Zeichen Press – Page 26 – Design & Letterpress for the people.

Letterpress for you, Minneapolis! (And the Greater Twin Cities Metropolitan Area)

The�No-Coast Craft-O-Rama�is behind us and – like so many weekends – it’s all a blur.

I do remember Jen yelling “yahtzee!” whenever someone ordered the Show Special (two eggs, a slice of bacon and Texas toast with a dozen cards). And I remember feeling drunk with power. The top-selling card of the weekend was:

That tells me that Minneapolis is full of a lot of weirdos. Like me.

This card was also a big seller:

And that tells me�that Minneapolis is full of a lot of moral ambiguity.

That reminds me! We had a snowstorm on Friday!

Luckily nobody had to eat anyone else to survive. Whew, right? That would not have been great for sales.

December 7, 2010
Would You Rather?/No-Coast Craft-O-Rama

Would you rather have your significant other’s hands be replaced with Flounders OR your lips be replaced with a duckbill?

That’s a toughy.

How about:�Would you rather have to wear a Kiss the Cook apron everyday (for the rest of your life) OR a multi-colored clown wig?

Sorry about that.

Okay, would you rather do your holiday shopping at the Midtown Market – where there will be 100 venders, vending beautiful/original handmade goodness – the air filled with the smells of exotic foods and the spirit of gift-giving??? OR maybe you’d rather sit at your computer and click on an Add To Cart button??

We’ll see you there! Zeichen Press is at table E-35!

December 3, 2010
Trading letterpress cards for cash

The�Big No-Coast show�is only 5 days away.To prepare ourselves, Jen and I are watching hour after hour of training videos. We have found that the only way we can really get into the spirit of a craft show is with a Dolly Parton soundtrack. But I’m sure that’s true for everyone.

November 28, 2010
We want to be more than just friends with: i like you

i like you�–> 501 First Ave. NE Minneapolis, MN 55413

The first in a new series devoted to (not racially) profiling shops that carry Zeichen Press goods. I can assure you, it won’t be the last.

Sarah and Angela (or is it Angela and Sarah?)

are craft benefactors. Every square inch of their shop is filled with sweetness via craftiness. The gals (that’s what I call them – I’m sure they call me something) have packed all of the fun (and none of the lunch tables) of an urban craft fair into their North East shop. It’s a wonder to behold…

October 21, 2010
Letterpress studio in Minneapolis meets Apartment Therapy in New York, the Streets Run With Blood

Where was Apartment Therapy when I lived in an apartment?? I could have used some advice — My television sat on two empty Old Milwaukee cases and the only chair was my bed. I guess my source of income (cat breeding, just kidding. Grocery bagging. Just kidding. Stripping.) didn’t really provide a lot of extra money for decorating anyway. See “Tater Tots, Kings Wine Bar, Letterpress, Deer John”�
Every year, Apartment Therapy branches out of their usual home decorating palette to recognize�“the best” letterpress cards.�This year, we made the cut. I’d like to thank all of the families that send out those creepy holiday newsletters – you are an inspiration.�You know who you are.

October 21, 2010
Letterpress in the heart of the beast

The car was packed and I squeezed myself between a card rack, a change box, some stuffed animals and one dozen boxes. I was just lucky there was room for me at all. Okay? OKAY?

Jen and I have gotten pretty good at setting up for a show. It goes like this: I ask Jen which cards I should put where. She tells me. I do it. She dismantles what I did and does it a different way. It’s very efficient.

All the big names (in printmaking) were at MCBA on Thursday for the�Mid America Print Council Conference Press Fair. Jenni Undis (of�Lunalux) and I put on our roller skates and got into a battle – it ended with lots of hair-pulling and some teeth (hers) on the floor. It was worth it because I earned the title of “Letterpress Queen.” Maybe next year, Jenni.�Maybe next year.

A fair wouldn’t be complete without, at least, one doppelganger:

What a pleasant stalker!

OH,�ALSO:�Miss Amy Jo�was there! Good Lord, her work makes me love her.�I’m sorry you had to hear that, Miss Amy Jo.�

October 16, 2010

Nightmare/Retreat

I’ve been told that it’s important to take a break � get in the car, hop on a plane, inject yourself with propofol � whatever it takes. I love free advice � remember when everyone told me to get my cat fixed? She�did�die but I hate dwelling on details.

Anyway, I decided to take that break…

Step one was important and involved shaving the dog.

This took about two hours because she insists on wearing the wig.

Step two involved tuna-salad.�That’s self-explanatory.

And step three was spent poring over maps. This step was critical because, for some reason, I would be the person driving the car.�“WHAT?!”�you say. And rightly so.

Yes, for two and a half hours, my passengers/prisoners sat with clenched jaws, praying for safe passage or a quick, painless death.

Praise the Lord, prayers were answered, tuna salad was consumed, ticks were pulled, and screens were repaired.

It was only 24 hours, but it felt longer. If someone you love is diagnosed with a terminal illness and wants to make their life feel like it’s dragging on and on, send them to a place without flushing toilets � a place where you are forced to haul your own water to pour into the toilet bowl so the toilet will (magically) flush.

The drive home was terrifying and I gripped the steering wheel like a scrap of wood floating by a freshly wrecked ship. If the other drivers on 35W only knew my fear, they would have given me my own lane and maybe a police escort.

June 14, 2012
Free-Range Franimals

Off-key Christmas carols float dreamily through the Summer air, the ice-cream truck trolls for kids using low-fi audio technology. Water-balloons are filled, teams are picked (bubble gum, bubble gum, in a dish, how many pieces do you wish?) but distractions are everywhere and soon talk turns from who is on which team to pretend lands filled with orphaned children. Poor, parentless children, left to cobble together meals from mint leaves and wild rhubarb.

