago had been largely limited to work with an anarchist print shop. At the risk of offending, let me just say...BAD IDEA. Running a business with anarchists can put you off printing, politics, art, food, sleep, or associating with anyone for quite a while. True, I had kept my tiniest press and a great deal of type, lugging it from apartment to apartment, but I had never again had the space to truly set up and work.

All of this changed happily when I moved to Asheville and found Blue Barnhouse. I applied for and got an apprenticeship, began working on presses again, along with doing the various errands and coffee-making required of a new apprentice. In all honesty, I don't think I would have considered again buying a press without my experiences here. Blue Barnhouse not only does lovely letterpress work, (coupled with often dirty context), but offered a calm haven, where good music is played, beer is usually present after 3, and sarcasm is an appreciated art form. Check out their blog and cards online at bluebarnhouse.blogspot.com, buy a card, revel in the beauty. Or stop in and meet Brandon, Sarah, or Farrell, but don't tell them I said they were great, I totally won't admit to it.

Mr. Wright, who sold us the press, gave me rides on his golf cart.

The press ready to climb the tow truck bed.

Three very hot guys.

Three very hot guys and a tow truck driver.

The big baby in her home.

some more shots of moving day.

Sooner or later, most people learn that to be my friend means to be asked to move heavy shit. Sometimes, I have to make an entirely new group of friends to move letterpress equipment cause the ones I already have know better. Luckily, when moving to a new place, you can take everyone unawares. On this sunny Saturday, my boyfriend, (who should know better, but is in for the ride), and two new friends helped me to move this beautiful Chandler and Price from a garage 15 miles away into my own garage/basement.

Surprisingly, it was all smooth sailing til the end. I apparently had not considered the roughly 6 feet of grass between the tow truck and the concrete floor of my basement, and when the press touched sod, it sank into the ground, ready to spend the rest of its days in my yard. Happily, people in Asheville are a friendly lot, and the tow truck driver proceeded to get a jack from the truck and wedge it and himself under a corner of the press. (This would not be likely in Chicago, where the tow truck driver would probably drive away quickly, laughing.) Together the 4 "strapping" "lads" hauled that curmudgeonly machine into the house, its outdoor life ended, at least for while.