30 Amazing Letterpress & Screen Printed Designs
Digitally-created designs don’t need to look overly modern and perfect once printed. Choosing to print your designs with a time-honored method like screen printing or letterpress can give digital artwork a particularly special character and tactile quality.
These traditionally printed designs will give you a taster of what can be achieved using ‘old-school’ print methods…
1. Pirrip Press Wedding Invitations
These silk screen printed designs from British designers Alexander Higlett and Georgina Hounsome of Pirrip Press demonstrate why screen printing is well overdue a popular revival. The beautifully crafted designs use only a limited palette of colors, but are incredibly impactful and romantic. Type styles inspired by 1940s and 1950s designs make each invitation feel like a much-treasured book cover.
Looking for more invitation inspiration? Our pick of modern wedding invites will get you inspired to create your own contemporary designs.
Design: Pirrip Press
2. Galerie C Screen Printed Posters
Swiss graphic design studio onlab creates these mesmerising posters for contemporary art gallery Galerie C each season. The digitally-created posters are overprinted with an image from the current season’s exhibition using a screen printing method. The result is ethereal, playing with conceal and reveal to create a multi-layered, complex image.
Design: olab for Galerie C
3. Print and Grain Stationery
If you’re looking to introduce more texture into your print designs, letterpress is a beautiful method for creating designs that have a tactile, vintage look and feel. These business card and invitation designs from Oregon-based print shop Print and Grain show the diversity of looks that can be achieved with letterpress, from true-to-vintage styles to bright and punchy modern designs.
Design: Print and Grain
4. Coco Rico Letterpress Designs
French print shop Coco Rico opt for the most traditional of printing methods, letterpress, to bring a unique and special quality to every invite, card or label they print. With an emphasis on modern styles with pin-sharp brand design, letterpress helps these already striking designs to feel even more luxurious.
Design: Coco Rico Letterpress
5. Ye Olde Studio Letterpress Designs
You know how a wine that’s older tends to taste better? Yup, sometimes in print design too the oldies are the goldies. These letterpress-style designs by Joe White of UK-based Ye Olde Studio don’t stray far from late 19th and early 20th century design styles.
Classic etching and cross-hatching add vintage detail to linocut-style illustrations. Keeping colors simple and striking makes sure the focus remains entirely on the wonderful detail of the designs across packaging, branding and cards.
Discover how vintage styles are enjoying a modern resurgence in graphic design, or why not delve into more fantastic stationery design inspiration?
Design: Ye Olde Studio
6. Equator Beer Branding
Design studio Equator were already experts in creating amazing brand and packaging design for food retailers, so it seemed only natural to create their own company-branded beer. The print method they chose for the task? Letterpress of course!
The unique impression letterpress imparts on the paper meant that the design didn’t even need to be embellished with color. It’s a great idea for creating an interactive product that people will want to pick up and touch.
If you can’t get enough of packaging design you won’t want to miss our curated selection of some of the most stylish wine bottle labels. Or get your creative juices flowing with our inspirational choice of beautiful food packaging designs.
Design: Equator Design
Explore even more fantastic designs on our Inspiration page or learn more about the print process by reading our quick-start guide to print finishes.