Summertime, and the children and animals are off-leash � days are filled with sprinklers, wet bathing suits, hot dogs burned on the grill, and day dreaming.

Here’s a new card:

June 9, 2012
Freaktastic.

They were born not as two, but one. Cut from the belly of a woman who was hardly human. Her womb, an experimental lab � a petri dish, an incubator of life not fit for earthly habitation. But life, still.�

Strange!

No, not strange:

June 5, 2012
Gratitude & Regret

Like�Bread & Pickle�(LOVE their lattes) but it serves turkey chowder in an air-sickness bag.�

Life is full of gratitude and regret. Both should be acknowledged.�Hopefully via a Zeichen Press card.�I am sure that if we all thoroughly examined our consciences, we would discover a whole room of regret. That room would be furnished with a urine-stained futon, a musty trunk, and an ash tray.�That’s sad!

CONVERSELY, the gratitude room is full of Daylilies and cookie jars.

Here are some cards for both occasions:�And don’t act like you don’t need both cards.

We still love you.

June 1, 2012
Speaking of Snakes

There was a pet store in my neighborhood�(Petcetera)�that had all kinds of fascinating creatures. The best creature was a full-size (5 feet, from snout to tip of tail) alligator in a steel tub. The tub had a makeshift screen cover so that the alligator couldn’t escape.

A screen cover.�

So the ALLIGATOR couldn’t escape.

I think it was drugged anyway � it just laid there, blinking it’s beautiful eyes.

Of course there were snakes, and I don’t know much about snakes, but what I�do�know is pretty scientifically accurate.�When snakes speak, they drag out their s’s.�They’re usually pretty shy but if you give one a frozen mouse they are your friend for at least 5 seconds.

May 30, 2012
Wanted: Design Pimp

It was a fat PVC pipe, coated in Crisco, pitched at a 25� angle and suspended over a pit filled with filthy water. A $5 bill was clipped to the high end and my job was to shimmy my way to it.�(Why am I always shimmying poles?)�With my glasses pushed tight to my face, my stringy blonde hair moved back and forth as I slid myself toward my goal. I wore my lucky shorts � Granny Smith green with pink piping � and “my 4th of July” shirt � red and blue striped off-brand Izod.

A crowd gathered.

I wanted that $5 and the glory that came with it. With that $5, I could buy enough candy to satisfy my aching sweet tooth and with that glory came a lifetime of bragging rights.�“The greased pole in the Hollow in Barnstable? Yeah, I did that.”

I entered a competition today. This one does not involve poles, pits, or Crisco. It does involve money and Jen and I have both agreed that we will do (almost) anything for money.

Uncommon Goods�invited us to submit designs for an iPhone case and after slathering myself in Crisco, I submitted some designs. I know you’ve�seen these before. I’m really into recycling.

May 26, 2012
Hang Your Skirt On The Flagpole Day

I know that Native Americans can anticipate the change of seasons by paying close attention to the subtle signs in nature.�I’ve been doing that too.�

Sign number one was seeing a rat splattered on the street in front of my house. When the rats crawl out of the sewers it means we are in for a serious drought. Or that I need to move.

Sign number two was seeing a man peeing on the side of my garage. When a man pees on the side of your garage it means that I need to move.

Okay, the school year is fizzling out like a dud of a firecracker and that’s good because I’ve seen those mangled hands and it is difficult to fill in those little SAT bubbles with a nub-hand.

Once Upon A Time,�I made the difficult transition from Catholic Grade School to Catholic High School � this meant going from blue and green plaid skirts to brown and gray plaid skirts. THIS meant that I�had to�inch my way up the school’s flagpole and fly my skirt like a flag.

Just like Hayley Mills (in�The Trouble With Angels!) sans cigarette.

It’s not too late to send your favorite graduate from the Class of 2012 a Zeichen Press card stuffed with money!� (You’re welcome, graduates.)

May 23, 2012
Heavy Metal Type

One fully loaded�California Job Case�weighs as much as I do and�I have spent the week proving this.

We are in the process of rearranging the shop and I am in the process of atoning for my sins via physical labor ��my hair shirt is at the cleaners and flip-flops don’t hold small rocks like Uggs.

Here’s how it works: I carefully slide one 100 lb case out of the cabinet�and onto the floor.

And then I do that, like, 60 more times.

If I realize there is a case of type I need on the bottom of the pile, I simply pick up each and every case on top of that case and create�another�pile on the floor.

At some point, intern(s) get involved.Their apprenticeship is very old-school: They sort type/hate me. That’s how they used to do it in the good ol’ days, I’m just trying to keep tradition alive.

They’ll thank me later.

May 18, 2012
Happy Mother’s Day! -AND- Some Other Tidbits

The Craftstravaganza is o-v-e-r. And in case you missed it, Jen gave a stirring performance as Janet Jackson circa 1989 – here’s a photo I took at the event,�right before she threw down her cardboard and got totally into it.�

That was really something.

Also, and I don’t know why, I made this card after the show:Happy Mother’s Day, all you mothers!!

May 13, 2012
Craftstravaganza 2012 + Mother’s Day 2012 = Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo

Jen has already packed up her cardboard for our big breakdancing number � that is our “workshop” for the Craftstravaganza on Saturday at the MN State Fairgrounds.

I sewed costumes (Jen will be dressed as Janet Jackson : Rhythm Nation 1814 and I will be a butterfly). Other workshops include weavers weaving, making t-shirt necklaces, food jewelry, and yarn bombing.�The yarn bombing sounds dangerous.

There will be�nearly 150 vendors, so if you can’t find a Mother’s Day gift on Saturday, I can only assume you hate your mom.

May 10, 2012