For the past six years, industry recruiter James Cryer, a 4th generation Australian printing identity, has been consumed with researching his grandfather's 1913-14 sea voyage to America to study printing techniques - mostly Letterpress. From diaries, postcards and other material, he has completed a magnificent 164-page lavishly illustrated hardcover book that is a must for anyone in the industry.
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| The hardcover book contains 164 pages of enthralling reading and illustrations |
Australia's first posters and outdoor signage would have been printed by Letterpress. It's a long way from there to today's digital wide format world but Letterpress still holds a fascination for anyone with a passion for print. Indeed, Letterpress is still 
alive and thriving today, with boutique printers such as The Distillery, Watermarx and Chapel Press producing high-quality wedding stationery, cards, letterheads and other beautiful, albeit niche, products using craft skills that basically remained unchanged for the first 400 years of printing but are still a marvel to behold.
With ink flowing through his veins, James Cryer has produced a book that is not just a record of how the printing industry was pre-WW1, but an important historical document of life, travel, societies and adventure in a bygone era. It's a delight to read, look at and hold. Walter J Cryer's narrative, immortalised in his diaries that were discovered by good fortune, is engaging and informs us of how a young Australian viewed working life - and the world - in 1913.
We wholeheartedly endorse James Cryer's 'magnum opus' - it represents far more than a walk down memory lane for Letterpress - it's an historical tapestry, pre-TV, pre-commercial radio, pre-internet, pre-jet travel; woven into a beautifully designed book (Roger Cole, designer and typographer), excellently printed using the latest digital technology (Fuji-Xerox Iridesse at Intertype, Melbourne), includes a Letterpress-printed 'Ex-Libris' card (Watermarx) and available now for AU$64.95 (with free postage and packing in Australia) at:
https://booksonlineaustralia.com.au/shop/the-romance-of-letterpress/
We guarantee you won't be disappointed as you join the young Wal Cryer on his amazing mission to discover the secrets of American printing and bring them back to Australia in 1914! Also availabe for Kindle on Amazon. International postage rates for printed book calculated at Australia Post cost.
