Stumptown Printers by Monocle

[libertango]

Hey, pub-your-ish, old-time-technology, lead-type, hand-cranked, small-personal-business people (I'm looking at you, gerisullivan and fringefaan)... Monocle magazine has a great video report about Stumptown Printers in Portland, OR that you should see.

Monocle's interesting in general. If there can be such a thing as "Davos Man," then I suggest there can be such a thing as "FT 'Weekend' Person" -- and Monocle has that niche down pat. I may never be able to afford it, but it's interesting to get a look in now and then.

Comments

[randy-byers.livejournal.com]

Thanks, Hal. I seem to have a hard time finding time to watch video on the internet, but I will try to get back to this. (Hadn't realized that Stumptown was an old nickname for Portland, by the way. Seeing this company name jogged my curiosity because of Stumptown Coffee.)

[gerisullivan.livejournal.com]

Interesting, Hal. Thanks!

There's lots of that old equipment out there. Not just a few decades old, but back to the late 1800s, early 1900s old. Even printers that are filled with modern digital equipment and its totally amazing digital dots often have an ancient Heidelberg press for invitations and other small, handcrafted runs. The unique thing about Stumptown Printers is the market they're serving.

Press proofing it totally awesome. (The part where they talked about customers coming in and watching the process.) Laurie Toby Edison and I spent two days in rural Manitoba press proofing the cover and interior pages of Familiar Men.

[stevegreen.livejournal.com]

I would so like to work there...

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

To me the most fascinating thing about the Stumptown piece is the sense of replicating fandom that attaches to it. One of the two company founders talks about moving to California as a teenager and discovering zines and underground culture, and the whole idea that anyone, simply anyone, can write down their subjective experience and find the handcrafted means to publish it and put it out there into the infosphere. And one of the ways that business has been growing for Stumptown is by weird, semi-underground personal networks. The result is letter-press CD cases, but the process is a lot like fanzines.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Yes, it does seem like a very cool work environment, doesn't it?