13x18 Chander & Price Craftsman Press, Courtesy of Boxcar Press, Syracuse

This quaint drive through the past has been particularly pleasant for some in the printing world. Technology is the “great democratizer”, allowing more people to do more things, independently and cheaply. Yet, for industrial production in America, technology has often been the great eraser of jobs. One particular victim of this is the large-scale printing press, many of which have been forced to cease operations. Thus, letterpress machines held within these shops are sold, usually on the cheap. Printing enthusiasts, craftsmen and artists seized upon these deals. Through their smaller scale operations and less commercially tethered output, they’ve contributed to the growth of what is commonly referred to as the “Small Press Movement”.

Not just for weddings anymore, the past five years have seen a letterpress resurgence steeped somewhat myopically in its own history, with obsessive collectors sent rummaging for fetishized old typesets and flourishes. Developed over 500 years ago, letterpress is a printing process that uses raised metal type to actually make an impression into the paper. Replete with an extensive, and some might say exclusionary, language all to its own, (different sized type is referred to as agat, minion or nonpareil) to explain the intricacies and delicacies of its precise process is a bit of a herculean task, recounting the particulars of each machine.

Generally speaking, said raised type is inked and pressure is applied for the image to register in the paper with the obvious implication of the thicker the paper, the deeper the image; text you can not only see, but actually feel.

The first presses were hand operated and remained so for the first 350 years. In fact, these presses were manufactured up until the 1970s and remain in widespread use in many small presses. Eventually the process was automated and the machines became larger to accommodate this. The availability and array of type sets and ornamental embellishments (fleurons) is nothing short of remarkable, a veritable museum of visual communication.

The Heidelberg Cylinder, Courtesy of Boxcar Press, Syracuse

Of course, this reliance on previously produced pieces traps the work in a time machine prison, a specific visual aesthetic that has found favor in the burgeoning nu-hipster economy for concert posters and music packaging. Although this imparts unarguably beautiful prints, it is ultimately limiting.

SCI-Arc Graduation Ceremony Letterpress, Designed by Brian Roettinger

Alan Nadon, one half of Traction Press, explained how small press printers have been able to expand their repertoire of images through the integration of technological innovations, specifically the advent of the photo polymer plate, which breathed new life into the medium. The solar responsive plastic developed in the ’60s and perfected for letterpress in the ’80s, allows for images designed on or imported to the computer to then be made into super hard plates for impressions. Instead of floridly embellished corners and intricate and slightly askew type, all manners of images can be set deep into the paper.

Traction Press

Nestled away in a loft building in downtown Los Angeles, Alan and his partner Riitta Salmijak have quietly established themselves as printers with a formidable reputation, and as innovative design collaborators. “We’re hiding — I guess it’s a bit of fear of being branded”, is Alan’s explanation of their word of mouth following and lack of web presence. Some of their most forward thinking output has been with designer Brian Roettinger and his creative haul for Southern California Institute of Architecture. Brian explains, “They never let the medium get in the way of the idea, they don’t let what they can’t do get in the way of what they can”. This tenet is echoed by Alan himself, “When we get a job that looks impossible, we take it, we take it as an opportunity”.

SCI-Arc Graduation Ceremony Letterpress, Designed by Brian Roettinger

Alan cites Lewis Mumford as an inspiration, particularly Mumford’s philosophy that the “machine society” is oppressive and that megatechnics (Mumford’s term for “modern technology”) often produce low quality designs. Traction, and other small presses, have become their own “micro-factories”, where the factory owner is also engineer, laborer, and designer. Alan stresses the importance of self-reliance in this pursuit, he has taught himself how to restore and work with his extensive collection of machines.

Kluge, Traction Press

The arguable highlights include, but are not limited to, the Los Angeles Times original proofing press meticulously extracted from the archives of Otis College, a circa 1930s Kluge, automated with a vacuum system and customized for foil stamping, an 1890 Chandler Price and the 1910 Carver — 6500 lbs of pure machine brawn all channeled into a magisterial 4 x 6 image.

Carver, Traction Press

Coming from all across California, salvaged from shuttered shops and reverentially rehabilitated, Alan says of the machines, “It’s a whole other dimension of stability, when something was made for longevity. When I go into the nuts and bolts of the machines, it’s like talking to ghosts, the ghosts of the engineers. You really become part of something larger, this knowledge — it’s a culture of knowledge”.

