The Porcupine's Quill
Celebrating thirty-five years on the Main Street
of Erin Village, Wellington County
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The Porcupine’s Quill is remarkable in Canadian publishing in that most of the physical production of our journal is completed in-house at the shop on the Main Street of Erin Village. We print on a twenty-five inch Heidelberg KORD, typically onto acid-free Zephyr Antique laid. The sheets are then folded, and sewn into signatures on a 1907 model Smyth National Book Sewing machine.
To take a virtual tour of the pressroom, visit us at YouTube for a discussion of offset printing in general, and the operation of a Heidelberg KORD in particular. Other videos include Four Colour Printing, Smyth Sewing and Wood Engraving. Photographs of production machinery used on these pages were taken by Sandra Traversy on site at the printing office of the Porcupine's Quill, December 2008.
The Porcupine's Quill would like to acknowledge the support of the Ontario Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts for our publishing program. The financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP) is also gratefully acknowledged.
“You know when Tim is happy with you because when he phones or emails he says, ‘It's Tim the printer from Erin Village.’ Often he is calling or writing because he has a great idea for promoting your work or the press and he wants you to come along for the ride. The first ride for me was the day I met Tim in the bar of a Toronto hotel. He had invited Mike Barnes and me to meet the Literary Press Group and give a short reading. I was anxious to impress the people who would be selling my book across the country so I bought a new suit at the St. Regis room at The Bay. I met Tim and Mike and shook hands and then Tim told me his plan to throw an impromtu birthday party for the LPG in celebration of the Porcupine's Quill. Mike had to blow up balloons. Tim gave me the bag of party hats, noisemakers and confetti because I am a mother and so he believed I would know how to get people into the spirit of things. And I thought, well, anything for literature. And I think Tim and Elke think that way, too. But maybe especially Tim.” —Sandra Sabatini, author of The One With the News