Keepsake Press

The Keepsake Press was the creation of Roy Lewis (1913-1996) and grew out of his lifelong fascination with printing design and illustration. He set up his business in Richmond, Surrey, with the assistance of his daughters, as a way to help various poets among his friends and acquaintances to reach their public. Their choice had previously been between amateurish and off-putting duplication, and expensive self-financed publication. The Keepsake Press was able to produce presentable limited editions, composed by hand and printed letterpress. It also did all the associated work of advertising and negotiating with bookshops. Among the authors published by Keepsake were Edward Lowbury, Gavin Ewart, Mervyn Peake, Peter Porter, and Roy Fuller. The Press's bibliography lists eighty-one items, one of which is the Press's well-known series of Keepsake poems. Thirty-nine single poems with an illustration were published between 1972 and 1979, adding Vernon Scannell, Kevin Crossley-Holland, Charles Causley, and many others to the Press's list of authors.