TRACTION PRESS ADDRESS & CONTACT INFO:

Riitta Salmijak
837 Traction Avenue, Suite 102
Los Angeles, CA 90013
213-617-8190

FURTHER READING:

David Jury. Letterpress: The Allure of the Handmade. Rotovision, 2004.

Briar Press: a letterpress community

Robert Wojtowicz. “City As Community: The Life And Vision Of Lewis Mumford”, Quest, Volume 4, Issue 1, January 2001.

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Smoking & Barbecuing Fish Filets, 1893, Courtesy of Shorpy (Click on Image for Details)

Of course, the olfactory triggering of remembrances of things past is so ingrained in our collective consciousness, so parsed over and discussed in literature, that even the unemotional and detached ivory tower-dwelling denizens of science are in on the matter, with a number of papers and experiments on the subject. They hypothesize that odor induced memories enjoy a “privileged brain representation“

Butler's Smokehouse Beef Jerky

Looking like a pea pod and located within the inner depths of the brain, the hippocampus appears to be the scientific explanation for what the Madeleine munching Proust knew to be true 100 years earlier. While our senses of touch, hearing and sight make their way to our memory after passing through the thalamus, it is the hippocampus, which manufactures memory and influences spatial navigation, that harbors our olfactory responses to taste and smell.

From "The Old North Trail" by Walter McClintock, 1910

And while this certainly could prove a point of debate, there is something especially evocative about smell – and particularly about the smell of smoke. From the campfires of the old West and countless teen summer camps, to America’s carnivorous love of BBQ and all manners of meat, smoke is uniquely part of American memory, and a uniquely American flavor.

Now is the part of the article where a deep history would be launched, explicitly detailing the origins of smoking foods, for preservation and cooking and tracing its importing to this country built on imports. But whether the first caveman ate smoked Tyrannosaurus gristle or if it was the immigrant Europeans love of smoked fish, or the Native Americans’ tradition of smoking, its entrée into America is not a debate not to be had today.

Smoked Chicken, Courtesy of Odua Farms

Instead, what is it about smoke that is so alluring? Is it the atavistic infusion of the earth and wood into the foods we eat? Or is it our continued love affair with sugar and salt re-written?

Naturally, wood is the main ingredient in the smoking process, and as would be expected, different types of wood, often in the form of chips or sawdust, impart different flavors. Commonly used woods in America are Wild Cherry, Sugar Maple, Red Oak, White Oak, Ash, Northern Hickory, and Eastern Alder (Beech). These hardwoods are made of three main components, cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin. Those two celluloses are essentially sugars, and when burned caramelize, producing the sweetness and the color. The far more complex lignin, with its vast array of flavor-lending compounds, creates the varied other nuances: whether that be spice, smoke or vanilla essences depending on the individual wood.

Smoked Mackerel, Courtesy John Ross Jr.

Historically, smoking was combined with curing or drying to preserve meat, as the smoking process only adheres to the outer surfaces of the food and doesn’t penetrate the core. In more recent times, the issue of smoking has been one of flavor.

Noting this development of flavor over function, in 1895, a pharmacist named Ernest Wright revolutionized the world of smoking with his invention of liquid smoke. Using a proprietary distillation process similar to that of whiskey, he was able to manufacture, (at first) hand label and sell bottles of condensed liquid smoke. When he moved Kansas City to launch his product, he gave new meaning to the term “grassroots organizing” and started giving bottles to farmers who came to his drugstore. They, and their friends, and friends’ friends kept coming back for more, and the Wright company still makes liquid smoke today.

Traditional Smoking Pit

Liquid smoke remains a feature in kitchens and imparts its subtle flavors in the manufacture of meat, fish, cheeses, tea, salt, pepper and other spices. Not to mention the memories of us all.

FURTHER READING:

Marcel Proust. Swann’s Way: In Search of Lost Time, Penguin Books, 2004. (An excellent translation by Lydia Davis of the Proust classic)

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Yacón Chip

Of particular intrigue to health food shoppers are the quasi-comically named subcategories of “superfoods”, foods not simply content with being edible and delicious, but ones that go above and beyond the call of duty: valiantly fighting off ferocious free radical foes, miraculously moderating malicious moods and boldly beautifying badly blemished skin.

