Type foundry digitally preserves vintage stationer’s lettering styles

[Guest editor: Tamye Riggs]

The Sweet collection is composed of typefaces based on the engraver’s lettering styles that came into fashion at the beginning of the twentieth century. The collection is anchored by Sweet Sans, Mark van Bronkhorst’s interpretation of the engraver’s sans serif (kin to the drafting alphabets popularized in the early 1900s).

A type designer based in the San Francisco Bay Area, Van Bronkhorst had long been a fan of these historic faces, many of which had all but disappeared from use. A few cuts of the engraver’s sans style existed in digital form, including Sacker’s Gothic (Monotype Imaging) and Engraver’s Gothic (Bitstream), but these interpretations were somewhat limited in their scope.

Van Bronkhorst sought to study the original forms in depth. As a graphic designer, he had worked with an engraving house in the past, and was aware that stationers and engravers used “masterplates” as lettering patterns, tracing letterforms with a pantograph device to manually transfer the forms to what would become the printing plate. He began hunting for masterplates, but found that most had been destroyed as engraving shops converted to digital typography. The majority of these shops had abandoned the tedious masterplate-tracing process in favor of more expedient photographic processes where “pretty much any digital font would do,” Van Bronkhorst says. He decided it would be a good idea to preserve the masterplate lettering styles—some good, some bad, some ugly—as they seemed otherwise destined to disappear unless interpreted as digital fonts.

After doing some digging, Van Bronkhorst discovered a stash of antique masterplates. With Linnea Lundquist, he commenced work on the first typeface in the Sweet range—Sweet Upright Script—likely the first digital version of this vintage social engraving design.

Van Bronkhorst then turned his attention to the engraver’s sans. Sweet Sans hearkens back to the same or similar masterplates as Sacker’s Gothic. Upon close inspection, various masterplates of what would seem the same letterforms varied considerably. The process of interpreting the design was one of selecting various forms and characteristics while leaving others out. The engraver’s sans was typically a cap-to-small-cap combination, yet a lowercase model did exist. Van Bronkhorst decided that Sweet’s interpretation would be broad, including lowercase and small caps, and in weights from Hairline to Heavy, with true italics. The result is a nine-weight sans family that pays homage to the charm and dignity of its model.

Encouraged by the positive response to the first releases, Van Bronkhorst is expanding the Sweet Sans family with a slightly modernized version, and plans to continue to gradually introduce more vintage stationer’s lettering styles in digital form. His goal is to carefully build a collection that accurately represents the genre while offering type users a variety of styles to suit their needs.

The Sweet collection of fonts is available at http://mvbfonts.com.

Save the Date: Thursday June 16 @ TDC in NYC

Nancy will explain why the organic nature of steel die and copper plate engraved imagery and text complements and enhances our visual experiences, and will demonstrate the importance of engraving as a modern graphic design technique. She will show examples from several avid collectors of elegant and unique engraved imagery, and share her expertise on engraving techniques and methodology. She will also describe the recent installation of a working engraving proofing press and the establishment of a new and growing engraving community in the great American city beneath the sea (New Orleans).

Nancy Sharon Collins is especially well-known for her exemplary bespoke hand-engraved social stationery. Besides being a stationer, she is a veteran graphic designer, typographer, independent print history scholar, partner in Collins, LLC, director of special projects for the AIGA New Orleans chapter, and instructor of design at Southeastern Louisiana University. Her book about American commercial engraving is due out in the autumn of 2012.

For details and to make a reservation.

“Allied Oil” courtesy of Strathmore archives, Mohawk Fine Paper, Cohoes, NY; Monogram © Richard Sheaff; “D” monogram engraved by Emily DeLorge.

