Nottingham and Newcastle fire many fantastic careers: they’re similar, with a heritage that just won’t shut up. Both cities have a strong and creative industrial history, encouraging insightful experimentation because there’s a respect for people and the past that’s challenging yet respectful.
As you may know, Nottingham is the Unesco City of Literature, let’s not forget though, it’s the to-ing and fro-ing across the city and the world that has given us this imprimatur.
And the chicken and the egg of whether it is all the dreams and imaginations and manifestations of literary wonder in everyday life here that lead to lovely realisations like Ming and Steve’s (Chung and Dunn’s), Pop Press on St James Street anyway or whether the sunrise of Unesco status has changed everything in Nottingham forever is up to you to decide. Their shop is my dream of great 21st century commerce on the John Lewis model. Fantastic offer in the store combined with great web showroom!) Welcome!
Trained at Newcastle in bespoke print design, Ming and Steve went straight into making and selling beautiful hand printed works. The course and city did more than enable them to understand their profession but made them realise that there are many different routes to understanding why they loved design. Steve took further training in electronic publishing and Ming trained as a dietician.
Moving to Nottingham with children, the dream of creating a community hub for traditional printing was something they privately worked towards, doing Illustration Fairs and keeping up with a growing national awareness of the value of illustration in the creation of the first living museum of Illustration, the House of Illustration which opened in 2014.
When the very popular and loved skate shop on St James St
became available when the owner wanted a change of career, Ming and Steve who were already engaged with the Malt Cross creative community, saw an opportunity. Their children were less of a responsibility, so Ming and Steve said yes to the next phase of their careers in print.
Pop Press is an ethos of how to make, sell and live well with others, so promoting co-production and interdependence. Like a parent or a good primary school the shop makes everyone a winner and everyone can be a winner because everything that they stock has been designed and made with care and attention to the final product and experience of giving and owning. Nice one Ming and Steve!
signsofanopencity 
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