The story of the cat book continues.
Tue 22nd Jan 2013
The limited edition, hand-printed ‘Night School for Cats’ is completed. In fact Serena Smith and I finished off all the printing, including the cover, back on the 5th November. So much for my 2012 New Years resolution to keep people informed of the book’s progress. I made no such rash commitments this New Year.
I think Serena and I were both rather agog that it was finished when we pulled the last copy of the cover off the stone. We celebrated by clinking our mugs of tea together.
After a few weeks in the drying stack I returned home with the precious cargo to start the unnerving job of cutting. This took a surprisingly long time and, many scalpels later, I folded and sewed the books together and they are now under heavy weights. This has been the perfect winter pursuit. I am very proud of my small stack of books and now even more in awe of the early book printers
I added colour to five of the copies that were printed on Heritage paper. Not every cat is coloured, but there is a smattering throughout the book. I cut the cat shapes out of clear plastic acetate and then rolled these very fiddly little pieces up individually in ginger and grey colours placing them onto correct cat before putting though an etching press.
During the printing Katherine Brown LPW’s administrator and in-house film wizard, filmed a short sequences of each page being printed. This is in the process of being edited and will soon be available to see on my website and the LPW website. A DVD of the film will be given away with each hand printed book so the new owners can see the labour and process involved in making their copy.
I am now entertaining myself making some very hand-made sketchbooks from the off-cuts. They are not as beautiful or as professional as the books made by my fellow Leicester Print Work-shopper Sarah Kirby, but they are jolly and are a ‘waste not want not’ exercise. They will be presents for family and friends who need to appear grateful even if really they are the ‘want nots’!
Plans for a grand book launch at LPW are in progress, but late spring is as precise as I can be at present. Various things are going on in the background such as the film and changes to my website on the Hütte press page. I will let everyone know by email, post, smoke signals, shouting and in these news bulletins.
