
We were proud to participate in a print exchange to honor the first 100 years of Vandercook printing presses. Organized by Paul Moxon of the ever-so-helpful Vanderblog, 100 printers pledged to each design and produce an 8.5×11″ broadside celebrating the Vandercook Centenary (1909-2009).
The deadline was August 16th, which happens to be R.O. Vandercook’s birthday — and funnily enough — our own Vandercook’s birthday! According to the records, Ephemera’s Vandercook SP-15 test press was originally shipped on 8/16/1966 to the National Printing Company in Buffalo, NY.

A drawing of what our press looks like. Ok… this one is a lot shinier.

Above is our submission to the print exchange. Get it?! No??!! Then you must never have had the pleasure of printing on a Vandercook. When printing, you continually switch between its “trip” and “print” settings. I know, I know. It’s a real knee slapper. We used a combination of wood type and photopolymer plates, and printed it in 4 runs on lovely gray Magnani Pescia paper with a deckled bottom edge. I absolutely love deckled edges.
The best part about having participated in the exchange is that sometime soon, I’m going to get a set of all 100 prints in the mail. Paul has been updating the gallery on his web site as the submissions roll in. Here are some of my favorites:

From top, left, submissions from: Uno in Los Angeles, CA ; Pellinore Press in Baltimore, MD; Studio 204 in Dallas, TX; and Parallel Press in Fairfax, CA.
You can view all the submissions here. I am so excited to see them all in person, and have tons of new artwork for framing.
Yay, Vandercook!
Tara