A sort of native-chic and indigenous aura exists around these, as they often originate far back, from the native inhabitants of the land. But once that level of artifice is peeled away and the foods are examined for what they actually offer, it is remarkable to see the interaction of nature and nutrition achieved.

Yacón Tuber

One of the more exciting and effective superfoods to have been revisited and revised to modern needs is the Yacón root. While native to Peru and stretching back in history to the Moche era (100 – 700 AD), its caught on and currently cultivated through North America, from Maine to New Mexico and even Oregon, to the rejoicing of diabetics worldwide. Why? Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

The yacón is a distant relative of the sunflower. But while sunflowers are known for their seeds, it is instead the delicate yacón tubers that are prized. Hiding beneath the ground, these engorged white storage organs look a bit like an ugly albino potato, a homely exterior that belies their tasty sweet flesh. Crisp and juicy, the longer they stay in the ground, the sweeter they get. With texture like an apple and a full flavor redolent of melon, legend places their origin high in the Andes with uses ranging from the ceremonial, linked both to Day of the Dead and winter solstice Inti Raymi, Festival of the Sun, to thirst quenchers, dug from the ground during long bouts of travel for refreshment.

Yacón Chips

Early gastro anthropologists wrote the root off as merely a lump of sugary nothingness, but in recent years, examinations of the chemical compounds making up these sugars have lead to exciting new low-glycemic uses.

While other roots and tubers store their carbohydrates in the form of glucose, yacón stores them as inulin. The human body lacks the enzymes to process inulin, so it simply passes through the body un-metabolized, with almost no calories, of particular interest to diabetics. This type of sugar also feeds the healthy pre-biotic bacteria in the large intestine, leading to increased absorption of a number of vitamins and foods, elimination of toxic compounds and clinical studies have even shown increased bone density, of particular interest to almost everyone.

Dried yacón slices are perhaps the most delectable preparation, the sweetness is diminished through dehydration and they serve as a nice snacking alternative to chips. A tea is also made and works to moderate blood sugars and, in the same vein, yacón syrup is a low-glycemic sweetener a bit like molasses.

The indigenous people of Peru have proven a prodigious source for foods in the past, namely myriad varietals of potatoes, and the recent utilization and supply of superfoods from there, Maca, Camu Camu, Sacha Inchi, provide an valuable case study in the integration of indigenous foods to the modern menu.

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Naugahyde Advertising, 1967 (Read Full Copy at Bottom of Article)

While countless hours and word counts could be amassed in dirtily detailing and decrying the toxic waste generating production practices of the vinyl manufacturing process, the Naugahyde story boasts far more fascinating aspects, namely the advertising coup d’état from the medium’s first and foremost svengali that inadvertently established it as the defining material of mid century kitsch culture.

To this day, the word “Naugahyde,” rather than invoking a still extant company that continues to manufacturer a popular, versatile, widely used, water resistant textile that is rich with history and remains Made in the USA, instead summons up the ultimate imitation and fraudulence, forever ingrained in the popular lexicon as a punch-line signifying ersatz second-rate quality.

U.S. Naugahyde and U.S. Koylon Advertising, 1956

And yet it wasn’t always this way. Named after the town in Connecticut where the Uniroyal Engineered Products that developed it was based, Naugatuck was the epicenter of American rubber production, dating back to 1847 and the birthplace of Keds sneakers and the rubber vulcanization process. The term “Naugahyde” was first used in 1936, much earlier than the mid-century lore would have led one to believe. But the term wasn’t ultimately necessary until then.

Naugahyde Advertising, 1967

Post war America was deeply in love with vinyl coated fabrics. With rampantly expanding industry, the need for flexible, versatile industrial materials and the plastic industry’s willingness and desperation to provide just this, Naugahyde was the innovator in the field; Buckminster Fuller used it to cover chairs in his Dymaxion House, the United Nations used it for their chairs as well.

By the mid 1960s, America was producing 142 million yards per year of vinyl-coated fabrics, but not all of it used was actual Naugahyde. The originators had numerous competitors and lookalikes crowding the market.

