Letterpress Fundamentals: Six-week Course

Thin Ice Press is running a six-week course in letterpress printing this winter, from Wednesday 4 February to Wednesday 11 March. It's an in-depth introduction, so it works for absolute beginners as well as people who've dabbled a bit and want to get a proper grip on the craft. The sessions run on six consecutive Wednesday evenings from 18:00 to 20:30, and the whole thing is limited to eight places.

Letterpress is a slow, tactile way of printing. You set metal type by hand, lock it up into a forme, and print on tabletop Adana presses. It's a far cry from anything digital, and that's the point: you're working with physical characters and ink on paper. The course is taught by Nick Gill and Phil Treble, two printers who live and breathe this stuff. Gill is a full-time letterpress printer, typefounder and book artist who casts his own type at Effra Press & Typefoundry; he's also Printer in Residence at the University of York and Master Printer at Thin Ice Press, and was named England Maker of the Year at the 2024 Heritage Crafts Awards. Treble is a typographer, letterpress printer and bookbinder with over 15 years' experience publishing fine press books and printing typographic art prints under the name Muttons & Nuts, following work for Cambridge University Press, Penguin Books and Sotheby's.

Thin Ice Press itself is a well-equipped printing and printmaking studio in the heart of York, trading as the York Centre for Print. They run workshops in letterpress, linocut, risograph and bookbinding, alongside regular clubs, equipment hire and exhibition space. Their letterpress sessions let you set metal type, lock up a forme and print on Adana presses, and the centre runs children's sessions led by Director Professor Helen Smith.

The course costs £350, which covers the six weeks of tuition, a Thin Ice Press printer's apron to keep, all your materials, and tea and coffee. With only eight places, it's a small group, so you'll get plenty of one-on-one time with Gill and Treble. If you've ever wanted to see how a page is actually built from the ground up, this is a good place to start.