Please join me in welcoming the latest member to the Sprouts Press team – a Triumph Cutter 4700 series!!! It’s a stack cutter that can handle 2 and 3/8 inches of paper all at once, when serviced and in peak condition! Woot!! 
To be honest, I’ve dreamed of having one of these machines in my studio for a long time now. It’s still a little unreal that it’s actually standing behind me as I type this! It’s an older piece of equipment, worn in and well-used, but trustworthy nonetheless.
To bring this into reality, here’s a story about it.
We arrived late to pick up the cutter, damn rush hour traffic. But it was still there, it wasn’t going anywhere. It took 4 of us to lift it onto a dolly and just as many to navigate through doorways and narrow hallways out into the daylight. We loaded it into a taxi. That’s right, a taxi. Then, once at my home studio, we nearly couldn’t get it through the door. I almost had an additional studio space in the hallway of our building, ha! However, we strong-armed it through the door, over top of the banister and into the safety of our living room.
Next project: getting the Triumph into my upstairs studio. This required negotiating a turny, narrow staircase, while carrying a too-large 300lb piece of metal equipment. Attempt #1 failed, it was disappointing. However, a new day brings new perspective and I figured out how to take it apart, which made things a bit easier. It was still a heavy load. Eventually, we managed to finagle it up the staircase without any yelling or tears. Success!!
Next up, servicing and tune ups, blade sharpening and handle-fixing. I’ll keep you posted on the status as I journey into stack paper-cutter land!
It ran along the west Toronto Railpath, and was led by the folks at 
After the walk, everyone emptied their bags of collected finds (there are rules to foraging responsibly on the railpath, I’ll list them below). Then we sorted them, mixing and matching with everyone else’s finds, into possible ink recipes.
In the end, I made a beautifully deep and intense black ink. It’s made from the charcoal dust of burned virginia creeper, mixed with water and gum arabic. Of course, the folks from 
Sprouts Press 