From humble beginnings on the kitchen table with an Adana 8x5, Mostly Flat now operates from a workshop stuffed full of hand-fed printing presses, metal type, ornaments, wood letter and inky paraphernalia

Where are you based?

Mostly Flat is in Ludlow, Shropshire

How many staff do you have?

Just the one! With the occasional helper

What does your firm do? 

Traditional letterpress printing, design, demos and workshops with a contemporary aesthetic and often with a playful or humorous edge. Work is either self-initiated or to commission. Using mainly hand-set type, I design and print invitations, posters, cards, stationery and artist’s books. I run regular letterpress printing workshops and love to take my smaller presses out to schools and events

What’s your typical customer?

For workshops: people who want to get hands-on with type in a workshop, learn traditional techniques and produce a beautiful piece of print. For commissions: people who value good typography and design, are looking for someone very visually aware with whom they can collaborate, and who want a tactile product printed to exacting standards the old-fashioned way

Which geographic areas do you serve, local, national international?

Mainly Shropshire, Wales, Herefordshire and Worcestershire, though some customers come from farther afield

What equipment do you run?

Three Adana 8x5 tabletop platens plus a couple of the smaller ones, a Model No. 3, several galley proof presses, a Saroglia treadle platen and a Vicobold. I dream of a Vandercook!

What’s been your proudest achievement in the past few years?

Running letterpress workshops at Hay Festival

Anything else we should know?

I’m always interested to hear of letterpress type or equipment, so please get in touch if you have anything you’d like to pass on to a good home. I’m looking to build a ‘portable’ kit I can take out and about more easily to teach larger groups, so even small founts of type are useful

What’s your team’s favourite biscuit?

Choco Leibniz