Type and Lines: Type looks fabulous in letterpress, but we recommend you use 8 point minimum, and your lines should be thicker than .25 point. Please avoid using rows of dots, or any kind of hairline (these are vulnerable in the photo-polymer plate-making and print process). Text is best from Illustrator, rather than Photoshop. Artwork must be black & white – no grey or colour.

Artwork: Our preferred way to receive your artwork is as a print-ready PDF. We require one pdf per colour plate you specify.  They should be 100% black CMYK, all text turned to paths, with crop marks at 2mm.  Vector images (from Illustrator or InDesign) work well in letterpress.  We’re not keen on Photoshop creations – the raster images are blurry, and the type is not crisp enough to achieve a great print in letterpress.. Please avoid submitting greyscale images. If you’re not sure, please contact us or send through your artwork for consideration – we’re very happy to advise.

Colours: We work with Pantone uncoated spot colours. These are mixed by hand, and although there may be a slight variation depending on the stock you’ve chosen, we work really hard to match the printed ink with your colour choice.  We can also colour match to a swatch you supply, or piece of fabric.

Large Solid or Reverse Areas: These are not recommended for letterpress printing, as the nature of the printing process usually results in a colour fade or mottled effect.

Blind Debossing: this is a beautiful letterpress effect achieved by printing without ink. It requires it’s own plate, so please keep this in mind when producing your final artwork.

Perforating, Scoring, Die-Cutting , Creasing Debossing and Embossing: These are all available to you – please ask us about rates for your job. Perforating, scoring and die-cutting is done on the Heidelberg press.

We’re happy to talk through any of these aspects, or anything else letterpress related. Contact us here.

Because of the lengthy process of Letterpress, we have a print turnaround of 10-15 working-days.