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The St. Bride Printing Library is housed off Fleet Street, in London, England. It is the largest library in the English-speaking world devoted to the study of printing and typography. Indeed, the title 'Printing Library' shrouds the fact that this amazing reference collection covers a broad field: the Library is frequented by students, researchers, designers, publishers, and all those interested in publishing history and technology; the newspaper and magazine industries; graphic design history, theory, and practice; book selling; social and economic aspects of these industries; and much more besides. And the word 'Library', with all its associations of books and journals, hides the fact that St. Bride´s, in addition to holding important collections of printed materials of all kinds (from type specimens to the literature of printing technology), also houses a collection of the artifacts of the trade, from wooden and iron printing presses to wood, metal, photographic, rub-down, and digital type!
Though the collection is large, the space it occupies in the St Bride Foundation Insititute building in Bride Lane is restricting. It is not a lending library of course, but nevertheless the reading room sometimes seems to stretch to accommodate the large numbers of visitors it welcomes. The increasing numbers of design students, coupled with a general increasing public awareness of design for publishing in recent years has led to a significant increase in users of the Library´s Reading Room, making it busier now than it has ever been. (The St. Bride Foundation was established in 1891 as a school of printing and social resource at the centre of the printing trade: in its early days, then, the Reading Room was well frequented by all-comers from the surrounding printing community.) sister library devoted to printing technology. The construction of a building to house the Foundation, the St. Bride Institute, was started in 1893 and the building was opened late in 1894. (The printing school originally housed in the Institute became the London School of Printing when it moved out in 1922, and was subsequently renamed the London College of Printing when it moved to Elephant & Castle in 1963.) A year later, on 20 November 1895, the Reading Room opened its doors.
The Institute stands in an area which, though more recently specifically associated with newspaper printing and publishing, had been associated with book production since around 1500 when Wynkyn de Worde moved his printing press here from Caxton´s old printing-house at Westminster. St. Bride's Church -- the printer´s church where Wynkyn de Worde is buried -- is but a stone´s-throw: indeed its spire (designed by Christopher Wren) can be seen through the polished windows of the Library's Reading Room, the very spire used by Benjamin Franklin for his experiments with lightning conductors.
Since 1895 many further important collections have been acquired. These include the library of Talbot Baines Reed (1852--93) a typefounder and typefounding historian (author of 'A History of the Old English Letter Foundries') and John Southward (1840--1902), a technical journalist and author of a number of important books on printing practice, history, and techniques. These collections form the backbone of the Library´s historical collections, and they contain many examples of early printing. The Library´s further collections are more diverse. For example: wood blocks and other materials from the Chiswick Press; the archive of Eric Gill's letter cutting workshop; a collection of Gill's type drawings presented by the Monotype Corporation in 1976; and Jock Kinnier´s collection of designs and maquettes for the British road transport signing system dating from the early 1960´s.
These collections are the jewels in the Library´s crown but it is important to note that those who have managed the Library over the years have been keen to develop all areas of its wide interest in order to serve the ever widening community of users, and to keep the Library´s core collections up-to-date: it has a large collection of photographs of printing equipment of all kinds; a collection of specifications for British patents for printing and related areas; archive collections of leading printers and publishers; and William Blades´s and Talbot Baines Reed´s original collections of type specimen materials have been supplemented with 20th-century type specimens, type trade literature, dry-transfer lettering, and digital type literature. (Many 20th-century type makers have utilizedsource materials held at the Library, including Dave Farey and Peter Bronson who researched Eric Gill´s Aries at St. Bride before making the FontHaus exclusive digital Aries.)
James Mosley has been Librarian at St Bride since 1958. (He had been appointed assistant to his predecessor, W. Turner Berry, in 1956: Turner Berry being perhaps best known as one of the three compilers of the well-known Encyclopaedia of typefaces, widely refered to as 'Jaspert, Berry, and Johnson'.) James Mosley is recognized as a leading authority on type and printing history, and is a leading researcher and teacher in the field. All his working life has been devoted to the St. Bride Printing Library, and, given some of the pressures placed on the Library in recent years, one has to admire his ability to maintain such a leading position in his field.
