The Haunting Imposition Sheets of the Bröndal Letterpress Room

Quiet sifts through the Letterpress Room, where a toppled composing stick rests amid jumbled type. Nothing is overturned with force, yet every surface suggests a routine arrested at the moment of decision.

Margin Notes of a Craftsman

These tools belonged to Søren Bröndal, typesetter (b.

1873, Aalborg), trained in a modest provincial printshop. His neat Danish notations list small-town pamphlets and hymnbooks. A penciled reminder—“for Ingrid Bröndal, widen inner margin”—implies careful domestic obligations woven through steady craft.

Habits in Metal and Ink

The locked chase on the main press holds a partially imposed form, lines squared with habitual restraint. A composing table bears tins of lampblack, unspooled twine, and a proof marked with marginal ticks. Under a folded apron, a ledger catalogs piecework earnings in tidy columns, reflecting Søren’s disciplined temperament.

Slippage in His Typesetting

Later leaves in Søren’s ledger show uneven figures, scratched-out totals. Some proofs bear crooked baselines, their lockup insufficiently tightened. A strip of spacing leads, bent sharply, suggests frustration rather than chance. One clipped note—“client disputes misprint”—is smudged by a thumb pressed too hard.

In the final drawer of the Letterpress Room, an unfinished imposition sheet lists only broken lines, spacing notes abandoned mid-phrase. A penciled message—“revise margin tomorrow”—stops abruptly.

No record clarifies Søren’s halting of the press, nor why Ingrid never arrived for the corrected proofs.

The house remains surrendered to abandonment, its metal sorts cooling into permanent silence.