If you’re lucky, when you walk into Bison Bookbinding & Letterpress’s new second location at the Granary Building, you might catch owners Carly James or Kevin Nelson using one of their three vintage letterpresses.
Nelson describes one of the old letterpresses like it’s an animal as it whirs to life.
“These suction feet come down and they grab one sheet, pick it up, and these jaws are open for a split second, and they grab it, and it flips around here where it closes and prints,” he explains as the machine’s windmill arms pick up and drop off imaginary pieces of paper. It’s large and black, with all sorts of moving parts. It feels like you’re watching the inside of a modern-day printer, except it’s larger and louder.
James describes herself and Nelson as “stewards of the presses.”
“Because they’ll outlive us,” she said. “We’re caring for them in our lifetime. Someone else will take them once we’re done.”
Over 19 years in Bellingham, James said they’ve done “pretty much everything in the realm of printing, design [and] bookbinding.” They’ve valued having a business that’s part of a community, doing holiday shows and workshops. In 2015, they opened their own retail space on Grand Avenue.
Now, they have expanded and most of their revenue comes from retail. The revenue streams have changed over the years, and James credits the business’s longevity to its ability to be “nimble” and open to change.
The drive to open a second location was in part due to the success of the original retail store, but also due to a desire to “bring something beautiful” to the growing waterfront area of Bellingham, James said.
At Bison’s original location at 112 Grand Ave., the letterpresses were at the back of the store, further away from customers’ view.
At their new, second location at 1207 Granary Ave., the letterpresses, built in 1946, 1960 and 1965, are in the center of the square space.
While letterpress printing is only a small part of the business’s revenue, it’s a historical skill the owners said is valued by local businesses — Bison prints hang tags for Flying Bird Botanicals and menus for Old Town Cafe. It’s also an art form Nelson and James want to showcase.
In a recent visit to New York City, Nelson said they were inspired after visiting Bowe & Co. Stationers at the South Street Seaport Museum.
“It’s more of a museum than anything now at this point, but there’s letterpresses and you’re looking out the windows on the water,” he said. “We saw this space and thought it would be that version for Bellingham, in this old industrial building, doing printing on antique machines around the waterway.”
Nearly two decades of business
In Bison’s nearly two decades of business, it’s taken various shapes. James said the Bison concept came to her when she was 19 because she wanted to be a bookbinder.
“I think that there was a little bit of young, aimless naivete — I just sort of jumped into it and followed that path,” she said.
She worked at commercial print shops and then went to art school and learned letterpress. In 2004, she and Nelson started Bison Bookbinding.
Running a business based on paper products and paper arts could be described as archaic in a digital age. But James said there’s a population of people hoping to engage outside of that space.
“I think that as digital technology has consumed our lives, there are enough people that still want something tangible and tactile, and especially in this community. Those are our customers,” James said.
Book repair
Another aspect of the business is book repair. Nelson does the repairs with archival materials that he orders online. A customer may come in after waiting 20 years to find someone to repair a book. The books often contain the handwriting of a grandparent, or they’re family books that have been passed down through generations.
“I did a book from 1670,” Nelson said. “It just felt like the ‘Lord of the Rings’ — this is such an ancient object that survived for 350 years to be in front of it here. It didn’t get lost in a flood, it didn’t get lost in a fire, it didn’t get thrown away. It’s made it through all of the family histories and 350 years.”
The new retail store had its official launch on Friday, Dec. 1. It’s a bit different from the original — while the Grand Avenue location sells mostly paper goods, this location stretched into selling snacks, toys and pottery by local potter Cameron Jennings.
The Grand Avenue location will remain open, and James said there’s plan to expand their office supply offerings in that location in the new year.
With the launch finally here, James said it was nice to see other people in the space for the first time after working on the new location since early 2023.
“It definitely feels like there’s excitement for there to be something cool down here,” James said.
