Intro to Typesetting & Letterpress Printing

INSTRUCTORS: Janet Kupchick
Course Fee: $275
Class Length: 10 hrs (multi-day)

In this two-day workshop, students will learn the fundamentals of points, picas, type size, leading, and sorts—the essential elements for crafting a beautifully printed letterpress book. Students will spend about half the time setting their pages, and half the time printing what they've composed. At the end of the workshop, students will receive their own copy of the group's jointly-produced book, which will includes everyone's name and contribution. All skill levels welcome, and all materials are provided.

Letterpress Greeting Cards

INSTRUCTORS: Lorna Turner & Wendy Emery
Course Fee: $120
Class Length: 4 hrs

Design and print your own holiday cards! Learn a bit about the art of letterpress while creating your own set of 25 holiday cards—perfect for sharing a little handmade joy! You’ll set wood or metal type, experiment with image combinations, and ink up your form like a pro. This lively, hands-on workshop also covers scoring and folding, so you leave with finished cards ready to send. All levels welcome—just bring your curiosity (and maybe a friend)! Envelopes included, too.

Pressure Printing

INSTRUCTOR: Janet Kupchick
Course Fee: $100
Class Length: 4 hrs

Let your inner child bloom as you explore the playful world of pressure printing and create floral-inspired artwork using cut paper and collage materials to form a custom backing sheet. When placed behind a blank sheet and run through an inked printing press, you’ll transfer subtle variations in texture, revealing a beautiful range of tones, patterns, and colorful impressions with each unique print. You will be working with a range of materials as you bring your unique vision to life. Get ready to feel inspired and engaged. Perfect for artists, educators, and anyone seeking a creative boost, this vibrant half-day workshop encourages participants to try something new at the Printing Museum! All experience levels welcome.

Heidelberg Windmill Press Operation

INSTRUCTORS: Shino & Ken Carlson
Course Fee: $150
Class Length: 6 hrs

The “Heidelberg Windmill” is a remarkably precise and powerful workhorse of letterpress printing. Known for its reliability and iconic rotating paper gripper, this press has long been admired for consistently producing beautiful results. Learn directly from seasoned printers about proper safety, make-ready, automatic feed, impression, inking, registration, troubleshooting common issues, and basic maintenance. Become confident with the basics of operating a Windmill -- and you'll have printed a set of 30 two-color thank you notecards (that will come with envelopes) to take home.

Platen Press Operation

INSTRUCTOR: Wendy Emery
Course Fee: $120
Class Length: 5 hrs

In this introductory workshop, participants will explore the possibilities of letterpress platen printing using both tabletop and floor model presses. There will be discussions about and demonstrations of oiling the press, locking a form into the chase, packing, setting guage pins, inking, feeding the press, and of course printing! All levels welcome for this educational and very hands-on workshop.

Wood Type Posters

INSTRUCTOR: Lorna Turner
Course Fee: $100
Class Length: 4 hrs

Learn to print a traditional broadside with a modern vibe using letterpress and rare wood type in this unique workshop. Compose a phrase. Select your font. Apply your color of ink. IMPRESS YOUR POWERFUL MESSAGE ON PAPER. Beginners welcome as well as those more skilled. Bring a friend and celebrate together. This workshop is hands-on and very active. At the end of the class there will be a print exchange, in which you will take away a portfolio of prints made during the workshop.

Type As Image

INSTRUCTORS: Janet Kupchick
Course Fee: $100
Class Length: 4 hrs

This is a fun workshop that celebrates the magic of printing! Using the familiar shapes of letterforms in a playful way to create designs, patterns and characters is the goal of this seasonally-inspired workshop, tho participants will also be encouraged to maintain focus on proper printing technique and principles of design (scale, repetition, white space, canvas area etc). Once our designs are set up, we’ll get busy printing the designs, creating a folio of posters to be exchanged at the end of class. All skill levels welcome, and all materials are provided.

Photo Realistic Letterpress

INSTRUCTOR: Rebecca Chamlee
Course Fee: $425
Class Length: 18 hrs (multi-day)

Continuous-tone photographic images are characterized by gradual transitions between shades and colors and have frustrated letterpress printers for decades. The need for the traditional halftone screen often produces coarse prints, difficult registration and color issues. In this technical hybrid workshop, which includes both online and and in-person components, participants will explore the possibilities of letterpress printing as a means of producing successful four-color process images. Two live Zoom sessions include discussion and demonstrations on how to achieve successful results, choosing and editing original images, color manipulation in PhotoShop, soft proofing and preparing files for photopolymer plates. Students will order their own photo polymer plates for original four-color images. Two weeks later, with plates in hand, we will meet in person for hands-on printing, plus demonstrations of technique and discussions of strategies for letterpress printing of multiple plates in tight registration.

Skill level: Students should have letterpress experience. In addition, Adobe PhotoShop and Adobe InDesign must be available on the participant's computer, and they must have a basic knowledge of each.