‘Movable Type’
‘Movable Type’
My initial fascination with typography came to me while I was studying graphic design in college. I think the (then) unrecognized perfectionist in me found comfort in the metrics of how fonts were created. After becoming a jeweler, I later learned there was a historical connection and relationship between typography and goldsmithing.
That relationship was crossed when Johannes Gutenberg, a former goldsmith and gem cutter, introduced the reusable ‘Movable Type’ printing system in the 15th century. Along with the introduction of the new printing system, Gutenberg discovered a way to cast individual letters and characters in metal as opposed to the previous tedious and expensive technique of hand carving phrases and whole pages into wood blocks for print.
The Movable Type printing system was built up of cast metal blocks, with only one upraised (reversed) character per block; either a letter, number or punctuation mark. They were used to build literature for print—character by character (block by block)—and lined up on a flat tray called a composing block. Once your desired literature was composed on the block, it would then be inked, put into a press and printed (or pressed) into paper; also known as letterpress printing.
Before the Movable Type printing system was introduced, printing literature was done by ‘Block-Printing’ with each block printing a whole page at a time. An entire page was hand carved into one wood block and then it were inked and stamped into paper. This method of printing became very expensive and inefficient over time because the blocks were discarded after one use.
Gutenberg’s invention was revolutionary for the world of print so, I set out to give honor to a piece of our history.
Here we have ‘Movable Type’ modeled from my favorite sans serif—an imprint taken directly from my antique collection of metal type-setting blocks.
Completed on February 13, 2021
Set completion time [fabrication] — 58 hours
Set completion time [photography] — 12 hours
Ready to ship numbers available February 18, 2021 at 11a.m. PST
Numbers 1 through 9—one of each
(Above) 19th century metal movable type blocks for letterpress printing. Cast in an alloy of tin, lead and antimony.
(Above) A composing block built up of Gutenbergs Movable cast metal type.