Video killed the radio star, but e-commerce has not killed the hard copy catalog. And today, they come in all shapes, sizes and formats. Here’s a collection of some of my favorites. These are “coffee-table catalogs”—luxurious, eye-catching and too impressive to toss in the trash.
Hong Kong-based Tai Ping Carpets, which designs and manufactures to-the-trade bespoke carpets and textile floor coverings for high-end homes, hotels, restaurants, yachts and jets, wanted to produce a catalog that was folded like an accordion.
This was a technically challenging project, because the accordion was made of 13 panels with a total length of 76 inches, which meant gluing several forms together. We had a deadline of 10 business days to print and assemble 5,000 units, which required careful and precise line-up, as well as hand gluing, die scoring and hand folding.
I chose 80# McCoy Silk as my substrate, because the premium coated, acid-free cover has a luxurious silky feel and accepts ink beautifully to give images depth and richness that pop. The catalog is printed 4 color process + 1 pms.
All That Glitters
Leo Ingwer Inc. has crafted customizable engagement rings, bridal jewelry and other gemstone pieces for retailers nationwide from its Diamond District workshop since 1939, and wanted to showcase its timeless creations. The perfect bound catalog we produced for the firm was a short-run (200 pieces) that involved digital printing, hot stamping and a blind emboss—a combination of new and old techniques.
The outer cover of the catalog was hot stamped with silver foil on Reich Pewter 107# Cover and blind embossed. The interior was digitally printed on 80# Garda Gloss matte coated cover, which has a stiff, very rich feel. We also custom-made an envelope for the catalog from text weight Reich Pewter. The cover of the catalog and the envelope glitter like a diamond.
A Work Of Art
Salamatina Gallery, which is located on the Gold Coast of Long Island in Manhasset, exhibits paintings, sculptures and other artworks by emerging and established artists around the world. For an upcoming exhibit—literally last minute—the gallery needed a short run of 100 catalogs with a high-impact design that was equal to the magnificent art displayed on its pages. This 26 page + cover perfect bound book had an outer wrap-around jacket, and is among our prettiest digital printing projects. The colors are brilliant. We used Mohawk Superfine digital paper—80# cover for the interior, 110# for the outer cover and a 80# cover for the wrap-around jacket. It’s an acid-free archival paper, and one of our favorite offset papers.
The brilliant and bright images of the featured art works make this book a real standout. When we saw the color images, we suggested facing pages with gray text against a background of cmyk to provide a strong visual counterpoint to the images.
Stepping Stone
The marketing department at Artistic Tile was undertaking a refresh of its corporate branding. After highresolution produced new stationery, presentation folders and catalog sheets, we were tasked with producing 10,000 copies of a 176 page, perfect bound book featuring the luxury tile and stone Artistic Tile designs and manufactures for wholesale and retail venues.
The interior is printed 4 color process on 100# coated text, while the exterior has a striking black-on-black hot stamp foil on a 122# Black Plike Cover. We used a black taped binding to marry the signatures to the cover. The overall design, layout and stylized images of the tiles makes this more project more of a magalog than a catalog—meant to be perused in the showrooms of vendors Artistic Tile supplies, as well as its 12 retail outlets in New York, Chicago, London and other cities.
Luxury goods stand the test of time in terms of design, durability and desirability. The makers and purveyors of high-end, custom and hand-crafted products want to present their creations in a print format that shares these qualities.