fiore press

Weddings: K+N & G+J

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Mon, 25 Jan 2016 02:24:00 +0000

I love everything about printing and design. I love the challenge of designing something completely custom and unique for each client, I love figuring out the layout and how it will print best, and I especially love little added touches that make whatever it is that I print stand out from everything else.

Kari + Neal
This first set was printed in a slate gray. This custom invitation suite was loosely based off of another invitation suite I had done about a year ago with the Japanese wrap and layered invitation card mounted on a 5x7 card, which gives a beautiful 1/4" border and adds depth. Some of the brides for whom I design and print choose something they like based off of something they've seen in my custom collection and modify it to suit their taste, which is what we did here. Kari loved the idea of a wrap around the invitation and mounting it onto a colored card, so we based this suite off of that. She drew the beautiful flowers that we used on both the invitation and the rsvp postcard. I scanned it in, imported it in to Illustrator and then converted into vector art so that it would print best. Also, once something is in vector format it can easily be resized larger or smaller without losing quality.

For the rsvp postcard, Kari also drew the large rsvp wording and again I scanned it in the same way I did the flowers. What's great about this set is that using her artistic talents we were able to really create something personal. Plus isn't it kind of fun to say, "Hey, I drew that!" for your own invitations?

Grace + Jason
I have lots of great memories growing up and spending time with my four cousins on my mom's side. Jason is about 4 years younger than me and I always loved being with him and my other boy cousin Vince because they both had such a great sarcastic sense of humor. Jason was also a runner, as was I in high school and college. I remember when Jason was in Jr. High, he told me that one day he'd run in the Olympics, and I thought, "yeah right, kid!" Well, J went on to run in the Jr. Olympics, and later ran for Stanford and actually went on to the Olympic trials for the 10,000 meter run! He still runs to this day, something that I wish I still did.....but that another story.

Having moved from California to Chicago I didn't see my cousins all that much after college, especially since many of them moved out of state as well. Jason went to medical school in Ohio and would come visit us every year right around Thanksgiving so we were able to keep in touch more often. In the fall of 2008, Jason came out to Chicago for a conference and stayed with us. It was right around the time I found out there was a Vandercook press near me for which this woman was trying to find a new home. After boring Jason with a full explanation of what letterpress was and how excited this opportunity could be, he came with me to this woman's house to take a look. So naturally, four years later when he became engaged, it seems like a "full-circle" moment for me to be printing his wedding invitations! This invitation suite was completely designed by his uber-talented fiancée Grace, just wait until you see this map! We also used a QR code for the rsvp--that was really fun to be able to mix such old and new technologies.

Later this summer I'll be sure to post more photos of these gorgeous invitations!

Valentine's Day

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 04:52:00 +0000

A little sneak peek at a few things I'm working on for Valentine's Day....

Fiore Press featured on Oh So Beautiful Paper!

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 00:14:00 +0000

Click on the above photo to check out the entire blog entry! Or click here.

The fabulous Nole Garey Oh So Beautiful Paper featured Gabby's 4th birthday party invitations that I printed last Spring. It was so exciting to see my work featured on someone's blog--especially this one! If you've never heard of it, you must check it out. Nole features lots of talented printers' work, mostly letterpress. Thanks Nole!

Poppy + Fuchsia Party Invitations

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Mon, 23 May 2011 04:19:00 +0000

Homemade cupcakes for the special four-year-old! Recipe & frosting courtesy of Georgetown Cupcake--SO delicious! Marshmallow fondant was super easy to make too!

Britta & Dane's Wedding

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 02:04:00 +0000

Last year around this time, I had the pleasure of printing my sister-in-law Britta's wedding invitations. She is such a creative person, so it was such fun working with her. Britta and Dane's invitation suite included an invitation, r.s.v.p. card, accommodations card, thank you notes, and a map. The map is my absolute favorite part of the entire suite. Britta hand drew everything--from the little icons to handwriting the names of the streets and labeling points of interest! I told her we should turn her handwriting into a font (I still think we should Britts!). I absolutely love Evanston, and I know it also holds a special place in Britta's and her family's hearts, so that made this map that much more fun to create.

Click on the map below to enlarge it so you can see the printing detail up close!

This set was printed on a 110lb. all cotton/tree-free paper in kelly green. I also printed the place cards and table number cards....I'll post those in the next few days, check back soon!

Shower Invitations Part Three: Printing (2 color)

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 23:26:00 +0000

In the first two posts about printing these lovely shower invitations, I showed the design process for creating plates for letterpress, as well as how ink is mixed. This post will show the nitty gritty of the actual printing.

