Hammersmith (London, England) -- Imprints; Kelmscott Press; Printing -- Great Britain -- History
Although the books written by William Morris continued to be reasonably
printed, it was not until about 1888 that he again paid much attention
to typography. He was then, and for the rest of his life, when not away
from Hammersmith, in daily communication with his friend and neighbour
Emery Walker, whose views on the subject coincided with his own, and who
had besides a practical knowledge of the technique of printing. These
views were first expressed in an article by Mr. Walker in the catalogue
of the exhibition of the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society, held at the
New Gallery in the autumn of 1888. As a result of many conversations,
The House of the Wolfings was printed at the Chiswick Press at this
time, with a special type modelled on an old Basel fount, unleaded, and
with due regard to proportion in the margins. The title-page was also
carefully arranged. In the following year The Roots of the Mountains was
printed with the same type (except the lower case e), but with a
differently proportioned page, and with shoulder-notes instead of
head-lines. This book was published in November, 1889, and its author
declared it to be the best-looking book issued since the seventeenth
century. Instead of large paper copies, which had been found
unsatisfactory in the case of The House of the Wolfings, two hundred and
fifty copies were printed on Whatman paper of about the same size as the
paper of the ordinary copies. A small stock of this paper remained over,
and in order to dispose of it seventy-five copies of the translation of
the Gunnlaug Saga, which first appeared in the Fortnightly Review of
January, 1869, and afterwards in Three Northern Love Stories, were
printed at the Chiswick Press. The type used was a black-letter copied
from one of Caxton's founts, and the initials were left blank to be
rubricated by hand. Three copies were printed on vellum. This little
book was not however finished until November, 1890.
[Illustration: Ornaments designed and engraved for Love is Enough.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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