HooksmithPress  is a small letterpress print shop based in East London. Limited edition print runs of posters are hand-crafted using a combination of traditional wood type and metal type. Russells work reflects  a slower time and a love of typography and the written word. Inspiration is also drawn from 30 +years of appreciating and collecting Kiwiana and other ephemera, and his own rural, New Zealand upbringing. Letterpress is a medium which allows Russell to collect and re-use elements from the past to create something new; a tangible and tactile connection to history and  a continuation of a craft.

The name hooksmith alludes to a time of specialised artisans and guilded craftsmen.  It  plays on the most common European surname in New Zealand, coupled with the Maori myth where Maui pulls up the North Island with a fish hook.  Okay maybe it also reflects his fly fishing infliction.

Hooksmith - A Letterpress Story from Joshua Panter on Vimeo.