There’s a particular sound a book makes when you open it for the first time — that soft crack of spine and air and intention. It’s the sound of permanence. It’s the sound of care.
Ink & Ribbon Press began, in many ways, as an act of defiance — a small, stubborn refusal to accept that poetry should be disposable, that literature should be frictionless, or that art should move at the speed of the algorithm.
For years I watched the publishing landscape flatten under convenience: one-click uploads, endless print-on-demand titles, digital shelves that nobody visits. Books arrived in the post with their spines uncreased and their souls unawakened. I kept wondering — what happens to poetry when its vessel no longer matters? What happens to art when it becomes content?
Ink & Ribbon is my answer to that question.
The Why
I created this press to slow things down.
Not nostalgically — not to chase some sepia-tinted idea of the past — but because the slowness of craft still matters. The weight of good paper, the texture of a cover, the discipline of editing, the patience it takes to typeset a poem line by line: these things are not trivial. They are the ritual of attention.
Poetry deserves to be made, not just printed.
When I founded Ink & Ribbon Press, I knew I didn’t want another imprint fighting for sales or algorithms. I wanted a nonprofit dedicated to permanence — a press that could exist outside commercial constraint, supported by community, patronage, and belief in the long arc of art.
We’re a 501(c)(3) pending nonprofit because what we create shouldn’t be beholden to quarterly targets or ad metrics (a world I have lived in for 15 years as a growth marketer).
The measure of success isn’t margin; it’s memory.
If one of our books finds its way into someone’s hands fifty years from now, if the spine softens from being read again and again, that’s the return I’m after.
What We’re Rebelling Against
There’s a quiet revolt at the center of Ink & Ribbon.
We’re rebelling against print-on-demand culture and the convenience that erodes care. Against a marketplace that equates quantity with relevance. Against the idea that poetry must justify itself by reach or virality.
Print-on-demand has democratized access, yes. But it has also diluted reverence. Books have become transactional objects, stripped of their weight and ceremony. I wanted to bring the ceremony back.
We’re also rebelling against the speed at which art is consumed. Against the constant demand to explain, simplify, and optimize. Poetry is not a product to be optimized. It is an act of witness, and witness in my opinion, requires stillness.
Ink & Ribbon exists as a place for that stillness.
Why a Nonprofit
Early in the planning process, I had to decide whether to form this as a traditional small press such as a for-profit micro-publisher that sells limited runs, or as something more principled, more enduring.
The answer came easily: this work should serve the public, not the market.
A nonprofit model means I can prioritize beauty over volume, craft over clicks, discovery over distribution. It allows us to publish a single book beautifully rather than twenty forgettably. It lets us invite patrons and donors to join the mission, not as customers, but as custodians of poetry.
It also means we can champion voices who might otherwise go unheard. There are extraordinary poets whose work doesn’t fit commercial molds, whose manuscripts are too quiet, too complex, or too careful for mass production. They’re the ones I want to print.
Our books won’t chase trend or algorithm. They’ll chase truth, precision, and permanence.
What I Hope to Achieve
Ink & Ribbon is small by design. I want it to feel like a private press from an earlier century, perhaps something tactile, intentional, and human-scaled — but built for the contemporary world.
Our goals are simple, though ambitious in spirit:
To publish poetry as art, not commodity.
To award The LemonLight Prize, celebrating courage in craft.
To create The Inkwell, a journal of essays, interviews, and reviews that extends the conversation.
To host readings and workshops that reconnect the written and spoken word.
To preserve the printed poem as a living, physical artifact.
Every decision — from paper stock to typography — is guided by one question: Will this endure?
The Inflection Points
Ink & Ribbon wasn’t born from theory. It grew out of experience — from years spent at the intersection of creativity and commerce.
In my professional life, I’ve led marketing teams, built strategies for global brands, and spent countless hours analyzing growth curves, funnels, and conversion metrics. That world taught me precision and scale, but it also left me wondering what gets lost when everything becomes measurable.
Somewhere along the way, I realized that the metrics I was optimizing for — reach, engagement, revenue — were the very things draining meaning from the work. I wanted to create something that couldn’t be measured in impressions.
At the same time, my creative life was expanding: four self-published books, each one teaching me more about the value of craft and collaboration. The Night Shines Like Fireflies taught me patience; The Sail taught me design; The Anteater That Didn’t taught me compromise and chaos; Carbon taught me endurance. And The Familiarity, my most recent work, taught me intimacy — the art of knowing something deeply enough to print it slowly.
All of that converged into a single realization: if I could bring the discipline of craft from poetry into publishing, and the clarity of structure from growth strategy into the arts, I might be able to build something rare — a press that’s both sustainable and soulful.
Ink & Ribbon is that experiment.
Looking Forward
We’re small, local, and independent based on Bainbridge Island, with ambitions that stretch far beyond geography. I don’t want to be the largest poetry press. I want to be the most deliberate.
I want our books to feel alive, to have weight, smell, texture. To be things you keep on your nightstand, not your Kindle.
I want The Inkwell to become a space for thoughtful reflection. Imagine a digital reading room where writers and readers meet in conversation rather than consumption.
And I want this community of poets, patrons, and readers to help redefine what sustainability in the arts can mean: not scale, but stewardship.
This press is a rebellion wrapped in reverence. A belief that beauty, once made, should last.
Thank you for being here at the beginning. The ink is still wet, the ribbon still unspooled. We’ll make this together, one carefully printed page at a time.
— G. K. Allum, Founder & Executive Editor
Ink & Ribbon Press
It sounds like a revolution, indeed. And isn't that we are coming back to valuing most? Reclaiming back our humanity and our creations.
"Poetry as art, not commodity." Just this.