TYPE SPECIMENS
STEPHENSON BLAKE.
A Book of Types – SL1.
Sheffield & London, [1956].
8vo, pp. 74, [2 (blank)]; a very good copy, stapled in the original blue printed card wrappers, string hanger to inner upper corner, some very light foxing to front wrapper.
[offered with:]
[—.] Specimens of Printing Types. Sheffield, 1953.
8vo, pp. 16, 16a-b, 17-92, 92a, [1 (blank)], 93-104, 113-118, [1 (blank)], 118b, 119-130, 130a, [1 (blank)], 131-134, 143-244, [2 (blank)], with one folding plate; a very good copy, perfectly preserved, bound in the publisher’s quarter cloth over boards, spine lettered gilt; addition slip pasted to p. 91; printed note ‘Important’, dated July 1956, with the most recent addition ot the specimen book, pasted to front pastedown.
Two beautiful type specimen books from the last typefoundry in England. A Book of Types (‘SL1’) is the first in a series of five type specimen lists issued by Stephenson Blake from 1956-1963. In this first issue, among some of the various original designs of the foundry, such as Coronation, Grandby, and the Grotesque series, two new types make their first appearance, ‘Consort’ and ‘Consort Light’, a re-issue of the original Clarendon type, with new weights added. The 1953 Specimens of Printing Types opens with a brief history of the company, tracing its origins, somewhat hopefully, back to William Caxton. It then illustrates various examples of types, ornamental borders and brackets, steel and cast-iron furniture, brass rules, initials, vignettes, emblems, indices, crests, and Royal Arms.
When it closed in the early 2000s, Stephenson Blake was the last active typefoundry in England. Founded in Sheffield in 1818 by toolmaker John Stephenson, silversmith William Garnett, and financier James Blake, the company was initially largely based on the purchase of the foundry of William Caslon III, which was put up for sale by William Caslon IV in 1819. The company grew further by acquiring most British typefoundries: Fann Street Foundry in 1906; Fry’s Type Street Letter Foundry, via merger with Sir Charles Reed & Sons, in 1905; H.W. Caslon & Sons in 1937; and Miller & Richard in 1952. Its matrices and other old typographic equipment are now preserved in the Type Museum of London.
