Der Koloss

The German publisher Suhrkamp created a special collection of books under the imprint  ‘Suhrkamp Letterpress’ in cooperation with typographers Erik Spiekermann and Süpergrüp — a group of seven renowned German graphic designers. So far seven outstanding works of the 20th century have been  published, type-set and letterpress printed. The books are printed using polymer plates in classic letterpress on an original Heidelberg cylinder press. These exclusive titles have a limited run of 1,000 copies.

The edition of Sylvia Plath’s Der Koloss was designed using Tablet Gothic by Veronika Burian and José Scaglione, and printed using a ‘post-digital printing’ technique that combines  traditional letterpress with laser cut, polymer, metal-backed plates: direct-to-plate lettepress printing.   This is a perfect match for Tablet Gothic, a typeface with strong reminiscences from the grotesques 19th century Britain and Germany, with a contemporary personality. 

Credits 
Book design and type-setting by Erik Spiekermann & Ferdinand Ulrich
Book cover by Sarah Illenberger, Süpergrüp
Print from polymer plates in classic letterpress on a original Heidelberger Zylinder by Daniel Klotz, Die Lettertypen
Paper: 120g/m2 Rough by Metapaper
Limited edition 1000
Binding by Buchbinderei Müller in Leipzig
Publisher: Suhrkamp Verlag

Photographs courtesy of Norman Posselt, at www.normanposselt.com and  www.p98a.com