Tea: lifeblood of nations

Inasmuch as I’d missed too many sessions to complete what I’d set out to do in the Introductory Letterpress Course at NCAD with Mary Plunkett, I instead made this concoction:

Tea n. 1 a hot drink made by infusing the dried, crushed leaves of the tea plant in boiling water. the dried leaves used to make tea. 2 the lifeblood of nations. 3 the elixir of gods. 4 Mmm, I think I will brew a pot right now...

The details:

  • 24pt Clarendon with 24pt Univers Bold and 24pt Univers Light
  • 30pt line height on 36pc measure
  • 8in x 10in 170gsm paper

Clarendon wasn’t my first choice, since it looks rather too thick and solid, but the case of 24pt Plantin had no ‘l’. This wasn’t a Christmas card, so I needed to find another font that fitted the look of a dictionary definition, even if you never will find a dictionary definition quite like this in real life. As it is, I had to modify the text from what was planned because there weren’t enough ‘e’ and ‘k’ in the Clarendon. I’d also planned 18pt type on a 24pc measure, but somehow 18pt became 24pt. If the ratio had been maintained, that would mean a 32pt measure. The ratio didn’t survive laying out the first line of the Clarendon, since ‘infusing’ didn’t fit in the first line of a 32pt measure.

And, yes, I did stop for a cup of tea in the middle of writing this.

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