First thing's first: You have to ink up the press. You take the ink you oh-so-carefully mixed. I ended up lightening my ink up with some opaque white to match Paper Source's "Pool."

I simply dab it across the rollers evenly. Then when I turn the press on, the distribution rollers (so appropriately named) distribute the ink very evenly onto all the rollers. I usually let that run for about a minute or so (I've actually never timed it), until the ink is nicely coated on the rollers. You can also see if you need to put a little more ink here or there to make it even.

Below is a little video so you can see how it's done. You'll notice that there was ink already on the rollers. I was re-inking. You have to do that from time to time as you print. That's why with letterpress, some prints end up a little lighter or darker than the next.

After the ink is distributed evenly along all rollers and before pulling that first print, you must ink the form (which, in this case, is the photopolymer plate with our image). You put the press in "trip" mode and run it once down the bed of the press and back and it coats the plate with a very thin layer of ink. You'll notice that the base onto which the plate is adhered is gridded--that makes it a lot easier to line everything up. This is especially important in this case, since I'm printing two colors.

After adjusting the height on the form rollers (more on that later), I'm ready to print my first color! You can see in the video below....

After I'm done printing all the prints I need of the first color, I have to clean off all the ink from the rollers. This can take quite a bit of time and is why printing a 2 color job is a lot more expensive than a one color job. You really have to make sure all the ink is cleaned off so as to not accidentally mix it in with your next color.

After the ink is completely cleaned off, you're ready for the second color, which means using the second plate. This is where the gridded base comes in really handy. Depending on what I'm printing, I have crop marks on my plates to help me with registration as I line up the plate for the second color.

Below is a video of how the second color is printed. After each piece is printed, all that's left is cutting. Oh and lining the envelopes, gluing, addressing......

As you'll see in the photos below, I also printed the return address on the outer envelope flap as well as a little box on the front of the envelope where I wrote the destination addresses. Those were all done in red. After I finished with the second color of the invitations themselves, I set the press up for the printing the envelopes.

Well, I hope you enjoyed this little tutorial. There are many little details involved in the actual printing process, but this gives a pretty general overview. Please feel free to comment or send me an email {ciao@fiorepress.com} if you have any questions!

Nate & Morgan's Wedding

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 07:27:00 +0000

I had the privilege of printing wedding invitations for my close friend Nate's wedding this past fall. The invitations turned out beautifully and the couple was very happy! {*Photos 4 and 5 by Enrique Martinez.)

Shower Invitations Part Two: Mixing Ink for Letterpress

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 04:08:00 +0000

In the last blog post, I showed you how I prepare files for letterpress printing. In this post, I'll take you through the steps to mix the ink needed to print. For letterpress, you have the choice between rubber-based and oil-based, as well as soy inks. I personally prefer rubber-based ink, but I know many printers that use other types of ink and are happy with what they use for various reasons.

In the photo below I have a picture of the envelope and the liner I cut out for these shower invitations. I am going to be using two colors for my invitations, a red and a pool-colored ink. I already have the red mixed up, so here I'm mixing up "pool."

The color I'm using is Pantone 7464. The Pantone guide gives me a formula (see photo below) of what colors I need to mix, along with their ratios. So if you look closely, I need mostly white with a little bit of blue, and a tiny bit of yellow with an even tinier bit of black. The ink is thick and goopy, and it takes a little while to work through, but I was really happy with how the color came out on the first try. I might add just a tad more white to lighten the color up a bit.

A few notes on mixing ink for letterpress:

1. The Pantone guides are printed offset, so the color "recipe" is going to come out about a shade darker than the swatch you pick. It's usually a good idea to mix a shade lighter, that way it comes out just right.

2. Also with letterpress, most of us mix ink by hand. Some people use a scale to measure the parts, some buy the ink pre-mixed, and some mix it up by eye. I just figure the ratios of the colors I need and go from there. I've always been happy (and so have my clients) with the way the colors turn out.

3. It's a lot easier to darken up your color than to lighten it, in my opinion. I find that if a color calls for mostly white (like in this example), I will start off with white and slowly add in the other colors. Otherwise, it can take up a LOT of white to lighten the ink.

Questions about any of these posts? Just leave a comment and ask!

Shower Invitations Part One: Design & Platemaking

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 22:34:00 +0000

Many people are seem so perplexed as to how this whole letterpress thing works, so I thought that with this next project I'm working on, I'd do a series of posts on each of the steps taken to make letterpress prints. In this instance, I'll be using shower invitations I've designed and I'm going to print for my sister-in-law's bridal shower.

