Posts Categorized: Letterpress

May 17 | Design for Print: Slow Type — Letterforms & Typesetting on the Letterpress

Designers work with type constantly, but often take for granted the rules and nuances of elegant typesetting and type design. This workshop, led by Amira Hegazy, is an invitation to slow down and develop a more considered relationship with letterforms: their history, their construction, and the decisions embedded in their design. Drawing on a survey of typographic history, the session moves into a close examination of letterform anatomy — the relationships between strokes, counters, spacing, and proportion that give each type its unique voice. The workshop culminates in a hands-on letterpress activity, where setting type by hand makes abstract principles concrete. There is no better argument for understanding type as a physical, spatial thing than having to reckon with it as one.

This is the second workshop in the Design for Print sessions with Amira Hegazy

This workshop series is built for designers and other digital image makers to translate their digital skills to physical making. We will take specific elements of the design process and decode them to print processes. We will highlight historical and theoretical elements that have woven through design practice from days of physical production to our digital workspaces. Expect to leave each workshop feeling more knowledgeable about your day-to-day design workflows and how to realize your designs through hands-on print practices at Spudnik Press. 

Note: Each workshop in this series is enrolled individually. You can register for a single workshop or sign up for the full series.

Amira Hegazy is a Chicago-based designer, printer, bookmaker and educator whose work lives at the intersection of print, publication, and community. This four-part workshop series is designed specifically for graphic designers looking to deepen their print knowledge — from file setup to finished object.

June 7 | Scratch & Press: A Three-Part Youth Printmaking Series

For ages 11–14 · 3 sessions · All skill levels welcome
Sundays 9am-12pm (June 7, 14, and 21)

Get your hands inky and your prints analog. Over three sessions, you’ll explore three completely different printmaking traditions — each with its own tools, materials, and magic. From screen printing your own wearables on day one, to scratching metal plates and pulling intaglio prints, to running paper through a letterpress — this series is designed for curious, bold makers who want to learn how images are made.

 

Session 1
June 7 9am-12pm
Screen printing — wear your work
Start by screen printing an apron you’ll use for the rest of the series — then keep the press warm with t-shirts, tote bags, and whatever else you bring to print on. You’ll learn to expose a photographic screen, mix custom ink colors, and pull clean prints through the mesh. Walk away with wearable art.

 

Session 2
June 14 9am-12pm
Drypoint etching — scratch, score, and print

Learn the fundamentals of intaglio printmaking by drawing directly onto a metal plate with a steel needle. Drypoint is immediate and expressive — the burr your tool raises holds ink in ways that produce rich, velvety lines unlike anything you can get from a brush or pen. You’ll learn plate wiping and printing technique, and leave with a finished plate and a set of prints.

 

Session 3
June 21 9am-12pm
Letterpress — texture, pressure, and the printed page

Finish the series on a machine that shaped the modern world. Using stencils and low-relief collages — cut paper, string, netting, plant material — you’ll create richly textured prints by running them through a letterpress cylinder. The varying thickness of your materials determines how much ink transfers to the page, producing nuanced, one-of-a-kind impressions up to 19″ × 25″. Experiment with hand inking and multi-layer compositions to tell a story, build an illustration, or just see what the press can do.