Flora and Fauna Press is located in downtown Los Angeles. Christine Brandt, the owner, printer, and designer founded the press in 2006.

Christine Brandt received her B.F.A. in Fine Arts from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville where she studied printmaking. During this time she learned the art of letterpress printing. She attended graduate school at the University of Madison Wisconsin, receiving a M.A. in Studio Art.  She later completed her M.F.A. at California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) in Los Angeles. Upon graduating from CalArts, Christine chose to begin a business utilizing her extensive art education.  Christine began to take note that letterpress, a once believed dead practice, had begun to gain popularity again.

About Our Press, “Rusty”

Remembering fondly her days in art school, working on an antique Vandercook letterpress, she sought out to find one.  However, with advent of modern printing technology, most were sold for scrap in the last several decades and they were becoming hard to find and competition for the few remaining was fierce.  After searching high and low, she finally discovered someone who had moved a number of these sought after presses out to a printer’s graveyard in the middle of the Nevada desert.

Christine and her boyfriend left from Los Angeles with a moving truck and low expectations.  Upon arrival at the “salvage yard”, their expectations were confirmed when it was learned that these presses for sale had been outside, exposed the harsh desert elements for 23 years.  Nevertheless, they purchased the best one in the lot and began the extensive restoration process to bring “Rusty” as he had become known, back to life.

The remainder of the summer was spent sanding, grinding, lubricating and painting Rusty.  Much blood, sweat and tears were shed during the restoration, which took place during the height of the summer.  After months of work, and a little help from Bob of The Crawford Company, one of the few remaining repairmen of this type of machinery, the press was finally ready for printing.

 

 

 

 

 

About The Letterpress Process

Letterpress printing began in the mid 1400s following the invention of movable type by Johannes Gutenberg. A raised surface is created from lead type, wood type, or polymer plates. This 'relief' surfaced is inked and paper is printed with great pressure, creating the lovely debossed surface unique to letterpress printing.

Letterpress is more time consuming than most printing processes, and because each color run is separate, inks are usually limited to two or three colors. The best letterpress printing will be clean and crisp, and the best design for letterpress should be bold and modern, or elegant and simple.

 

 

 

Our Mission

Our mission at Flora and Fauna is to provide our clients with superior printing and exceptional customer service. We aim to assist our clients in making the most appropriate choices for their occasion and we believe these choices should reflect the client’s own personality and desires. Whether you know exactly what you want or just have a rough idea, we will make your ideas come to light. Flora and Fauna will mix practically any color, (just give us a swatch) and you’ll have a wide variety of choices in paper and fonts. All of our printing and design is performed in-house to guarantee quality and satisfaction.