The first part is all on the computer. Most of what I've done is custom work for things like weddings, showers and baby announcements. It's very important to get a good sense of what kind of style the client likes (as well as what they don't like). In this case, my sister-in-law has no choice, because I'm one of the people throwing the shower for her. HA! I have a feeling she'll like these. Sometimes I create my own artwork, and sometimes I buy art in vector format. Unlike clip art, buying artwork as vector art makes it possible for me to easily make changes to the art to suit the client's needs. I liked this little cake because it looks Swedish, and my in-laws are Swedish. I was able to then separate the cake and put the text in between. You can see here that this will be a two-color job:

Once the design is all set, I send the file off to get plates made. In letterpress, if you design something on the computer, one of the options you have is to get photopolymer plates made of your design. Without going into too much detail, it's a thick piece of plastic that has your raised design in reverse so that all you have to do is adhere it to a metal base which brings everything to the correct height for printing. However, since you can only print one color at a time with letterpress, you need to separate your colors before making your plates (ie two plates for two colors, etc.). So if you look at my design above, I need to separate all the blue from the red. When I print, I'll lay down the plate with the cake first and print that, then clean off all the ink from the rollers and lay down my second plate that has the text and print that in red. This is why it is a lot more expensive to have invitations printed with two colors instead of one. Laying down that second plate can be tricky because of registration. When I print wedding invitations, I always print crop marks (as you can see below) because not only does it tell me where to cut, it helps me with registration on the second color.

Below you will see what my file looks like when I'm ready to send it off to get the plates made. You'll see that I've ganged up some other images that I will cut out and use for the outer envelope and the back of the invite.

It should also be noted that it is possible to make your plates exactly how you will be printing them (without separating) and physically cut the plates with scissors. I opted not to do that in this case since the text and the layers of the cake were so tight. I didn't feel like I would have enough room to cut in between, so I thought I'd play it safe and separate the plates.

Below is a close up of those cute little birdies.....

Got questions? Leave a comment and I'd be happy to answer!

Christmas Cards

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 05:04:00 +0000

Here are some shots of Christmas cards I printed this year.

This card was printed on Crane's Lettra 110lb. cotton paper in a navy blue and a lighter blue. I printed the lighter blue first, but in retrospect I should've made the lighter blue even lighter because I think it makes the text a bit more difficult to read. Minor detail, really!

My favorite part (besides the cuties in the photo) was the envelopes. I made a little box for the addresses and you'll also notice that the snowflake design spills over onto the flap where the return address is.

And lastly, I actually printed my logo on the back of the card, which I rarely do. With letterpress, you have to be careful when printing on both sides. If you want a really deep impression, which is what everyone seems to want now, it will sort of "punch" through to the back side. I found a good balance with this card where I felt that I got a good impression and was still able to print that small logo on the back.

Overall, I love the way these turned out. Very crisp!

Valentine's Card

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 03:28:00 +0000

Well that hiatus lasted a lot longer than expected, so I'm hoping to post more frequently in 2010! I have some exciting things in the works so I'm anxious to show you all as they are happening. I'm in the process of co-designing a wedding invitation suite with my fabulous betrothed sister-in-law. She is really creative so it's been fun to be able to work together on this. I think I might make her mix some ink so she can get a feel for the process just a bit--hope that's ok with you Britts!

Here are some Valentine's cards I actually printed last week. They are for sale in my Etsy shop now, click here to buy! They say, "I love you" in Swedish.

These cards are A2 (4.25 x 5.5") folded, and are printed on a natural white 100% cotton, tree-free paper with a matching natural white envelope.

Hiatus

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 04:02:00 +0000

Hello friends!

It's been a while! It's been a very busy summer--after 3 sets of custom wedding invitations, 2 custom save-the-dates and 1 round of custom baby announcements, I'm still here! I'll post fotos soon. For now, check out my very first listing on etsy! Yes, I know it's very age and gender specific, but it's a darn cute card! More to come!

A few more peeks...

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 03:59:00 +0000

This summer's been so busy with custom projects that I haven't had time to print greeting cards from all the plates I made earlier this spring. Today though, before I cleaned the rollers, I thought I'd throw on a few plates just to run a few test prints. The first one is a personalized notecard for a very sweet little 4-year-old girl {who also happens to be my cousin's daughter} named Caitlynn. She actually drew this darling bee and her super creative mom Nikki, who runs five.thirty.one.design, finished the design. I can't wait to print the real ones! It will be in black ink, but I had brown on the press here.....

