The Rampant Lions Press was a fine

letterpress Letterpress printing is a technique of relief printing. Using a printing press, the process allows many copies to be produced by repeated direct impression of an inked, raised surface against sheets or a continuous roll of paper. A worker co ...

printing Printing is a process for mass reproducing text and images using a master form or template. The earliest non-paper products involving printing include cylinder seals and objects such as the Cyrus Cylinder and the Cylinders of Nabonidus. The ...

firm in Britain, operating from 1924 to 2008. The firm was founded by Will Carter (24 September 1912 – 17 March 2001), publishing its first book in 1936, and was continued by his son, Sebastian Carter (b. 1941), from 1966.

History

Rampant Lions started life as a

private press Private press publishing, with respect to books, is an endeavor performed by craft-based expert or aspiring artisans, either amateur or professional, who, among other things, print and build books, typically by hand, with emphasis on design, grap ...

in 1924, when Will Carter was still a schoolboy. After the war, his interest in printing was such that he decided to try to establish the Press on a commercial footing, and did so in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge beca ...

in 1949. From that date until the formal closure of the Press at the end of 2008, Rampant Lions has been among the most highly regarded letterpress printing-offices in Britain. The skills of Will and Sebastian Carter in design and press-work have been recognized by publishers, who commissioned work from them. Their skills have also been recognized by collectors, who have sought out their publications since the 1950s. Sebastian Carter also has an international reputation as a writer on type and typography and is the author of several books, including in 2013 ''The Rampant Lion Press: A Narrative Catalogue''. Besides printing, Carter also designed two fonts for Monotype, Klang and Octavian, the latter with

David Kindersley David Guy Barnabas Kindersley MBE (11 June 1915 – 2 February 1995) was a British stone letter-carver and typeface designer, and the founder of the Kindersley Workshop (later the Cardozo Kindersley Workshop). His carved plaques and inscriptions ...

. He also designed signage and a font for

Dartmouth College Dartmouth College (; ) is a private research university in Hanover, New Hampshire. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, it is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Although founded to educate Native ...

, where he was artist-in-residence for a time.

Legacy

At the

Fitzwilliam Museum The Fitzwilliam Museum is the art and antiquities museum of the University of Cambridge. It is located on Trumpington Street opposite Fitzwilliam Street in central Cambridge. It was founded in 1816 under the will of Richard FitzWilliam, 7th Vi ...

from 18 March to 18 May 2014, the exhibition ''The Rampant Lions Press: A Letterpress Odyssey'' took place, featuring books published since 1982, when the press had been the subject of a retrospective exhibition there, celebrating ''A Printing Workshop Through Five Decades''.

References

External links

Rampant Lions Press website
(including a catalogue of books in print) * Nicolas Barket

''The Independent'', 20 March 2001.

Luc Devroye.
Finding Aid for the Rampant Lions Press Collection 1961–2001
The Online Archive of California. Book publishing companies of the United Kingdom Small press publishing companies Publishing companies established in 1924 British companies established in 1924 1924 establishments in England Private press movement {{publish-corp-stub

History

Legacy

Further reading

References

External links