the whirring sound of the Heidelberg Press made us truly feel that we were in a printing house

I fell in love with letterpress from the very first lesson. I am sure this is true for anyone who has held type in the palm of their hand and felt its reassuring weight. It demands your full attention and slows down time. Finding and placing the letters one by one is like learning to read and write all over again, while learning about the invisible elements that hold it all together is discovering a hidden language.

My first lesson in letterpress took place at Sektor30 on 26th November 2022. The workshop Introduction to Letterpress Typography was presented by Efstathios Maggos, Specialized Technical Laboratory Staff at the Typography workshop of the School of Fine Arts.

Through an engaging slide show, Efstathios Maggos led us through a brief history of Typography from Johannes Gutenberg 1450 until today, the role of paper and the different printing techniques.

We then moved onto the fun bit. Printing.

Practice in typesetting. Composing and locking movable type in the chase of the press. Proof printing and corrections.

The chase was taken to the Heidelberg Windmill. Together with Ilias Koen of Sektor30 the press was prepared for printing, further adjustments to the text were made and the final printing run begun. Another colour was added. The whirring sound of the Heidelberg Press made us truly feel that we were in a printing house.