A few definitions and conditions, so nothing here gets read as advice it was never meant to be.
When these notes mention a shared bench, they mean any surface that also serves another purpose during the week: a kitchen table, a desk, a folding trestle in a spare room. It does not describe a dedicated studio, and the storage habits below assume the press has to be packed away again.
Keeping ink, solvents and sharp tools away from where food is prepared is a housekeeping habit, not a regulatory standard. Nothing on this page replaces the instructions printed on a product label or the guidance of whoever owns the building. Where a material has its own handling sheet, that sheet wins.
A shelf of unmarked stock is a shelf nobody else in the house can use. The convention followed in these posts is simple: weight in grams per square metre on one line, grain direction on the next, supplier and date on the back of the wrapper. If you keep your own shorthand, write it down somewhere the next person will look.
A line strung across a room is a temporary measure, not a fixture. Prints hung to dry should not block a doorway, a passage or anything that opens and closes. Where the only clear span crosses a walkway, the honest answer is to dry in smaller batches rather than string a line higher and hope.
Someone who was not at the press cannot see what went wrong, so a proof that failed needs context before it needs an opinion. Describe what you changed between pulls, what the ink did, and which part you already know is off. That is a conversation about process, not a request for a verdict on the work.
Nothing here is a schedule, a booking or a service. Workshop dates, supplier lists and open studio days appear in individual posts when they are known, and they change. For anything specific to your own setup, write to hello@hunterashworth.com or call +27 72 704 6819.
Most of us do not have a dedicated studio. The press sits on a bench that doubles as a desk, the paper stock shares a shelf with the good scissors, and the type drawer lives under the kitchen table. These notes are about making that arrangement work without ruining the paper, the tools or the evening.
Nothing here is a rule. It is what has held up in shared rooms across Observatory, Woodstock and Braamfontein, written for the person who has to pack everything away before dinner.
Ink tins, cleaning solvent and sharp tools belong in a closed box away from where food is prepared. Label the box, keep it low, and put the rags in a lidded tin rather than the kitchen bin.
Write the weight, grain direction and where you bought the sheet on the wrapper. Anyone in the house can then find the right stock without opening every drawer.
String across a corner, not across the path. Clips at the top edge only, so the sheet hangs flat and the ink does not pool where the peg presses in.
A removable board over the press, a tray for loose type, and one cloth that only ever touches the press. It takes two minutes to reset and saves an hour of sorting.
If a proof fails and nobody else was at the press, the notes in use cases help explain what went wrong without turning it into an argument. Longer write-ups on materials and methods sit under plans.
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