Dampening paper for letterpress printing

The combination of correct roller height, the right amount of packing for impression, the correct amount of ink on your rollers, and good quality type are essential in getting good results in letterpress printing. What elevates the quality of printing from good to great is by printing on dampened paper. Dampening the paper relaxes the fibres in the paper making it more receptive to impression, and less ink is required to get a denser print whether printing fine text or areas of colour for illustrations. A description of the process is not easy to find, although accounts have been written, notably in Printing on the Hand Press by ??????, and more recently, accounts by contemporary printers have been made available in a zine published by Russell Marat.

Dampening

The method of dampening the paper is relatively easy, although care must be taken not to over saturate the paper as this can result in the top layer of the paper being pulled off on impression due to the tackiness of the ink.

Preparation

You will need:

• Paper cut to size. Mould or hand-made paper works best.

• Pieces of felt cut to around 10% over the size of your paper. This allows for shrinkage due to wetting the felt.

• Some Benzalkonium Chloride to avoid mould formation

• A couple of boards of MDF to place on the top and bottom of the stack. This helps with taking them in and out of the bag.

• A plastic bag large enough to take the stack of paper and felt (and boards if you have used them), or a plastic box with a lid

Method

1. Divide your stack of paper for the print run into piles of 10–15 sheets.

2. Wet the felt. I just run it under the tap until it is saturated and then Squeeze the excess water out. It may be necessary to stretch it out to shape if it has contracted too much. You might want to consider using some Benzalkonium Chloride in the water to combat mould forming on the surface of the paper, in which case use a container instead of the tap.

3. On top of one of your boards place a piece of damp felt and then a pile of your 10–15 sheets

4. Put another piece of felt on the pile and repeat until you have your stack of paper interleaved with damp felt

5. Finish with a piece of damp felt and place the other board on top

6. Transfer to the plastic bag or box. If using the plastic bag make sure it is sealed.

After a few hours take the stack out of the plastic bag and reassemble the stack by dividing each pile of paper in two so that the middle sheets are now top and bottom of each pile, and replace the damp felts as before. This will ensure that you have an even distribution of moisture throughout the stack. Put the stack back into the bag. Don't place the stack under weights – you might be worried that the paper will crinkle but it wont. Leave the stack in the bag overnight ready for printing the next day.

If your printing requires several passes on the press that will take a while, you can reassemble the stack when you have finished printing for the day and return it to the bag overnight to maintain the level of moisture for the next day.

You can also re-dampen the paper if you need to print more at a later date, as long as you make sure that you dry the paper properly. This is very important because if you don't then mould could develop on the surface of the paper ruining all your hard work.