This one below will be a happy birthday card {ya think?}, but I will use a more cheery color. The design will run off the card I'm thinking, so you won't see the full circle. Can't wait to post the real one when it's made. Maybe someday soon I'll have some cards to put on the etsy site.....Anyway, this was me having fun with some pretty cool tools in Illustrator to make the design. Any suggestions for colors?

Is it too early for Valentine's Day?

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 04:12:00 +0000

Here are a two greeting cards I ran a test print of today. The first one means "I love you" in Swedish and the second one my 4-year-old came up to me and said out of the blue, "Mommy, I heart you." I thought it was so sweet it needed to be printed on a card!

Dahlia Save the Dates

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 18:40:00 +0000

I finished these save the dates I was working on this weekend and they came out so beautiful {if I do say so myself!}! The orange and blue go so nicely together. Here are a few photos....all that's left is for them to be cut. And now, I'll be taking a little printing break while I send my rollers off to be recovered. Hopefully I'll get over the separation anxiety and they'll be back before I know it!

Another Sneak Peek!

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Sun, 31 May 2009 15:19:00 +0000

This week I've been working on some save-the-date cards for a very lovely couple who are getting married this Fall. This save-the-date will be two colors, an orange/poppy color with navy blue text. This shows the progression from plate to finished piece of the first color. To apply the second color, the ink must be cleaned off the rollers, a new plate set up, registration set up and then all the sheets need to be fed one by one again with the new color on the rollers. It's a lot of work, but well worth the effort! I love how these are turning out so far. Stay tuned for the finished piece!

A close up of the dahlia printed in a poppy color. Sorry, the photos don't do these beautiful pieces justice!

Sneak Peek

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Fri, 08 May 2009 04:27:00 +0000

Here's a little sneak peak at just a few of the designs I've been working on. Today I sent the files in to get some plates made, so I look forward to printing these soon!

happy birthday + personalized stationery

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 18:54:00 +0000

I got to printing some more this weekend and was experimenting with some color. I will be putting these *happy birthday* cards in my etsy shop soon, so stay tuned!

What's that saying about a cobbler's family whose shoes are always in need of repair? I figured I would treat myself {and my daughter} and print us up some of our own personalized stationery. This monogrammed card has a reverse effect--the solid purple area is printed, leaving the monogram itself to sort of *pop.* And let's give it up for rounded corners......doesn't everything look better with rounded corners?
Here are some cards I printed for my daughter. It had to be in pink, of course!

happy birthday cards

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 12:57:00 +0000

I was glad to be able to do some printing yesterday!

press in action

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 20:49:00 +0000

I took a little video of the press here posted below to show exactly how the carriage moves down the bed of the press and how the automatic paper return tower works {so awesome!}. The tapes on the tower are to hold and carry the paper down and back. For what I was printing tonight, one of the tapes is moved over to the side so that it wouldn't get in the way {and therefore crush} the image on the plate.

moving right along....

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 04:02:00 +0000

For those of you that know {and/or care!} about the process of letterpress printing as well as the maintenance of a printing press, I'll post some photos of my new press and the things I am doing to get it ready for printing. The gripper bar is the part of the press that grips the paper as it carries it over the cylinder and down the bed of the press. It was pretty dirty and would stick, so I took the whole assembly apart and cleaned it.

all taken apart

soaking in a Simple Green bath

all clean!

Ciao!

noreply@blogger.com (Fiore Press) — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 01:53:00 +0000

Welcome to the official blog of Fiore Press! This has been a very exciting adventure for me and I'm thrilled to finally bring this all to life. Soon I will post some sneak previews of some new things I've been working on, but first thing's first. Have you ever tried moving an 1800lb. piece of printing equipment into your basement? Well, it's definitely harder than it looks! We used Ed Regan {from Regan Printing Machinery Movers} and he is the guy to use! After much research, we are very happy we chose Ed to move our press. He and his son did an amazing job. Here are some photos from the move. Waiting to be loaded onto the truck....

Ready to make the 15 minute drive to its new home!

How cool is this? They had it made for them--if you look closely, you can see the date it was made...

Since there are steps leading up to the doorway, they had to jack up the press little by little and put blocks underneath to raise it. This took a LONG time!

The press was anchored to a trailer.

About ready to make it down the stairs.

On its way down....

Almost there! Skids are waiting at the bottom....

Here's the press after they put the cylinder and the tower back on. There is an automatic paper return on this press {so awesome!} and this photo was taken as it was making its return to the feed board.

If you'd like to see all the pictures from the move, you can see them here on flickr. Until next time!