Gloop doop

And a beep bap boh

Apr 07, 2025

Two wee bears. No paper jogger, no cutting equipment, no unruly stacks of paper threatening to avalanche, no collator, folder, booklet maker, nor IS300 in sight. Looks like we’re completing our first swatch book. It was something we thought we “ought” to do. Can you smell the innocence? We look showered. Well slept. Leisurely discussing a project using full sentences, actually face to face making eye contact.

Fast forward to March 2025

Since 2022, BearBear moved into a bigger studio space within The Bindery for a year, and then moved again within The Bindery to our mega-ultimate-chaos room, as glimpsed above. So much has happened in three years. We served over 450+ students through RISO BASICS classes since the workshop’s inception. Our machinery count is now beyond fingers and toes. We hired an accountant, switched web platforms, traveled to the borders of this country to vend at art book fairs, and even — horror — started using project management software to track beer label design client work and risograph print for hire requests in tandem with self-publishing schemes.

We get a lot of requests for quotes that don’t materialize into jobs. We also get a fair amount of ones that do, only to be referenced years later, and we have to have a way of seeing what paper stock we printed on and how much we charged for the work.

Above: Ben extracting the master unit in anticipation of major jostling at the back of a moving truck. Not just any truck. One with “Hernia” emblazoned across the booty.

Three college bruhs (mere infants) with gelled hair and Converse kicks schlepped our metal chunks and wooden caboodles from one end of Bay View to the depths of another. Our flimsy lines between work play and sleep just got slam-dunked into the recycling bin.

Above: A view from our wood paneled basement once the majority of our equipment made the voyage. Hello, new bearbear riso den. We need to figure out humidity and temperature controls as we head into Summer. Lighting is another puzzle to solve.

How does this effect you?

We’ve been hinting at this transition for months. It all boils down to us being able to provide you to same services but with greater efficiency (less rent cost and logistics) and hopefully with a clearer focus. Living at The Bindery was an amazing, immeasurably rewarding incubation period. But now we’re detached! Free to roam and mess up and try again! So we’re partnering with Cactus Club (a stellar all-ages event space, music venue and bar in Milwaukee) in conjunction with their new artist residency, to continue Riso classes. CC’s mezcal negroni on tap gets top marks.