Recent Developments The Corporation of London (a Local Authority, with responsibility for London´s 'square mile') has administered the Library since 1966. In 1992 it faced a crisis as a result of redevelopment plans made for the Institute. Thankfully the Library was saved by the Corporation of London´s timely intervention supported in no small part by an organization of 'International Friends of the St. Bride Printing Library'. Since 1992 the Library has, thanks to James Mosley and his knowledgeable staff, seen improvements in decoration, seating, and on-line cataloguing. However, sadly, a further crisis is afoot.
Recent changes in the rules for local authority spending have meant that the funding of the Library has again been called into question. This year the Corporation has cut its libraries budget by £1.2 million. Last year it was cut by £1.3 million. St. Bride´s book-buying budget has been slashed. This is a serious problem: unless a realistic budget is re-established the Library´s collection will stagnate, and the functionality of the Library will be seriously reduced. The Friends of the St. Bride Printing Library Partly in response to all this, the organization of Friends of the St Bride Printing Library has been re-established, with Justin Howes as Chair based in the UK, and Terry Belanger in North America. The Friends´ immediate priority is to raise awareness of the importance of the Library through events, publications, exhibitions, etc. The first exhibition entitled 'Primitive Types: the Sans Serif Alphabet from John Soane to Eric Gill' opened at the Sir John Soane´s Museum on 29 January and runs until 24 April 1999. The Friends have also published a companion volume to the exhibition entitled 'The Nymph and the Grot' by James Mosley, otainable from the Friends' UK address given below. In addition James will be presenting a lecture entitled 'The Nymph and the Grot: the revival of the sanserif letter' at 6.30 pm on 22 March 1999 at the Art Workers Guild, 6 Queen Square, London WC1.
The Friends is open to membership and support from all sectors of the design and communications industries. If you are interested in joining the friends, or in lending your support to this vital work in any way, please contact:
Europe: Justin Howes on email jhowes@stbride.org (or fax +44 (0)1933 419477) Mailing address: European Friends, St. Bride Printing Library, Bride Lane, London EC4Y 8EE.
North America: Terry Belanger on email belanger@virginia.edu (or fax +1 804 924 8824) Mailing address: American Friends, Book Arts Press, University of Virginia, 114 Alderman Library, Charlottesville, VA 22903.
See also http://www.stbride.org where it is also possible to sign up as a Friend and for further information about events and exhibitions.
Sources used in the preparation of this text Steven Tuohy (1995) James Mosley: a checklist of the published writings 1958--95, Cambridge (England), The Rampant Lions Press. Robin Kinross (1991) 'Temple of type', Eye, 1/2, pp.75--78. Colin Clair (1969) A chronology of printing, New York, Frederick A. Praeger. Dictionary of National Biography on CD-ROM, 1995, Oxford, Oxford University Press.
Andrew Boag Typographic problem solving, London - Information design - Type research, writing, and consultation - Typography and design teaching & sole UK agent for The Enschede Font Foundry
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The St. Bride Printing Library is housed off Fleet Street, in London, England. It is the largest library in the English-speaking world devoted to the study of printing and typography. Indeed, the title 'Printing Library' shrouds the fact that this amazing reference collection covers a broad field: the Library is frequented by students, researchers, designers, publishers, and all those interested in publishing history and technology; the newspaper and magazine industries; graphic design history, theory, and practice; book selling; social and economic aspects of these industries; and much more besides. And the word 'Library', with all its associations of books and journals, hides the fact that St. Bride´s, in addition to holding important collections of printed materials of all kinds (from type specimens to the literature of printing technology), also houses a collection of the artifacts of the trade, from wooden and iron printing presses to wood, metal, photographic, rub-down, and digital type! 
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