Engraving Workshop

I am giving an engraving workshop at Loyola University New Orleans. This is a breezy overview of what is contemporary, commercial “engraving”:

Friday, March 18 @ 6:00pm
Loyola University New Orleans
Media Room 1.
Monroe Library

(This same workshop was recently given at:

Tuesday, March 1 @ 5:00pm
Southeastern Louisiana University
Mac Lab
East Stadium)

Each workshop includes:

•    what is engraving and why do we love it.
•    historic specimens of weird and fantastic engraving.
•    contemporary applications for engraving.
•    how to prepare art for engraving, and the various kinds of “engraving”.
•    how to engrave…
•    …or, how to work with an engraver (so you just have to design and leave the engraving to somebody else.)
•    engraving resources (so, I have this engraving-appropriate art. now, how and to whom do I send it to get it “engraved”?).

Students of host university, ATypI, SOTA and AIGA members free; moderate fees may apply for non-members and students of other institutions.

Inaugural Meeting of Louisiana Engravers Society

Thursday, January 6, in Jennifer Rice’s Innisfree office at 729 East Boston Street in Covington, the inaugural meeting of the Louisiana Engravers Society met. This is a landmark event because engraving for print is almost a dead art. Nancy Sharon Collins of Covington and Yvette Rutledge of New Orleans have banded together to formalize the growing group of engraving enthusiasts whom they meet and who practice here in south Louisiana. Together, they have made it their mission to not only keep this venerable, exquisite art form alive but also encourage its growth by introducing it to younger generations. Highlights were meeting and networking, learning and sharing information and resources, especially sharing technical innovations. Sam Alfano demonstrated the work he has been doing creating digital translations of ornate engraved scroll designs, a process that took him three years to perfect (you can see some on his website.)

Engraving is the most beautiful form of printing known; think of Old Masters prints, those portraits and landscapes made-up of thousands of tiny lines, that’s engraving. Albrecht Dürer was a master engraver, Raphael and Rubens allowed master engravers to copy their work thus increasing the market for their famous paintings. While etching has come to be the prevalent form of intaglio printing practiced in the fine art, printmaking world, engraving has fallen out of favor because it takes 6-10 years to become a master! (The difference between etching and engraving is that in etching, acid is used to make the “cut” while engravers literally cut into the surface of the metal to form designs. The similarity is that the printing process is then the same; ink is worked into the “cuts”. the excess wiped clean, and a print then pulled. Several etching artists are represented at the St. Tammany Art Association where their work can be seen). These days, engraving is best known on the currency carried in our wallets, all our postage stamps used to be engraved, and fancy social stationery and wedding invitations are still engraved. However, we have master engravers right here in our community and several students locally who want to learn.

Participants included Yvette Rutledge and Vince Mitchell, co-directors of the New Orleans Center for Lettering Arts and Mystic Blue Signs (Rutledge is herself a master letter and engraver), Nancy Sharon Collins, bespoke hand engraved social stationer (who also teaches graphic design at Southeastern Louisiana University), the Alfonos (Sam is a master gun and jewelry engraver), Cordelle Louvier, master printer, Emily DeLorge (graphic designer and engraving apprentice) and Skye Jenkins and Alex Babbit (enthusiastic students wanting to learn.) Noel Martin, local master stationery engraver, was unable to attend at the last minute but was present in spirit. Alfono offers engraving classes for jewelry engraving and Rutledge will be offering an engraving class for print, jewelry and metal work this coming fall.

http://www.nancysharoncollinsstationer.com/
www.mysticbluesigns.com
http://www.masterengraver.com/
http://www.jenniferrice.net/
photo: Kyle Petrozza http://www.kylepetrozza.com/

Is Engraving Important to Design Education?

Saturday, October 16 at 2:00 pm
Session IV, Panel 3

The American Printing History Association 35th Annual Conference
Corcoran College of Art + Design
Corcoran Gallery of Art, 500 Seventeenth St. NW
Washington, DC

(This presentation was first given in Dublin at the 2010 ATypeI Conference.)

Although rarely studied in today’s classroom, commercial engraving for print is a vital element in the teaching of graphic design and media studies at the college and university level. This notion, which will be explored in the proposed presentation, is based on more than a decade of independent study of steel die and copper plate engraving, the recent installation of a working engraving proofing press within the Loyola University of New Orleans graphic design department and the establishment of a new and growing engraving community in New Orleans. This is the first new and only robust commercial print engraving community in North America.

