DIP-Tech and Steinfort Glas Make Beautiful Music… and Design Together

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Haarlem City Theatre dripping excitement over waterfall refacing

Jan Anjema always keeps an eye toward the future.

As the Managing Director of Steinfort Glas in Franeker, The Netherlands, a full-service glass processing plant with more than 100 employees, he’s long been a believer in adapting the latest techniques to keep Steinfort ahead of the pack. While its traditional focus is on glass for furniture, interior design and shop interiors, Anjema was eager to expand his plant’s capacities. Traditionally, Steinfort’s projects centered on screen printing. This is an expensive process in terms of materials and personhours for set up, clean up, storage and reclamation. This all makes screening ill suited for small to midsize jobs. Custom work is generally rendered cost prohibitive from the very beginning.

As part of his quest to find a solution to provide cost-effective custom work to his clients, Anjema began closely monitoring the evolution of glass printing equipment. Finally, in 2006, he saw a printer that was so technologically advanced that he decided the time was right to invest in digital printing. “We were essentially handcuffed with the kind of jobs we could accept,” states Anjema. “The screening process was familiar but cumbersome, costly, and not at all flexible, so we were ready to make a move.” It was a bold, well-timed move, indeed.

Witness the Stadsschouwburg (City Theatre) Haarlem. Noted Dutch architect Erick van Egeraat designed a dramatic glass facing to create the illusion that water was cascading from the roof and down the sides of the building. This monumental task required 400 different prints on 400 different sized panes.

Originally, the plan was to complete the project via screening. Since each window was a different size and print, it quickly became evident that this would be cost prohibitive. A more viable, economical approach would be necessary to bring the City Theatre’s new image to life.

DIP-Tech and Steinfort Glas Make Beautiful Music… and Design Together

Haarlem City Theatre dripping excitement over waterfall refacing

The Steinfort Glas Solution – Finding a Better Way to Present Beauty on Glass

Enter the GlassJet, the first industrial direct-on-glass digital printer. Providing unique versatility, it is suitable for virtually any glass application. Its user-friendly design allows for rapid set up and printing of digitally processed images from a variety of file types (TIF, EPS, PDF, JPG). Images are sent directly to GlassJet via the network, like any other printer. Even low-resolution images aren’t a challenge due to the inclusion of Pixel- Blaster software. Each image can be individually numbered, allowing for easy tracking of the 400 unique panels the City Theatre project required.

A More Colorful Challenge

To bring the Haarlem project to life, the design and build team had to confront two major challenges. The first was color. To achieve the desired effect, Steinfort mixed three of the nine available ceramic-ink colors in seven different combinations until Van Egeraat decided they had created the ideal color palette for their project.

The second issue was to make sure that the different prints were located on the correct part of the pane, with one part in green and the other in white. The GlassJet’s capacity to print up to five colors at a time streamlined this process, providing a clear advantage over using screens for such an undertaking.

“The logistics were relatively straightforward,” says Anjema. “We received the files and instructions from the builder. We then prepared two print files for each window that we transferred to the printer via the Internet. The panes were then printed. We actually had to sort the panes in the factory due to the absence of space at the building site.

“Although a job this size can be confusing, the GlassJet comes equipped with an easy solution - its variable data feature, which easily handles multi-tiled jobs. It hides numbers in the corner of the tiles, eliminating any potential mix-ups during installation,” continues Anjema.

“But after all of this – we still were not finished,” Anjema concludes. “We sent about a quarter of the panes for double glazing. Given the scale and boldness of the project, it went remarkably smoothly.”

Creating the Previously Impossible – and Making it Cost-effective

The economic advantages were immediately apparent to all involved, making it a key selling point for Anjema. “We can now offer a small run project for relatively little expense as compared to using screens. We have already done five other projects that were more than 100M2, which would be impossible with screen printing due to the variation in prints per window.

“Overall, the low setup cost is the key economic factor, as well as being able to supply a very high quality product for which the customers are prepared to pay a good price, while still reaping significant savings over screen printing – helping their projects’ bottom lines as it adds to ours.” While economics are a significant factor for companies like Steinfort Glas in adopting the GlassJet, the startling beauty of the designs as seen on the Stadsschouwburg Haarlem are sure to continue to inspire architects and designers to continue to push the boundaries of creative expression on glass via digital printing.