Potato Printing

Who would have thought that I’d be involved in the print industry about five decades after playing with potato printing and a John Bull Printing Set as a child, I certainly didn’t foresee this happening. 

Coincidentally I started with photography about the same time too buying my first camera aged nine (a second-hand Kodak Brownie bought for 2/6 in a junk shop in Bridlington during a family holiday) and that’s another key element of my business.

Potatoes are great to use as stamps for printing and you can use the inedible green ones or even those that are slightly soft.

Great for children of all ages and you can use your potato prints to make patterns and pictures. You can cut out letters too and spell out simple words.

All you need to get started are potatoes cut in half, a bit of imagination, a knife and some paint.

Start by marking you design on the face of the potato half with a pencil or felt-tip pen (it helps to dry the potato with kitchen roll) – remember to put down some sheets of newspaper wherever you’re planning to work as it can get messy!

The score the marks with a knife and remove the bits that aren’t part of the pattern.

Then coat with paint (or dip them into saucers of paint!) before pressing them onto your paper. You make repeat patterns or mix and match different stamps. Great fun for children of all ages…