The legacy through which we have studied, and viewed, graphic design, typography and the book arts primarily has been through the lens of the letterpress form. For over 500 years, almost all of our print communication was fashioned within this framework and according to a specific, or implied grid (grid being the series of units aligning both vertically and horizontally in an intentional, recognizable pattern). In the western world, almost every description of commercial visual communication is presented in this format; books, newspapers, periodicals, even the orientation and navigation of websites depend on a grid for their structure.

Engraving, on the other hand, is a fluid, free-hand expression restricted only by the perimeter of the surface upon which an engraving is worked. The exquisite beauty and gracefulness of arcs and shading inherent in the engraved line is unparalleled and had become, until very recently, an unfortunately moribund craft.

This twenty minute presentation addresses ways in which the organic nature of steel die and copper plate engraved imagery and text complement and enhance visual experience, why and how engraving is a central part of any modern graphic design curriculum, and dynamic ways that it can be introduced in the classroom. By providing examples of elegant and unique engraved imagery, we can inspire the next generation of visual thinkers to keep this important art form alive.

© 2010 Nancy Sharon Collins

Hand Engraved Social Stationery Article on Ephemera Site

Great article about what is engraving for the American social stationery trade on American Ephemera Society website:

http://www.ephemerasociety.org/articles/collins.html

New Year’s Hangover Special: Throw a Party!

Invite your nearest and dearest friends over for some post-holiday libations. Make the invitation the right way with this set of 4 hand engraved fold-over Cocktail cards on white 100% cotton rag stock, 3.5″ X just under 5″. $12.50 plus postage.

4 matching envelopes included.

Visit the engraving lady’s store, Petite Suite, at Felt & Wire for details.

Hand Engraved Samples & Press Proofs in VOGUE’s Blog

“Need to Know” section of Vogue magazine’s online zine by Stephanie LaCava and edited by Virginia Tupker.

This features re-purposed, vintage, hand engraved dies. They are goofy and some with nifty old type. http://petitesuite.wordpress.com./

Calligraphic Engraving

This past week I spent researching calligraphic engraving at the Harry Ransom Center (HRC) at University of Texas at Austin. HRC archives hold many copybook (or copy book) specimens, three “The Universal Penman” by George Bickham, great master of this highly specialized craft in 18th-century England, one beautiful copy is in the fabulous bound Beaufoy, H.B.H., collection of English, German and Dutch writing manuals.

I examined over 1,460 individual engraved plates either bound or tipped-in to these books or the Beaufoy collection.  There are exquisite examples of engraved calligraphy but of greater interest to me was being able to look at the structure of engraved letter forms.  I was able to bring with me, and use, the 3X photographic loop, with excellent optics, so was able to see some great detail.

I will be writing my observations here in my blog.  Meanwhile, anyone interested in the genre can go to this bibliography about origins of letter forms including writing and copy books:

http://ihl.enssib.fr/siteihl.php?page=45&aflng=fr.

Also, a reasonable copy, offset not engraved, of Bickham’s “Universal Penman” can be bought as a Dover edition for fairly cheap.

My favorite specimen was a complete book by Snell, about 4-5 characters per page, 13 plates in all illustrating the entire alphabet.  At the end of which (and I could not tell if it is part of the Snell book or a random, tipped-in item) was a grid comparing each character in the alphabet for Roman, Italick [sic], two kinds of script, “secretary”, “church”, engrossing and several other forms of types.

I will post pictures in the coming weeks, it takes four to six (weeks) for the HRC to process orders for scanning copies.

Love Letters: American Commercial Engraving, Monograms and Social Stationery

Please join me at University of Texas at Austin for the most recent rendition of this evolving presentation about American commercial engraving.

Tuesday September 22

6:00pm–7:30pm

Art Building, Room ART 1.120

This lecture will include images from recent research and sources of commercial engraving and specifications for engraving types never before shown in public or discussed.

http://aigaaustin.org/events/2009/09/detail/414/