Letterpress imprinting utilizes metal type pieces. These range in size from a very tiny 6 point (pt) to a very large 72pt. Our go-to general imprinting size is 30pt.
To view these sizes before ordering, you can generally print a sheet of paper with a line of text and select the sizing such as 24pt, 30pt, 36pt in the formatting box and print. This will give you an idea of the actual imprint size however some fonts can vary. Our 36pt Dorchester imprints smaller than our 30pt Deepdene.
Although we generally like 30pt for most items, it's not always practical for smaller imprintables or for very long text. We often use a 24pt size for longer lines of text and we have many of our type in different sizes so a combination of sizes is possible. For example, you'd like to say "Thank you for joining us today" and then the bride and grooms names on line 2. We would set the first line in 24pt and the 2nd line in 30pt or even 36pt if desired.
The smallest size font we use is 18pt, we use this for very long lines of text or for very small imprintables such as a 2" x 2" x 2" box top.
Metal type pieces are not in large production anymore. We have spent many years accumulating the type we offer our customers. Many type are acquired used because rarer specialty fonts for letterpress are hard to find in a full set and in usable conditiion. We do order from several type foundries for some of our more common easily replaceable type such as Goudy and Deepdene, but some rarer fonts such as Raleigh and Typoscript are no longer in production so they must be sourced from sellers liquidating their stock.