We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Cory Wasnewsky a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Cory, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

In a broad term sense, I’ll never cease striving to learn something new with letterpress. I have the “formal” letterpress training that I received in school, which was my foot in the door. Working now for 8 and a half years at Hatch Show Print is where I continue to hone those fundamentals, as well as learn and push the craft. Letterpress is a strange animal in the sense that anyone could make a print with a day long workshop, but it takes a lifetime to learn.

I recently spent some time looking back at prints that I’ve made both on the clock, and work that I’ve made off the clock over the past 8 years. It was a really eye opening experience to see the progress i’ve made. I saw posters that made me recall the mistakes I learned from, as well as the experiments and success that all culminate into the knowledge I have today.

Working in a shop where we have interns alongside us, I usually wind up in discussions similar to this question. I like to tell them that the first year working taught me more than all of my schooling did. That isn’t a dig at schooling, but more a nod to how much any working artist experiences in a year of working in the “real world.” There are so many parts to being a maker that don’t involve making, and my personal experience was learning all of those miscellaneous pieces to being a well rounded creative.

In the past few years, all of the knowledge I’ve learned on the clock have led to an influx of freelance work that I felt comfortable taking on, knowing I’d be able to meet or exceed expectations. This has lead to some incredible connections and friendships with other artists, makers, and people that I don’t think would have ever happened without putting in the work to learn and continuing to learn and explore the letterpress process.

Cory, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I was first exposed to letterpress back in 2010 during my first semester at art school. My professor, Sarah Smith, took the class I was in down to the letterpress studio for a day. She was, at the time, the chair of the Book Arts department and saw something in me during that short time that told her I would enjoy letterpress and bookbinding as an academic pathway. BOY WAS SHE RIGHT. Through the rest of my time in school she was a great resource for advice and communication about various things related to furthering my learning of letterpress. She was the one who urged me, and helped me apply for and internship at Hatch Show Print back in 2013. That is ultimately why I am where I am today, both physically and career-wise.

Three Cheers Press actually began in 2013 during a class in college, so it’s been a decade since I completed my first job and made my first dollar from this venture. I don’t recall the name of the class, but it was a design class where as students we were supposed to create some sort of business branding guidelines. I had already done a couple of freelance printing jobs, and thought it would be a great opportunity to commit to a press name. I spent the whole semester completing projects that built out what I wanted my “brand” to be. Suffice to say, it has changed a whole lot since, and for the better.

I began Three Cheers Press as a print, design, and bookbinding studio. I was using all the tools at my disposal which included screen printing at the time. I’ve since dropped screen printing all together, and have really shifted away from bookbinding as a main focus. My main services these days are letterpress printing, design, and repair and maintenance. I offer job printing if someone has a design ready to go, or can work from square one if someone has an idea and needs me to design as well. I have a number of years of experience in pre-press file preparation for various printing methods and can help folks with those services as well. While it’s not a main focus of Three Cheers Press, I am always willing to have a conversation about a bookbinding project if a client needs that service. Recently, I have added die-cutting to my services, which is something that is relatively unavailable in Nashville for some folks without working with a larger company that may have minimums too large for their budget. I’m always more than happy to have a conversation with anyone who would like to work with me, no matter what their project is, and discuss what I am able to offer for each individual.

Folks should know that Three Cheers Press is a one man operation. It’s me, myself, and I dealing with everything from replying to emails to running the numbers. The same guy who is designing your project is the same one printing. It’s not uncommon in a letterpress studio for that to be the case, but it is a positive for clients. With all the experience i have in both designing and printing, I pride myself on the quality of the finished product in a timely manner. I have the knowledge and equipment to print jobs of most all shapes, quantities and sizes, with clients ranging from musicians, to couples getting married, to large international corporations.

Something a little more niche that I can offer is the repair and maintenance of letterpress equipment, as well as moving the equipment. Moving is something that can get quite expensive with riggers, who may not always have the experience with letterpress equipment and the nuances that each one possess. When someone hires me to repair their presses or equipment, I like to have them there with me to understand the problem so they can learn how to repair it for next time a problem arises.

Are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

I have a love/hate relationship with academia when it comes to art school. I don’t think the critique I have falls in the hand of the professors, and certainly isn’t specific to any one school. I think art schools do a great job at teaching fundamentals and studio practice. It’s where you learn to do what you want to do. I think they do a horrible job at teaching how to turn that practice into a career. I mentioned that I learned so much during my first year working in a production shop that has helped my freelance work. A lot of that had to do with pricing my own work. Understanding how to price a multitude of jobs with a wide range of size and scopes. Client interaction was all but brand new to me when I started working at Hatch.

I’ve heard similar stories from interns and friends that I’ve met through the years. Sure, there are certainly schools and educators that are implementing some sort of curriculum that tackles this, but I don’t feel it’s enough. I know there are now a number of books that tackle these various topics, of which I do own a couple and have come in handy many times. There’s also something to be said about the broad reach that social media has allowed us to communicate with other makers across the world. People who are doing exactly what you are doing are the best resource, and I wish I knew how to utilize social media to the extent that I need it sooner.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

Personally, creating something with my hands is the most rewarding thing as a maker. Every single poster, or card, or print is as gratifying as the last. I really enjoy and am lucky to be able to be creative every single day in different ways. Whether that is creating a design, troubleshooting the printing press, or physically putting ink on paper, I never take for granted that I get to do what I do for a living.

I also love that there is a heavy chance that if you live in the Nashville area and are someone who owns posters, that you probably have something I made. Furthermore, knowing that something I created could be in the hands of anyone around the world at any moment is incredibly rewarding, and a little surreal. That said, thank you to anyone and everyone who has supported me in some way shape or form.

Contact Info:

• Website: Threecheerspress.com
• Instagram: @ThreeCheersPress