Australian printer Bob Armstrong has won another swag of gold medals at the major North American printing awards night, beating already lofty expectations from previous years.

Armstrong’s photography and print house Body of Work picked up a staggering 17 golds and 42 awards in total from its 42 entries in the 2014 American Premier Print Awards – of the 109 ‘Benny’ gold awards handed out at the Chicago gala.

He narrowly missed out on winning the Best in Show for the third year running, coming in second place with its Casino Collection. Chinese company Artron Art Group won the top award for its service catalogue, Master of the Earth.

Body of Work also picked up silver honours for earning the second-highest tally of awards in the competition, picking up more gold Bennys than the outright winner, prolific Mexican print outfit Offset Multicolor.

Armstrong says the vibe at the American awards is stronger than ever, with the industry interested in swapping ideas to produce more and more impressive print.

The 2015 Body of Work calendar was back amongst the gold winners for the third successive year, in the calendars, and diaries and desk calendars categories, and was further honoured with a Special Innovation Award for Printing.

The calendar consists of a Bakelite holding structure, with printed aluminium leaves for each month that slide in and out. Armstrong says that at $30,000 it would be among the most expensive calendars in the world.

One of the pages in this year’s calendar entry, he adds, took eight days to print, with 16 layers in perfect registration. The calendar has been designed to work as a wall or desk calendar and won the Benny for both categories.

Taking away nine golds at last year’s awards, and five the year before, the company now has 31 Benny awards to its name.

Armstrong says he has not yet decided if Body of Work will enter the awards again in 2015; for now the studio is enjoying its recent success with photoshoots and more creative content in the works – pursuing quality under the tagline, The endless journey.

He tells ProPrint, “The American print awards go beyond the technical side of printing, our photography plays an enormous part in our success in the competition.

“I’m not sure yet if we will be back again next year, but it has been wonderful to be recognised for our work in Chicago once again.”

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