Naugahyde Advertising, 1956

To combat their weak brand image, they turned to Madison Avenue advertising guru George Lois, the man responsible for successfully selling the Volkswagen to America. Playing up the cruelty-free, vegetarian-chic elements of Naugahyde, Lois conceived what might be one of the most simple, yet devastatingly effective, advertising campaigns of the 20th century.

The Nauga was, and is, a mythical creature with a toothy grin, narrow set but wide eyes and a skin (s)he sheds once a year, resulting in Naugahyde. Alarmingly cute dolls were made and a complex origin story and mythology was launched in advertisements featuring drawings of “prehistoric” Nauga in their native Sumatra from “30,012 B.C.”, emigrating through Ellis Island and even donating their “hydes” to the War Effort in 1944.

Naugahyde Advertising, 1967

The concept stuck like a sweaty leg to a Naugahyde couch. A Nauga appeared opposite Johnny Carson on the Tonight Show, Nauga dolls were made available in showrooms – and the brilliant print advertisements continued. “The Nauga is ugly, but his vinyl hide is beautiful.” By drawing attention to the essential imitation and fakery of the material and essentially celebrating it with a fake narrative wrapped in a knowing, wry, winking humor, Naugahyde was vaulted into the collective consumer consciousness – the ultimate triumph of advertising achieved.

Unfortunately, time has not been so kind to the mid century fetishization of the faux to the level of luxury, and with modern ecological concerns, these materials look even worse. To this day, though, Nauga dolls are collectible items, kitschy reminders from a naively Utopian yesteryear. And the affecting aftertaste of George Lois’ ads lingers heavily over urban folklore with younger generations wondering precisely just where the hyde in Naugahyde comes from. Beware, beware the noble Nauga.

COPY FROM ADVERTISING “THE GREAT IMPOSTOR”:

“That’s him. The one that doesn’t moo. The Nauga. But: His vinyl hide – Naugahyde – can give you the most gratifying feeling known to man: Getting away with something. Naugahyde can look, amazingly, like anything. Cow’s hide? Beautiful. Horsehide? Beautiful. Aligator? Beautiful. (Only your taxidermist will know.) But unlike leather, Naugahyde won’t crack or stain.

If you don’t want it leather-like, you can get Naugahyde that looks like linen. Wool. Silk. Tweed. Brocade. Burlap. Bamboo, for heaven’s sake. It fools all the people all the time. In 500 different colors and textures.

They never guess it’s Naugahyde vinyl fabric. A picture of the imaginary Nauga hangs on every piece of Naugahyde furniture. Look for him when you’re looking for beautiful indestructible furniture, or luggage, handbags and accessories. (If you can’t fine the Nauga, find another store).”

COPY FROM ADVERTISING “INVITE A NAUGA TO YOUR PARTY”:

“Make the Nauga feel welcome. Punch him in the nose the minute he comes through the door. Spill a Bloody Mary on him. Get him with a pie in the face. Smear chocolate on his chest. Kick him around. His vinyl hide is Naugahyde vinyl fabric. It’s indestructible. Any soapy sponge, and Naugahyde comes clean. Same thing when Naugahyde is on furniture. The Nauga’s hide is a great deceiver. (…)”

COPY FROM ADVERTISING “THE INDESTRUCTIBLE NAUGA”:

Sadder but wiser mothers pray for permanent furniture. The Nauga answers those prayers. With the hide off his back. Naugahyde vinyl fabric. Naugahyde is so rough, it breaks a kid’s spirit. So comfortable, it gets overused. So durable, the kids are old before it is. With Naugahyde you can sail past the Jones’s. It can look like the most expensive fabrics. Linen. Tween. Silk. Leather. Wood. Brocade. Burlap! Bamboo! 500 bewildering varieties and every single one is Naugahyde. Look for the imaginary Nauga and find beautiful indestructible furniture. (…)”

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It is a renewable resource,  relatively easy to carve, and a good polishing results in a glassy luster. In addition to carving, the gelatin present in animal horns softens up when heated, allowing for it to be flattened and separated into sheets that can be formed into whatever shape necessary.

Cow Horn

Technically speaking, it’s the sulfur in egg white and in caviar that tarnish the metal and change the taste. Mother of pearl has actually the same quality as horn, and is therefore also used for fine spoons. Horn (and mother of pearl) spoons are also used by homeopathic pharmacists to measure and administer medicine because metal can sometimes effect the potency of the substances.

