Located in the small town of Chehalis Washington, just south of Washington State's capital, Hoban Press is a tiny letterpress shop owned by Evan Calkins. Friends Ben Ellis and Claire Green also work in the shop and together they print and fulfill custom orders from all over the world. The shop is outfitted with 4 old letterpresses. The original press is a 10x15 Chandler & Price platen press from 1
902 and weighs about 1500lb. It is a beautiful cast iron machine that is treadle operated. It's little brother, a 8x12 Chandler & Price also makes it's home in the shop and handles much of the business card printing. A newer and larger machine which handles larger stationery pieces and longer print runs is a 1956 Heidelberg Windmill. The Windmill is a gorgeous German engineered printing press that has a signature whooshing sound as it prints. Lastly, the shop is blessed with a small Nolan proof press that can be used with old wood moveable type to create posters or proof colors before they go to print. Each of our business cards we print are hand fed through our presses - one by one. We make plates for each color represented on a print job. If there multiple colors on a job, the pieces must be fed through for each one. It's a very time consuming process, but the quality of the finished product is very much worth it. Letterpress printing is sought after because it is often printed on thick, toothy 100% cotton paper. The actual print makes a tactile impression into the paper that can be seen and felt. A term that is often used is "debossing," which, is essentially the opposite of an emboss. Instead of the artwork being raised up from the paper, it's actually pushed into the paper. It creates an elegant, unforgettable quality to the printed item.
