The Press has produced a second series of broadsides. Our first broadside series with political quotes sold out.

Hand printed on the Vandercook Printing Press on Hahnemühle Ingres Paper, each broadside contains a quotation about the censorship and banning of books by a well-known author.

If you would like to purchase this series to keep for yourself or post around your town, you can find them on our Kickstarter campaign page for Babylon Songs. Purchase the fine press book Babylon Songs during the campaign, and we will give you one set of the broadsides for free!

The Kickstarter platform made Babylon Songs one of their “Projects We Love.”

This means they will feature the limited edition book’s project page throughout their website. It was chosen for its creativity as well as the transparency of the work we are doing on the project.

This is a tour of one of the printing presses that we use at First Bite Press for Printing Books. Babylon Songs, our newest limited edition book, was printed on the Victoria Parallel Platen Press.

When you purchase books from the Press, the funds not only go toward making the publication, but they are also used to maintain our hardworking and historically significant printing presses.

The press was made by Rockstroh-Werke AG of Heidenau, Germany. It is the “Model B” of the several models that were produced in Germany.

We are not sure how this Press came over to the States, but it ended up in San Francisco and was in use by the Grabhorns in the early to mid 1900s. We have been informed by master printer, Wesley Tanner, that this was the press that Jane Grabhorn used for her own books when the Grabhorns were not using it for their fine press publications. Sherwood Grover printed on the Vic while he worked at the Grabhorn Press from 1935-1962.

In order to give more readers an opportunity to experience fine press printing, we created a series of prints for the release of the poetry collection, Babylon Songs.

These prints can be added individually or as a series and will be available first through the Kickstarter campaign and later on our website - if there are any remaining.

These have been hand printed on the Vandercook Universal Printing Press on fine press paper. Each one features a poem from the poetry collection, Babylon Songs by Colleen Harris and an illustration by Sandie Levent of Studio Mauvais Oeil. Here are more details about these prints. These were created to support the funding of the full limited edition poetry book.

Sign up on our Kickstarter Pre-Launch Page to get notified when we go live.

The first 10 supporters will receive an early-bird reward of a limited edition book.

Babylon Songs is written by Colleen Harris with linocut illustrations by Sandie Levent, the collection is divided into three sections: “A Prelude to Madness,” “These Inconvenient Women,” and “Perishable Truths.” Each section of the collection combines Harris’ lyrical poetry form of storytelling with relatable and reflective dialogue that feels like a personal exchange between the poetess and her reader.

First Bite Press is preparing to announce the launch of a Kickstarter campaign to create the limited edition collection of poetry, Babylon Songs. This is our second Kickstarter campaign after the successful funding and fulfillment of the limited edition book and card deck, Banned Books Written by Women. 

The last time we ran a Kickstarter, we offered early supporters of the book a special handprinted broadside. This time, early supporters will receive a special handbound, illustrated edition of The Sirens Three, a poem by Walter Crane.

New year, new limited edition books, new First Bite Press update.

First Bite Press welcomed viewers to an online studio tour for the San Francisco Center for the Book’s From the Bench series.

We ended the summer by finishing up a Kickstarter Campaign and kicked off the fall printing a new limited edition book. Anne Covell has the pages of Victoria: A Bedside Table Tale down in San Diego and will be binding the limited and deluxe editions in time for the CODEX Book Fair 2026. We are finishing up the imposition for a poetry collection, and working out the paper engineering for a limited edition book translation of an work of Interactive Fiction.

More details on all of these upcoming fine press, limited edition books are below.

Huzzah! Our first Kickstarter Campaign to fund the production of an upcoming limited edition, hand printed book and card deck was successfully funded several days before the deadline.

Thank you to everyone who supported this project - whether that was in the form of a pledge to purchase the book or old-fashioned mentorship and elbow grease!

First Bite Press is launching its first Kickstarter this upcoming Friday morning at 8am to fund the production of the Banned Books Written by Women book.

This project showcases 52 fascinating women authors and has an important story to tell about censorship and challenges to women writing about love and desire across the world throughout many centuries.

There are several ways to support the Press in making this book happen that range from $20 - $600 and include receiving handmade items from the Press.

Check out the preview of the Kickstarter page and sign up for notification of Friday’s launch, if you are interested in joining us in producing this book!

First Bite Press was excited to have a booth alongside other Bay Area fine press printers and book artists at the Rare Book Fair in downtown San Francisco on the first weekend in February.