Blog - Relief Printmaking

I’m Nathalie Krona of Krona Prints. I am a linocut printmaker from Birmingham, England and I currently live in Edinburgh. My most popular prints have been pieces that use multiple blocks. I hand burnish all of my prints and work mainly on paper but occasionally play with fabrics. I’m currently making prints that are re-framing … Continue reading "Meet the Maker: Krona Prints"

One of the great things about printmaking is that one design can be used to create a whole edition of prints. That being said, editioning is something that some printmakers can find frustrating if you just want to get on with the next design! Knowing how to edition, sign and number your prints can be … Continue reading "Editioning Prints"

Reduction linocut is one of the printmaking methods favoured by Picasso. To make a reduction linocut we use only a single piece of lino. Layers of colour are printed on top of one another, each from the same block which is carved between each colour. A reduction linocut can be easier to register than a … Continue reading "Making a Reduction Linocut"

Colour mixing can become a very complicated topic. When printing, it is tempting to use colours straight from the tube as mixing the perfect shade can be a little daunting and result in a large quantity of unwanted murky brown ink. We wanted to create a few colour mixing guides to help printmakers build up … Continue reading "Introduction to Colour Mixing: Caligo Process Colour Wheel"

Relief printing is a technique in which the raised surface of a block or plate is inked up and printed when in contact with paper (or fabric etc.) A linocut is a relief printing method using carved lino. Any areas that are left uncarved will be inked up with a roller and printed. This project … Continue reading "How to Carve and Print a Simple Linocut for Beginners"

It can be interesting to include natural textures in our relief prints. Wood grain is a beautiful organic pattern and can be printed especially well if we emphasise the natural grain in the wood. We can do this with a blow torch. Scorch the surface of the wood to bring out the wood grain. (Please be careful … Continue reading "Relief Printing from Wood Grain"

If you haven’t tried printing with magic Heat Stamps yet, this is your new project. It’s really quick to create a unique block that can be reused again and again to create different textures and patterns. All you need is a heat gun and a variety of objects and surfaces to create your stamps. Arrange a …

Homemade decorations can be the best (and cheapest!) way to decorate for Christmas. These little birdies would make lovely presents too. Get the kids involved with this easy project.  To make things even easier, we’ve made a printable template for you to use. Print out a batch of templates. Each A4 template can be used …

When transferring designs to a block, there are several factors to consider: can the design be seen on the block? Will it wash off? Will the design be transferred to the print? In this project, we test two different carbon papers on six different relief blocks. We test them with three types of ink: waterbased, water …

A rainbow roll is a great way to easily add a beautiful range of colours to a linocut. This project uses only two colours to create a range of shades, all in one printing layer.  We are using the jigsaw linocut technique to give us areas of different colours. We want our background to be …

We’re very pleased to have a brand new roller available for block printing onto fabric! We love using screen printing inks to block print onto fabric as it creates fast-drying washable prints. Screen printing inks are too slippery for standard rollers so up until now we’ve liked using Sponge Rollers to print our fabrics. Sponge …

We are thrilled to have Cranfield’s new Traditional Relief Inks in stock. Cranfield make the hugely popular Caligo Safe Wash Inks. These new traditional relief inks are oil based, highly pigmented and come in a wide range of colours including gold and silver! We couldn’t wait to get our hands on that gold. Take a …

There are a large variety of different lino cutting tools with different shapes and sizes. The most common lino tools are V Tools and U Tools. U Tools carve softer lines with a curved end point and an even width but it can be harder to get control over the placement of your edges. V …

Knowing which inks to use for which printing project can be a minefield. There are different inks for screen printing, relief printing and intaglio. Some can be used for more than one technique, some are only suited to one. Some can be used for printing onto fabric, some only for paper. We’ve created a chart … Continue reading "Which Inks Can I Use?"

With our Christmas Makers’ Market and our Christmas Fab Friday Workshop on last week, we’ve been getting in the festive spirit here in the Handprinted Studio. Our Fab Friday workshoppers printed sheets of wrapping paper that would add charm to any present. Here is a quick design we whipped up for the occasion that can …

There is something really compelling about miniature objects. A miniature print sounds just too good to be true. Don’t worry about carving tiny detail – this project will shrink it down for you! Start with a sheet of Shrink Art Plastic – we’re using white. Cut out your desired shape with scissors or using a … Continue reading "Printed Shrink Plastic Keyring"

One of the hardest things to do when printing a relief block (lino, vinyl or wood) is to print solid blocks of colour.  There are quite a few choices to make and if you get these right then your printing will be much easier.  Ink – an oil based ink will print better than a …

I (Shirley) have been on a trip to Tokyo to attend a five day Mokuhanga course (Japanese Woodblock) and to meet with a few of our suppliers. I have never been anywhere like Tokyo before so it was an experience on lots of different levels. I have been lucky enough to attend a couple of … Continue reading "Mokuhanga in Tokyo!"

The Xcut Xpress is traditionally used as a die cutting machine but has found a whole new life as a printing press! This small scale machine is portable, affordable and can produce amazing quality prints. We used our Xcut Xpress with Extended Print Bed and Felt to produce a linocut, a drypoint etching and a …

This project uses just one block of Easy Carve to create a two colour block print on fabric. This is an adaptable technique that will have you printing yardage in no time! Start by drawing your design out onto a piece of Easy Carve. Try using a pencil to map out your image and then …