The building of Tallinn Book Printers (Tallinna Raamatutrükikoda) was finished in 1985 and according to their website it was ‘the first printing house to be built exclusively for printing and binding books’. When I think about them, then the first thing that comes to mind is the people – the always friendly, helpful workers who care about cooperating with publishers and designers. Secondly, the building is always so pristine – not a hint of dust in sight. Also, they have kept their 1980s interior design which has value on its own.
After 1985 when they started their presses there have been several printing turns. In pre-press, printing and post-press. There’s less and less manual labour now. Men stand behind the printing machines, women are mostly in print binding and finishing. You can’t see the long table any more with ladies sitting or standing behind it doing chores that can’t be done with machines. The table is much shorter now and it is used for adding ribbon bookmarks and covers to books.