Just in time for those last excruciating few weeks of not-yet-spring: we have these delightful truffula trees from Mercantile 519 to brighten up your home while you yearn for this winter to finally, finally end.
(photo credit: Nicole Drouillard)
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.
I have decided that when the studio opens, I will close both of my Etsy shops and move the online sales onto the Levigator Press website. So until then, let’s have a closeout sale!
From now until March 14 (opening day!) you can get 20% off everything by typing in the coupon code MOVINGON at purchase.
For the Levigator Press shop, with prints and hand bound journals, CLICK HERE: Levigator Press Shop
For the Levigator Press textile shop, with printed scarves, bandannas, and bags, CLICK HERE: Levigator Press Clothing
On March 14, both of these shops will be gone, Daddy, gone.
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.
Here’s a little preview of some of the throw pillows in the Levigator Press shop at Society 6. The images are adapted from my sketchbook and other drawings, and are also available as fine art prints in a variety of sizes, tote bags, phone cases and more. Click here to check out the entire shop: Levigator Press at Society 6.
Lots of wheeling and dealing has been going on in the back room here at Levigator Press, some of which is not yet fit for public announcement (but rest assured, if things fall properly into place, there will be some exciting announcements soon!). I bought a new press and some other printing equipment, which was a complete steal and doesn’t yet fit into the studio and so there’s a bit more building and painting has to be done before the press can be used and shown off.
But in the meantime: I just had a birthday, and to celebrate, everything in both of the Levigator Press Etsy shops is 15% off until the end of December by entering the coupon code: fortythree. I’ve updated the shops with some new items left over from show season, and have a stack of half-bound books in front of me as I type, so you can expect more new stuff in the coming days!
New to the Levigator Press clothing and accessories shop: block printed summer cowl scarves, and giant tote bags:
The main Levigator Press store will have some new large journals and mid-sized pocket notebooks in the coming days, but is currently well stocked with lovely books and prints.
Please have a look, and if like what you see, don’t forget to enter the coupon code fortythree at check out to get 15% off!
Levigator Press is teaming up with Mercantile 519 this summer for a few local events, starting with the Downtown Windsor Farmers Market which opened its 2014 season this past Saturday morning. We’ll be there again this weekend (Saturday, June 7) and then will be back there every Saturday from September 6 until the end of the Market season. Check out the Events tab to see all of our market dates, and keep an eye out for other events we’ll be announcing soon!
A few pictures of our booth from opening day:
photo courtesy Nicole Drouillard/Mercantile 519
The market was bustling with around 40 vendors present, up from 15 at the previous year’s opening day. The morning was warm and sunny, the food was delicious, the shoppers were all lovely people with handsome children and adorable puppies. It really was a perfect market day.
Levigator Press debuted a new line of summer scarves in woodblock printed, lightweight breezy fabrics. We’ll get a few posted to the Etsy shop this week, but if you’re in the Windsor area, come see us at next week’s market!
We’ll be debuting these in person at the Made in Windsor Holiday show, but have posted a few in our Etsy shop in the meantime. They’re nice big triangles of soft jersey, printed with woodblocks and finished off with contrasting fabric binding.
Check them out here: Levigator Press Clothing and Accessories
Learn more about the Made in Windsor Holiday show here: Made in Windsor (facebook link)
Ms Polly models a few woodblock printed jersey scarves from our new line for winter 2013, coming to the Levigator Press shop just as soon as we can get outside for some beauty shots. Stay tuned!
A few of these are now available in our Etsy shop. Click the image to check them out!
Roller derby jammer sugar skull, screenprinted on cotton blend bandannas. Artwork by Mary MacVoy, exclusively for Levigator Press.