Jane Crosen: “I thought ‘Well, I’m going to do my own labels using calligraphy, and then I can be my own typesetting machine.’”

Very Expensive Maps

Penobscot, Maine mapmaker Jane Crosen discusses her 40+ year cartographic career, the sound advice of “when in doubt, leave it out,” creating spoof maps for the nautical market, producing two expanded and rearranged editions of George Colby's 1881 atlases of Downeast Maine counties, becoming “[her] own typesetting machine” with a calligraphy pen, the feeling of looking through an airplane window at the landscape she’s drawn so many times, and her “paste-up” map design process that involves a light table, a proportional scale wheel, a pica ruler, mylar, pencils, a 000 brush and india ink. You won’t be surprised to learn this interview was conducted via landline. See Jane’s work at mainemapmaker.com

• Penobscot Bay to Schoodic Pt.
• East Penobscot Bay
• Friendship to Vinalhaven
• Two-color posters
• Sea of Iniquity parody map
• Seal Harbor parody map
• Her updated re-issue of Colby’s Atlas of Hancock County, Maine, 1881
• Her map for Camden National Corporation
• Her cookbook
• A 3-color USGS topo: Ellsworth, ME
• Osher Map Library
• Maine Down East Ice Age Trail Map
• Augustus Phillips
• Margaret Pearce
• Michael Hermann
• Jamshid Kooros

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