Fisher restoration: Fisher Fine Arts Library is open and operating normally during ongoing exterior work. Find more details about this important restoration project.

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Learn Letterpress Printing, Bookbinding, and Book Arts

Learn a new craft, or expand your books arts skills, with the Common Press Studio! Students, faculty, and staff can attend workshops and book studio time, and faculty can arrange studio tours, workshops and other immersive experiences for classes. Our programs include open studio hours, visiting artists, and community outreach.

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Upcoming Workshops

More Common Press Workshops
An open book with hardcover
  • Workshop
September 25, 2025

Bookbinding Workshop: Pamphlet and Accordion Combinations and Variations

Come and bind your own books at Common Press! In this 2 hour workshop, you will learn the basics of making pamphlets and accordions, and create a handful of small books and book objects to take home.

  • 5:00pm - 7:00pm
  • Fisher B Level Seminar Room, Fisher Fine Arts Library, Lower Level
Open to Penn Students, Faculty, and Staff
A detailed black and white woodcut print depicts a bustling urban scene. In the foreground, a sign reads "Haircuts 4 Homeless"; next to it a standing figure is giving a haircut to a seated one. A passing bus has a large foreboding skeletal image on its facade, and additional skeletal figures are seen on the balconies of the homes in the background.
  • Workshop
September 26, 2025

Wood Engraving with Rebecca Gilbert

In this three-hour workshop, students will be introduced to basic wood engraving tools and will have the opportunity to begin a block of their own design.

  • 1:00pm - 4:00pm
  • Common Press, Fisher Fine Arts Library, Lower Level
Open to the Public
  • Workshop
May 14 - 15, 2026

The 12-Hour Declaration of Independence: Community Typesetting

To honor the 250th anniversary of the Declaration, Common Press will host a 12 hour, two day community typesetting event during which all are invited to hand-set metal type to help create a historically-accurate replica. The final forme of metal type will remain available for printing on our 19th-century hand press through August 2026.

  • Common Press, Fisher Fine Arts Library, Lower Level
Open to the Public
Service Category
Audience Groups

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