A new feature I want to include into this blog experiment is to display my love and collection of different pieces of design. From my camera collection to my antique printing materials to pieces of artwork to design books I highly recommend even if they collect dust on your coffee table.
To kick this off, I will introduce you to my Helvetica Bold Italic 14 pt Lead Alloy typeset I purchased off of eBay.

If you arn’t familiar with lead type, it was used to print anything from newspapers to magazines to everything in between.
Each letter (which was backwards to accomidate for a legible end product) would be aligned and formed into words and then the group of words would have ink rolled over top so it would hit the top surface (letter area). Then a piece of paper would be strategically placed on top of the type area, ran through a pressured press which would transfer the ink to the paper, and wha la you have a letterpressed piece of document.
Too bad you have to roll ink over top of the area almost every time you print. Thinking about how labor-intensive this could have been blows my mind and makes me appreciate my Canon laser printer that much more.
If you’re interested to learn more click here . Enjoy!
Filed under: machines, Old School , design, letterpress