page_title: Letraset
section_title: Product
hierarchical_section_title: Letraset / Product
caption_attribution_description: Painting中文: 繪畫עברית: ציור
context_page_description: Letraset was a company known mainly for manufacturing sheets of typefaces and other artwork elements that can be transferred to artwork being prepared. Letraset has been acquired by the Colart group and become part of its subsidiary Winsor & Newton.
context_section_description: In common usage, the name Letraset originally referred to sheets of transfer lettering which were originally manufactured as a wet process in 1959, with each character selected and cut from a sheet, placed face-down on a small silk screen frame and wetted with a paint brush to soften and release the gum arabic adhesive which held it. The frame was then turned over and the letter located over the artwork, and the character pressed into contact with the page, with the mounting base slid away as with model aircraft transfers.
  Later, in 1961, the process was much simplified and a dry transferable lettering system was developed, and it was this that made Letraset a household name. The range of available typefaces became extensive, incorporating both classic and contemporary type designs of the period, and each style was usually available in a wide range of type weights and sizes. Letraset sheets were used extensively by professional and amateur graphic designers, architects and artists in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s. For the first time amateurs could produce affordable and attractive artwork of professional appearance. As a result, and because of its ease of use, it also came to be used by printers, design studios and advertising agencies. In the late 1980s Letraset started to be replaced by desktop publishing. Today Letraset sheets are traded on eBay and elsewhere, and sometimes used so that a designer can avoid a digital look.
  The name is also often used to refer generically to sheets of dry transfer lettering of any brand. This technique was very widespread for lettering and other elements before the advent of the phototypesetting and laser computer techniques of word processing and desktop publishing. Currently, Letraset's line of print patterns and textures are more commonly used than its lettering.
caption: An example use of Letraset in modern art: labelling a photograph by Israeli artist Michal Na'aman
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