Our grand opening event was a huge success, with good crowds coming through the studio all day long, lots of interest in printmaking and the demos, and some lovely people signing up to take classes! Thanks so much to everyone who came out to see us or sent along your well wishes from afar. We’re overwhelmed, grateful, delighted, and exhausted. And super excited to get down to the business of making prints with all of you!
A shot of the shop during the last early moments of calm:
Letterpress demo:
Relief printing demo:
Our demo print: HEY. We printed this on t-shirts for some of our visitors. Can’t wait to see them being worn around town!
Special thanks to: Nicole Drouillard of Mercantile 519, who helped all day long by handling sales while I demoed and schmoozed; Leesa Bringas, who stayed up very late the night before helping set up the retail part of the shop; Eugenia Vlasova and Paul Phillippov of Weeded Words who made vinyl decals for our window and wall, as well as some sweet Levigator Press tote bags; my dear friend Monica Rock who helped with some of the gross jobs while getting the space ready, and who delivered the gorgeous flowers for the opening; and of course Peter, without whose support we wouldn’t even have this amazing space.
The shop window at 1:00am, all ready for the grand opening. My friend Leesa Bringas helped me to dress the window so that it looks like a charming setting for a 7th birthday party. We’re ready to open!
Yesterday my friends Eugenia and Paul came by and installed this lovely vinyl on the shop door.
You can see more of their work at their Etsy shop, Weeded Words. We’ll also have some of their work in our store!
And I built these four sturdy work tables. Some of them will eventually have glass tops for inking slabs, but as we’ll likely use a few for screenprinting, we’ll keep them without glass for the time being. They can be moved around the studio, which is great because I keep changing my mind about how I want to arrange the space. Better to keep things ready to be rearranged when the big etching press gets here in a few weeks.
We are pleased to announce that Crissi Cochrane will be performing at our grand opening party on March 14.
Photo by Kevin Kavanaugh courtesy of crissicochrane.com
A fixture in Windsor’s music scene, Cochrane’s sophisticated songs with soul and jazz leanings perfectly embody the feel of life in a border city: a distinctively Canadian pop sound with a heavy hint of Motown creeping in. She’ll be performing solo, intimate sets from 7 to 11pm.
For more details on our grand opening, click here: Grand Opening Party
To buy Crissi Cochrane music, click here: Crissi Cochrane Music
An exhibition of selections from the Drinks Diary project, at one of the places prominently featured in the project: Phog Lounge!
Click here to view a map: Where is Phog Lounge?
If you’re in the Windsor area, I’d be pleased if you’d wander down to Phog between March 1 and March 20 and have a look at the prints. Have a whiskey sour (with Bulleit) or a pint of the stout. Those are my favourites.
Here’s a little peek at some of the prints from earlier today as they were being trimmed up:
We have been working hard in near freezing temperatures to get the new Levigator Press store ready for our grand opening event, which is less than a month away now. Here’s a look at the space we inherited from the comic book shop:
It was pretty dingy, with horrible carpeting, walls full of drywall plugs, and lots of heavy particle board displays to dismantle and throw away (many, many more of those low counters fill the basement).
We started with a fresh coat of white paint to brighten everything up:
And the accent walls, which were a yawn-inducing dark blue, are being painted this glorious colour:
On Friday afternoon the first coat of turquoise went up:
Still to do: tear out the carpet, finish painting the baseboards, and paint the floor with a beautiful bright red paint. We’re super excited about that red floor! And have enjoyed thoroughly trashing the carpeting before we kick it to the curb.
In my haste to finish up with painting for the week, I splashed turquoise paint across my already battered and stained 23-year-old painting boots. A little memento.
I’m pleased to announce that in March 2015, Levigator Press will be moving out of the cramped home studio and into a shiny new storefront space in the beautiful Walkerville district of Windsor, Ontario. I’m thrilled to have a chance to add my vision to this amazing neighbourhood that is experiencing a tremendous amount of growth and renewal.
The new Levigator Press world headquarters will soon be housed at 1984 Wyandotte Street, East. That’s at the corner of Wyandotte St. and Devonshire Rd., right next door to the Walkerville Artists’ Co-op and less than a block away from the Arts Council Windsor & Region.
The all new Levigator Press will offer short workshops, longer courses, and private instruction in print media, book arts, papermaking, drawing, and fibre arts. We’ll also have outside artists coming in to teach so there will always be a wide variety of opportunities to learn and to make incredible things. In addition to the print studio there will be a gallery space and a cozy hangout area downstairs for less formal classes and gatherings.
We’re hoping to have the doors open early in March but our official grand opening event will take place on Saturday, March 14. I hope you’ll join us!
Levigator Press will once again be taking part in the FAM Fest fashion show, coming this Friday October 10 at 9pm. It takes place in the same location as last year, Venue Music Hall on Ouellette Street in Windsor.
CLICK HERE for information about FAM Fest
CLICK HERE to join the Facebook event
I’m hard at work in the studio preparing for the event: printing fabric, sewing dresses, knitting accessories, and preparing a few new surprises. Here’s a little peek of the printing that happened in the studio earlier this week, fabrics for skirts and dresses, and block printed t-shirts:
This fall I’ll be offering three workshops at Mackenzie Hall Cultural Centre: Absolute Beginner Knitting, Beginner Draw & Sketch, and Beginner Portraiture. They’re all one-time three hour sessions. For all the details, visit my Workshops page!
Self portrait drawing by Kiausha Burch, a student in my first year drawing class at the University of Georgia, Fall 2006.
