Blog: letterpress

Interrobang - call for submissions

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Ditchling Museum of Art & Craft

Calling all letterpress artists and designers!

Our friends at Ditchling Museum of Art & Craft are currently running an open submission for their forthcoming exhibition, Interrobang: an international showcase of letterpress print. The exhibition will be curated by the museum for The Village of Type, part of the Brighton Festival and the Artists’ Open House trail.

The Village of Type will be a season of exhibitions, workshops, lectures, residencies and printing events celebrating the centenary of the London Underground typeface, created by Edward Johnston when he lived in the village.

Publishers Random Spectacular will also be drawing on entries for a new publication looking at letterpress from around the world to accompany the exhibition.

Interested? Find out more and enter online here.

Entry closes on 14 February 2016. One submission per entry fee. All work must be printed using letterpress (although entries are to be submitted digitally), pieces can be created specifically for Interrobang or be existing work. Size is not limited, but pieces must be 2D and as this is a selling exhibition, you must have at least 5 copies of any submission.

David Wolske: Abstract Letterpress

Letterpress on a whole new level! Drop into Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft to see the “stunning, and purely abstract” letterpress compositions of American artist, David Wolske - 14 to be exact. His bold and mostly colourful, relief letterpress prints use woodblock letters overprinted to create beautifully graphic patterns and shapes.

The exhibition runs until 3 January 2016, so there’s plenty of time to plan a trip to this fantastic museum in the beautiful village of Ditchling. And if that's not a good enough reason to take a trip out there, they also have delicious cake, a shop packed with design books and products from local and international artists.

Pick Me Up 2015

Pick Me Up 2015 is currently in full swing at Somerset House, London showcasing a huge selection of illustration, design and print for the sixth year running and proving to be a successful platform for both emerging and established artists to promote their work.

London’s biggest graphic arts is not only a chance to engage with artists and designers about their work. Throughout the 12 days there’s a comprehensive programme of talks, debates, interactive workshops, demonstrations, the chance to create your own piece of print (with help) and the opportunity to purchase some wonderfully affordable art.

As we’re about half way through the festival I thought I’d share with you the very talented motley crew I’m showing alongside with BEST this year.

First up, our Brighton buddies hello DODO - ‘husband and wife team of playful printmakers’ brightening up the world with their colourful animal and pun-tastic screenprints.

Tattoo artist and printmaker, Alex Binnie. Normally found in his Brighton tattoo shop, Alex creates beautifully intricate wood and lino cuts inspired by his tattoo work and his past as a  medical illustrator.

Another pal of ours, illustrator and 80s toy collector Carlos Garde-Martin whose wonderfully detailed illustrations were seen all over Brighton last year as part of the Brighton Fringe Festival branding.

The lovely designer and illustrator Matt Jeffs (aka Nimbws - think ‘Nimbus’ but in Wesh) popping his exhibiting cherry at Pick Me Up with his quirky ‘cartoon Picasso’ style prints.

Dupenny, the brainchild of Brighton gal, Emily Dupenny brings a little cheekiness and vintage glamour to the party with her wonderful burlesque patterns and designs.

London based graffiti artists and designer Josh Stika (aka Stika) inspiring us with his great lettering and filling out our space with a giant (and I do mean giant) 3D ‘S’ - it lights up and everything!

Vinyl guru and king of perspex Curly Mark is back for a second year with more skulls, pop art style loveliness and laser-cut wooden jewellery.

Sam Egarr, designer, photographer and lover of all things typographic has joined us this year with her old shop signage inspired range of letter and number prints.

And last but not least, the lovely lady who had the vision and herded us all together Niki Best, former owner of BEST - the best shop in the world selling graffiti art, screenprints and limited edition art back when no-one even knew the name Banksy. Niki is selling off some of her very own collection at the show so grab the chance to own a classic Kozik smoking bunny, an Obey ‘André the Giant’ or an authentic Faile screenprint.

Pick Me Up runs until Monday 4 May. It’s open everyday 10am - 6pm and until 10pm tonight and tomorrow so come by and say hello.

Roadside Distractions

Today we'll be mostly hanging work at Somerset House - yep, we're showing with BEST at Pick Me Up again this year. Lots to do before the private view tonight so I won't hang about, but pop on down and have a look at the first two posters in our new 'Roadside Distractions' series of A2 lino prints.