Over time, horn slowly loses its natural oils and therefore requires a bit of maintenance, an occasional rub with oil. The range of patterns and colors from horns is remarkable. A set of six spoons from one horn will result in six very different spoons.

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Cockatoo by Johann Joachim Kandler, Meissen Porcelain, 1734 / Rijksmuseum, Netherlands

The name invokes as many reactions and impressions as its myriad uses — an MVP in fields as diverse as dentistry, electricity and fine art. All uses though, possess one commonality, their reliance on porcelain’s unique intrinsic characteristics: its hardness, translucency, inconceivably high resistance to heat, distinctively deep white color and range of texture from rough to smooth. Not coincidentally, the name “porcelain” refers to texture and translucency, derived from the Italian “porcellana” for a type of shell that reflects these very characteristics.

Manufacture Nationale de Sèvres, France

While no precise formulation of materials makes up porcelain, the clay mineral kaolinite is the most frequent main ingredient in an array that can include feldspar, quartz, bone ash and alabaster, among others, in the mix referred to as “paste.” This paste is then kneaded, reacting well to water and a skilled hand, allowing more or less flexibility and structure to the unfired clay.

Kaolinite / Image by Dennis Tasa

And, oh, the firing: here’s where porcelain truly stands apart; fired at temperatures up to 2700 degrees Fahrenheit that would reduce most if not all other types of pottery to a spectacularly runny mess, the resulting material is so hard that even the most formidable steel would leave no scratch. The lengthy firing process allows for a complete molecular rearrangement of the paste in a process comparable to the formation of rocks and minerals in the molten core of the Earth.

High Voltage Insulator Test, Circa 1920, Westinhouse Electric & Manufacturing Company, Derry, Pennsylvania

This also creates an unrivaled insulator, seized upon for industrial uses from common light bulb bases to larger power transformer bushings to porcelain tiles. Just how insulatory? Heat-wise, this is best illustrated from an incident reported at Europe’s first porcelain production facility, where a fresh-from-the-kiln white hot tea pot immediately submerged in cold water suffered absolutely no damage. From the whitest of heats to the coldest of colds, that’s remarkable for finicky earthenware’s delicately fragile reputation. In the ’80s, for the sake of historical accuracy, an evidently quite bored M.I.T. technician successfully repeated the experiment.

This strength lends itself crucially to electrical insulation as well, dampening any development of heat. A glaze allows for the shedding of moisture and unlike condensation-attracting glass, another great insulator, its strength allows any number of shapes free from structural strains.

Porcelain Insulator Manufacturing, Circa 1970 / Turkuceramics, Finland

Historically speaking, China is the birthplace of porcelain, with complex historical records putting its inception somewhere around the 16th–11th century BC. As it spread across the Middle East and eventually into the West, it became highly prized and an object of intrigue sought after to be duplicated.

Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD) / Dynasty Jade and Arts

In January of 1708, at the behest of the enviably named August the Strong (King of Poland, Grand Duke of Lithuania), a young alchemist named Johann Friedrich Böttger, working with Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus, brought porcelain to Europe.

In 1710, the still extant Meissen Manufactory was formed to produce Europe’s first porcelain, attracting artists and artisans from across the continent to lend their own styles in forging a visual language for the new medium. Johann Joachim Kändler had his rococo flourishes, Marianne Hoest her predilection for lugubriously lustrous fish.

Marianne Hoest for Royal Copenhagen, Denmark, 1890 / Danish Porcelain Online

Mercant Woman by J. Kändler, Meissen, Circa 1755 / Rheinisches Bildarchiv

Among a number of others, they ushered in an era of porcelain arts, crafts and kitchenware of unparalleled and previously undreamed of beauty and luxury. Companies sprang up in  France (Sèvres, 1740), England (Chelsea Porcelain Factory, 1743) and Denmark (Bing & Grøndahl, 1853) to produce all the figurines, plates and candelabras money could buy and that the imagination could summon. In 1825, William Ellis Tucker of Philadelphia was the first company to produce porcelain in the United States. They went out of business only thirteen years later.

