Gaspereau Press: Background

In February 1997, Gaspereau Press was established as a registered partnership by Andrew Steeves and Gary Dunfield. That year, Gaspereau Press launched the first issue of its literary quarterly, The Gaspereau Review, and published three trade titles. By 2000, the company’s publishing activities had expanded to eight titles annually. Gaspereau Press was relocated to Kentville, Nova Scotia, where a printing press and bindery equipment were installed, allowing the company to undertake the production of its own books and to maintain better control of both the cost and the quality of book production. That year the Press received its first grant from the Canada Council for the Arts, joined the Literary Press Group of Canada and expanded from four to six full-time employees. In 2001, Gaspereau Press discontinued publication of The Gaspereau Review in order to focus its resources on book publishing and printing. By the start of 2004, Gaspereau Press had nine full-time employees and was publishing 10 titles annually. That summer the company moved its shop and offices a few paces up Church Avenue from a rental space to its own building.

At the core of our philosophy is a commitment to making books that reinstate the importance of the book as a physical object, reuniting publishing and the book arts. Many of our covers are letterpress-printed, feature original artwork by artists like Wesley Bates and George Walker, and are printed on fine paper, in some cases even handmade. Most of our books are smyth-sewn & bound into card covers and are then enfolded in letterpress-printed jackets. Our house paper is Rolland’s Zephyr Antique Laid, a creamy, sensual book paper. Overall, the result is strong, flexible, attractive books that are comfortable, attractive and durable. And in addition to our trade titles, each year or so Gaspereau Press releases a letterpress project or two (from full-length books to broadsides) and three or four chapbooks in our Devil’s Whim series.

Gaspereau Press plays an important role publishing contemporary literature by both emerging and established Canadian authors, and as one of the few Canadian publishers that continue to print and bind their own books in-house. Like Coach House Books and The Porcupine’s Quill, Gaspereau Press offers a unique but traditional publishing model that brings printing and publishing together under one roof. Its publishing program stresses the importance of quality across the entire process, from editorial and design to the manufacturing stage.