The show runs from 23 April - 4 May 2015 and from what I've seen of the work being hung so far it looks like it's going to be a cracker.

Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft Letterpress poster series

I’m very excited to announce that the series of six letterpress posters I designed and hand-printed for Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft are now on display in the museum’s converted, 18th Century cart lodge - home of their shop and café.

The posters highlight key messages to museum visitors. Using a conscious mix of traditional techniques and modern design they reflect the attitude and direction of the museum – with bold, dynamic compositions, whilst remaining sympathetic to the museum’s identity.

The Print Room is my favourite part of the museum, so it was an honor not only to be commissioned to create these posters, but also to print them using the museum’s collection of beautiful wood block letters.

Renowned for its collection of work by artists and craftspeople once based in the village (including type-designers Eric Gill and Edward Johnston), Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft has a rich heritage of print and typography and for a few months Delicious Industries is a little part of that too!

Merry Christmas

Thank you to everyone who has shown support and encouragement, visited our blog, worked with us and for us. It's been a crazy year, but a good one.

With lots of exciting plans and projects in the pipline, here's to a fabulous 2015! 

Eat, drink and be very merry.

Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft’s 1st Birthday!

It's official, we're doing a pop-up shop at Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft as part of their 1st birthday celebrations!

Ditchling museum is a gorgeously designed museum nestled in the heart of Ditchling village on the South Downs. This unlikely village has a strong history in the art and craft world, having had many world renowned artists and crafts people living and working in it's community over the years. For example typographers Eric Gill and Edward Johnston both lived in the village and Eric Gill is buried there. The museum celebrates these arts and craft ties with an amazing collection of work and objects created and used by these people right there in the village.

To celebrate their 1st birthday the museum is opening up it's doors for free 11am - 10pm on Saturday 20 September. We'll be there selling our wares as part of the Best pop-up shop, along with pop-ups from Brighton gallery & shop Unlimited and the lovely guys from SORT Design. The pop-ups will be open from 11am - 5pm after which there'll be a paper-cutting workshop and a DJ so you can dance the night away.

There are loads of events on throughout the day plus there's delicious cake, locally sourced foods and real ales so be sure to put it in the diary. Come on down have a look around and say hello, there's a free shuttle bus to and from Hassocks Station too so there's really no excuse!

For more information check the museum website.

New Linocut prints

So here they are, our new set of A3 fairground and circus inspired linocut prints.

Each print is an edition of 100 and will be stamped and numbered. They're going to be for sale as part of the Best Home collective at Pick Me Up later this month and also at AT Openhouse as part of the Brighton Festival's, Artists' Open Houses throughout May. Once the shows are over the remaining prints will be available from Art-O-mart, our online store.

Spring Shows

Busy times at Delicious HQ lettering, lino-cutting and printing for our new range of circus and fairground inspired prints, totes and silk scarves ready for our Spring shows.

We're very excited to be doing Pick Me Up for the first time this year, as part of the 'Best Home' collective, the brain child of the lovely Niki Best, "print and graphic arts are all around us, and not just on our walls. We want to show the variety and number of different applications by getting various artists working in mediums that they havent worked in before". Best Home will be bursting with exclusive wallpaper & fabric, ceramics, paper cuts, prints, totes, notebooks and greetings cards from Antony Burrill, Lubna Chowdhary, James Marshall ( Dalek), Danny Sangra, Alex Binnie, Lou Taylor, Curly Mark, INSA, Stewart Easton, Home Slice and Stanley James Press. Best artists will also be running workshops throughout the show including paper-cutting, letterpress, embroidery and printmaking. Pick Me Up 2014 starts on the 24 April and runs until 5 May at Somerset House, London. Check our their website for more information and to book early bird tickets.

In May we'll also be back at AT Openhouse alongside an impressive line-up of artist, designers and printmakers; Alice Pattullo, An Alleweireldt, Becky Blair, Dead Methods, designosaur, hello DODO, Inkyskipper, James Sawyer, Mr Wingate, Nathan James Page, Petting Zoo Prints & Collectables, Sophie Abbott, Teresa Stewart-Goodman, Toypincher and Winsome & Saucy. Of course there'll also be lots of tea, coffee and cake! Artists' Open Houses are open weekends throughout May as part of the Brighton Festival. For more information and to keep up-to-date with artists and plans, check out the AT website.