Porcelaines De Sèvres / The Cleveland Museum of Art

Utilizing different firing, painting and glazing techniques, a new visual language was established, one in which everyday objects such as birds or children were bestowed epic seizures of color and infinite fits of luminosity. While their artistry is often suffocated behind glass at galleries and museums — when taken for the elemental and enthusiastic works of art they are, their history and achievements are truly remarkable.

Two Lovers by J. Kändler, Meissen, Circa 1750 / Königstraum und Massenware

In addition to the marvels of the figures, the bordering, often intricate, floral embellishment on the kitchenware now exists in the contemporary lexicon of design as a bonafide classic. Not only still used as decoration on kitchenware, these designs can be seen on everyday items from bed sheets to napkins.

Porcelain is so much a part of our everyday design vernacular, a wide range of interesting deconstructivist takes on the material have emerged, none more effectively than from the Dutch bastion of conceptual chicanery as Droog - where Hella Jongerius and Marcel Wanders have continued to expand the realms of the porcelain’s reach. That is the definition of timeless, a “white gold” for the ages.

Sèvres Designs for Plate Boarders, 1791-1792 / The Cleveland Museum of Art

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While different origin histories cite Muslim traders and former British colonies, for contemporary purposes, our attention is drawn to balmy New Orleans at the turn of the humid century, 1907 to be exact, and its master tailor Joseph Haspel. Realizing the lightweight fabric would serve the masses of workers sweating their way through work days mercilessly devoid of air conditioning, coupled with his marketing concept of ‘wash and wear,’ a new American classic was born. He is said to have christened his creation of alternating stripes of blue and white, the rough and the smooth, “seersucker” from the Persian words for “milk” and “sugar.”

Haspel Advertising 1949

Seersucker’s distinctive crinkly shape is achieved through a slack tension weave, resulting in a versatile fabric of bunched threads that not only looks great in a dashingly disheveled, devil-may-care way, but is lifted from the body, thusly allowing for said cooling air flow. Again harnessing its slack tension weave crinkle powers, no doting care is necessary; any ole washing maintains the look.

1954 Image Showing the Easy Care of a Seersucker Suit

And about that look, mirroring the trajectory of countless trends in modern America, what started as a working class thing, soon began appearing on college campuses. Then, in the 1920s, the suits were adopted by well to do Northerners vacationing in the South. Its utilitarian functionality continued to catch on, particularly in the nearby regions of the sweltering South, where it continues to carry its heaviest associations with the so-called Southern Gentleman.

Seersucker Suits / Image by Mistermort.com

Even the US Senate, historically known for its poor ventilation, on the second or third Thursday in June, holds a Seersucker Thursday, founded by notorious homophobic bigot Trent Lott, where caricatured images of those Gentlemen brighten up the usually dourly dressed denizens of the capital.

Before the fashion forward Senate, the US government recognized the potential of seersucker, decking out World War II nurses with matchy-matchy numbers, colored accordingly: brown and white for Army and gray and white for Navy nurses. Designed to take advantage of the fabric’s ruggedness in the field, its radical departure from stoic military tradition meant its longevity was for naught.

Navy Hospital Uniform, Circa 1945

Seersucker not only reigns supreme in suits, shorts, skirts – even the curtains of homes utilize this fabric. That said, the weaving process of alternating tight and slack weaves is labor intensive and expensive and companies stand to make little profit, resulting in fewer companies producing true seersucker. Harsh chemical treatments replicate the crinkle affect, but there ain’t no crinkle like a real seersucker crinkle, so make sure you get the real deal.

(Click on Image to See Details)

And in the real deal department, our old friend Joseph Haspel remains in the business of tailoring fine men’s suits via his family’s commitment to his vision. After flying the seersucker flag for years, even outfitting Gregory Peck’s Atticus Finch in the film adaptation of To Kill A Mockingbird, and winning over recent presidents with their fine suits, it’s inspiring to see a brand’s dedication persevere.

Gregory Peck Wearing a Seersucker in 'To Kill a Mockingbird' 1962

Seersucker Navy Uniform, Circa 1945

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Canvas Sails / USS R-14 in 1921

This conundrum has recently surfaced more and more in the mainstream, in relation to our shopping habits and reliance on the vilified plastic shopping bag. While synthetic blends, sometimes even recycled from plastic bags themselves, make up a large part of the available alternatives, the canvas bag’s simplicity and efficacy remains the most attractive solution, due in large part to the natural integrity and lineage of canvas itself.

