As you can probably see, it’s been a while since we last posted! Once thing’s for sure, It’s not because we’ve been ignoring our site, or our fans. It’s because we’ve been focused on finishing Writer’s Block, which has taken us more than a year to complete. If you would have asked us 16 months ago if we thought it would take this long, we would have certainly laughed at the thought. The trick with commissioned work is that you are not only creating a one-of-a-kind piece, you’re also charting new territory. This makes creative process is a not only a journey, but also a learning process. In the case of Writer’s Block, we learned a LOT along the way.
#1 Finding the right combination of blocks is critical.
Finding large lots of typesetter’s block is easy, and hard. It’s one thing when you simply want a complete set of only one typeface, but we wanted a large, diverse collection of many different typefaces and advertisements. This was the key to ensuring the mosaics had real character, and that the variety and contrast of wood and metal tones could make themselves known. After lots of searching, and little bit of luck, we were able to locate a former owner of a print shop that operated in the 1950’s and 1960’s. He had a large collection of type, illustrations, and advertisements – many of them local – that had been sleeping in an attic for the last 50 years. We immediately bought the lot. When we got the boxes back to the shop, we spent weeks sorting the collection and drooling at some of the blocks that had unique and familiar products and places on them. Everything from national brands – such as coca-cola and Schlitz – to defunct or once well-known empires – such as The Rock Island Line and Peter Pan Bread – were uncovered in the dust.
#2 Removing ink from 50-year-old typesetter’s block is a PAIN!
Vintage typesetter’s block has a number of challenges, depending on its age. It can be composed of 100% wood, metal faced with wood backing, or 100% metal. With the lot of blocks we acquired, we were working mainly with the first two since they would be glued onto wood panels for assembly. Since wood is softer than metal, and it floats, this meant we could not use industrial power-washing or ultrasonic cleaning. Instead, we had to clean each block – large or small – by hand. Additionally, we had to achieve this in a sensible and economical way that was environmentally friendly, and could be done indoors without filling our shop with toxic fumes.
After two weeks of experimenting with different solvents, detergents, and cleaners we found that using Finish Line citrus bio-degreaser for the metal faced block combined with scrubbing with fine steel wool worked best for getting all the crud out of the nooks and crannies. For the all-wood blocks, we realized that the the best method had nothing to do with the cleaner, but with temperature. Soaking the wood blocks in a simple warm water bath for about 8-15 minutes allowed enough time for the wood fibers to expand and push the ink to the surface. The block faces could then be then scrubbed with a soft, short bristled brush to avoid damaging the block while allowing us to get into all the hard-to-reach places. The unseen sides and backs of all blocks were scrubbed with a stiff wire brush to remove the thick ink layers, and to roughen the edges for better gluing during the build process. This eliminated the time-consuming (and dusty) step of rough-sanding the blocks later. After each block was scrubbed, it was dried, categorized, and stacked with its other counterparts.
We scrubbed blocks of every shape and size – big and small, square and rectangular, metal and wood – for three months. Our fingers are still black.
#3 If you have more than 1,000 blocks, you probably need 1,000 more.
Estimating exactly how many blocks we were going to need for this endeavor was…well…impossible. While we could calculate the square area of the finished piece, we could not calculate how many blocks would be used in each panel’s mosaic. That, unfortunately, would only be decided by the way the pieces fit while each panel was underway. So, we simply had to guess, and roll the dice. We originally thought we had enough blocks for two bookshelves. But in the end, really only had enough for one. Ironically, we even had to buy extra collections from sources on eBay to fill-in the gaps on shapes or sizes we needed most for the last two panels.
#4 Creating eight unique mosaics means a never-ending game of Tetris for a year.
Once the cleaning phase was complete, the most exciting, and often frustrating, building phase began. We had eight panels (four for each side of the bookshelf legs) to completely cover, and it wasn’t going to be easy. You need LOTS of room to work, and re-work. Two panels could be placed on our workbench and worked on simultaneously while still having enough room around the edges to place a decent variety of blocks to work with. This was nice, because we could compare both panels as we worked, ensuring we had a nice balance of wood and metal blocks, as well as shapes and sizes. Just like siblings, each of the panels took on their own personality as we placed blocks, but still retained a slight bit of similarity. This personality also meant that some panels went very smoothly, while others fought us the entire way. Some panels only took a week to complete, while others took a month because they had to be rebuilt (sometimes entirely) several times to find the right combination of blocks to fit the panels exactly. By the time we started the final two panels, our Tetris skills had been highly refined and honed, and we finished them both in a week!