I'll post up some taster pics over the next month as the new range comes together, so watch this space.

DB Photography

Here's the identity we created for Brighton-based street photographer Darren Baldwin to brand his business DB photography.

The brief was to design a bold, simple identity that incorporated a monograph of his intials DB and was black only to reflect his images. We're really pleased with how it turned out and even more pleased with how good it looks letterpressed on his new business cards. 

Check out Darren's wonderful images here.

Christmas Cards on Art-O-Mart

The countdown to Christmas has begun and our range of hand letter-pressed Christmas Cards are now gracing the virtual shelves of Art-O-Mart.

From Christmas puds to Christmas bunting, there's a design for everyone - even the grumpy. Check them out here.

Sell! Sell!'s Efficacious Fentimans Ad

Our friends Sell! Sell! have been busy hand-letterpressing the elements of their new Fentimans 'faithful to the originals' ad to give it a traditional, authentic feel.
Obviously the final design had to be created digitally, but all the elements were made into a block and letterpressed onto a range of papers to get different ink coverage before being scanned to create the final advert design.
I think you'll agree it was well worth the effort, you can really tell the difference between this and previous ads which have been created purely digitally - this one has so much more charm and depth.

Images copyright Sell! Sell!

Vintage embossing stamps


We were lucky enough to get these lovely vintage embossing stamps off santa, and this week the excitement continued when they arrived back from City Company Seals Ltd. with their new shiny blocks.

One is a circular 'notary' style stamp and the other is a rectangular address stamp. Both are fantastic, they not only look gorgeous, but they'll add a lovely bit of finesse to all our stationery and prints.

Strongly resisting the temptation to stamp everything in sight!

Tue 29 Jan 2013

Posted under: Design , Delicious work , letterpress

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AT Christmas Open House

Well it's (almost) that time of year again and this year it's even busier than usual - we've been in a printing frenzy getting ready for the AT Christmas open house.

AT will be throwing open their doors for the first three weekends in December. With paintings, prints, cards, paper cuts, soft furnishings, knit wear, photography and jewellery from Dead Methods, Snorkus, Hello Dodo, Petting Zoo Prints & Collectables, Lou Taylor, Erin Prior, Natalie Martin, Bernard Lodge, James Sawyer, Winsome & Saucy, Nathan James Page, Mr Wingate, Shona Macdonald, Carlos Garde-Martin and Best, it's set to be a cracker (sorry!).

We'll be posting up a selection of work from our favourite contributors throughout the week in a build up to the opening weekend, but for starters, here's some of our new letterpress prints...



Vintage 1920's and 30's adverts printed from the original letterpress blocks...

Letterpress Christmas cards...



Greetings cards...

Hand-cut Christmas banners...


And notebooks...

Make sure you pop by for some delicious cake, mulled wine, to enjoy the roaring open fire and of course, to buy gifts for all your wonderful family and friends! For more information and up-to-date news check out the AT open house blog.

AT open house, 42 Hendon St, Brighton BN2 0EG. Open 1/2, 8/9, 15/16 December 2021. 12-6pm.

Yee-Haw Industries closing :(

The wonderful Knoxville letterpress print shop we all know and love, Yee-Haw Industries has announced that they're closing at the end of April so that business partners Julie Belcher and Kevin Bradley can pursue other interests.

How sad and ironic is it that such a great studio/print shop, one that kept the letterpress torch lit for all these years, is closing at a time when (in the UK anyway) letterpress is making a huge come back.

The only good news is that they are selling off all their prints in their Etsy store and as you would expect, there are some beauties - this is only a tiny selection...








So what are you waiting for? This is your last chance to own a historic print from this renowned letterpress print shop!

All images copyright Yee-Haw Industries.

Wed 18 Apr 2012

Posted under: Design , Prints , letterpress

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Welcome to the Delicious Industries blog. We're an independent design studio based in Brighton, UK and this is our scrapbook packed full of design, illustration, photography & typography inspiration. Check out our work here.

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