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Bishop's map of Wellington (1882)
Bishop's Illustrated Guide to Wellington & District was one of a number of business directories and almanacs common in the period. As a general digest of information, this example includes advertisements from many contemporary businesses, lithographs of notable Wellington buildings and streetscapes, an article on the local newspaper press, and a description of the 1855 Wellington earthquake. Robert Burrett (est. 1857) printed the Guide in 1882 from his premises on Molesworth Street. Like many of his fellow letterpress printers, he was also a wholesale and retail bookseller and stationer, a bookbinder and account manufacturer, and an engraver. Burrett was a noted machine lithographer and was often contracted by the Government Printing Office to print their large-scale maps and plans.
1880's
Despite New Zealand's gradual decline into economic recession after the excitement and energy of the gold rush days, the 1880s marked the heyday of Victorian letterpress printing. New steam presses, new ornamented types and new printing processes gave printers increasingly sophisticated tools to get the word out whether in outrageous typography or glorious colour, in deluxe editions or in commercial quantities. The associated book trades including bookbinding, engraving, bookselling, publishing, paperselling and auctioneering all flourished. Wellington's dynamic duos, Lyon & Blair and Bock & Cousins, epitomise the range and quality of our print heritage in this uttermost part of the sea.