News
Designing Only on Saturday
There may be no task more daunting than designing a book about a designer — especially when that designer was your friend of 30 years. That was the case with Chuck Byrne, who wrote and designed our book on the work of Jack Stauffacher.
Jack Stauffacher on Working with Type
For the printer and designer whose wood type prints are the subject of Only on Saturday, crafting a perfect page meant getting a feel for the written word, its history — and what it means to be human.
What’s New in the Online Archive, Nov. 2019
The Online Archive continues to grow. The latest additions include hand-painted advertising comps and type specimens old and new. Become a member to get access now, while the site is in beta.
Type as Modern Art: The Influences Behind Stauffacher’s Wood Type Prints
Long before Jack Stauffacher picked up a piece of wood type and used it to create one of his typographic abstractions, the printer and designer had collected lessons in his craft from across time.
Read on to learn about just a few of the many influences that informed his wood type work, which is the subject of our third book, Only on Saturday: The Wood Type Prints of Jack Stauffacher, now live on Kickstarter.
Early Experiments in Printing
At an early age, Jack Stauffacher was practically anointed as a printer. Paging through an issue of Popular Mechanics when he was fourteen, his eye fell on a mail-order advertisement for a 3-by-5-inch letterpress, and his curiosity was permanently piqued. By the time he graduated from high school, he and his father had built a modest studio in the backyard of their home in San Mateo, California, and the tiny mail-order press had given way to a more stately Chandler & Price model. Named the Greenwood Press after the street adjacent to their home, young Stauffacher’s enterprise began to take on small commercial jobs.
Our New Book Is Now on Kickstarter
We are pleased to announce the launch of Letterform Archive Book No. 3, Only on Saturday: The Wood Type Prints of Jack Stauffacher.
A Summer at Letterform Archive
Jessie Carvalho reflects on her time as our summer intern.
This Just In: Jack Stauffacher’s Studio
For over 50 years, Stauffacher lived a singular life at the heart of San Francisco’s creative community. Now, his legacy lives on at the Archive, and his prints are the subject of our third book.
Some rooms convey history all by themselves. They tell stories about the people who live in them before those occupants even utter a word. Jack Stauffacher’s studio in San Francisco was such a place.