Canvas refers to a heavy-duty weave of fabric, a plain weave as opposed to a more complex weave, like denim. Duck canvas is a tighter, stronger weave, incorporating linen. All canvas can be measured by weight or through its reverse numerical system where a number ten canvas is the lightest and a number one, the heaviest.

Plain Weave Canvas

Twill Weave Denim

Historically its use is tied to painting and dates back to the progression from artists utilizing wood surfaces for their work to canvas. Prior to cotton, hemp was used, with the likely etymology of the word canvas essentially deriving from cannabis.

Over the years, the strength and versatility of its fabric weave lead to integration in a diverse smattering of industries. Waxed canvas found widespread use in the 1500s for sailing and by the 1700s, America’s oldest continuing company, J.E. Rhoads & Sons got its start making canvas conveyor belts for water mills.

Waxed Canvas

Over time, the rarity of hemp, despite its superior strength, coupled with the corresponding price increase lead to a switch to linen canvas and eventually its current incarnation, cotton. A quintessentially American crop, cotton boasts a number of benefits; renewable, biodegradable, reusable, it ages well and in terms of decoration, it is canvas after all, and functions as quite a palette for silk-screened or embroidered designs.

While in recent history, canvas mainly served the outdoor camping, military and industrial fields, a bit of a canvas reassessment and revival has accompanied the contemporary ecological renaissance, with waxed canvas in particular enjoying a revival.  Again boasting a rich history, with sailors using linseed oil to keep them dry at sea, each fiber is coated in a wax treatment, often close guarded secret ingredients,  that  create a remarkably water resistant fabric that ages quite gracefully.

As new and novel as technological innovations to old problems may be, the timelessness of a classic simply can’t be beat.

Vintage Cherry Hill Inn Promotional Tote Bag

Tote Bag After Years of Usage

The Indianapolis Star Canvas Bag 1972 / Photo by Shorpy

Manufacturing Canvas Punching Bags 1918 / Photo by Shorpy

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A trillion times more robust than tequila and delivering an intensely warming experience through its formidable smokiness, mezcal’s arduous craftsmanship, made almost exclusively through small scale producers employing traditional techniques 200 years old and laborious history, make it a standout tour de force of drinking.

Made from the agave plant, Oaxaca and its unique topography serve as the epicenter of mezcal production.  Grown for two years in garden plots, the agave are then uprooted, roots cut, leaves bound and left to heal in the shade for two weeks. They are then transported to the hills, where they are transplanted and left to grow for another four to ten years.

After harvesting, the cores are placed and buried in an eight feet deep pit, where a complex roasting/baking process lasts from three days to a month, imparting the flavors of earth, wood, smoke and rocks. After shade resting for a week and fermenting with airborne microbes, a horse powered stone wheel crushes the plant.

Making Mezcal / Image by lagaleriephoto.eu

From there, wooden vats hold the fermenting liquid for four to thirty days. After being transferred to stills, a 24 hour wood fire distillation process, which happens twice, resulting in mezcal.

Mezcal Distillery, Matatlan, Oaxaca / Image by Colors Magazine, Issue 69

As you could expect, a process this in depth and labor intensive, coupled with the albeit limited export demand provides vital employment for around 29,000 people. But when playing the numbers game, perhaps most remarkable is: of the the two million liters of certified production, only 434,000 of that is exported, meaning Mexico means mezcal.

When looking for a good bottle of mezcal, it’s important that it’s labeled “100% agave” as cheaper mezcal has an unfortunate history of color additives, including the marketing gimmick of a worm, which in fact used to indicate sub standard quality as that worm was a parasite from the plant. The purity of 100 percent agave is also fabled to be hangover free.

Not often found on menus, and lacking a signature genre defining cocktail like the margarita, mezcals are traditionally and best enjoyed neat, free from distractions. Del Maguey Single Village and Sombra are two highly drinkable names you’d do well starting with.

Del Maguey Single Village Mezcal, Pechuga, Santa Catarina Minas

The number of the bottle and other information is hand written on the label.

Sombra Mezcal, Agave de Oaxaca, Mexcal 45% Alc by Vol

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