History

On the 16th December 1892, Mr. Robert K. Burt made a deposit of £160 at the Prescott & Co. bank at 50 Cornhill, London, EC. (The bank subsequently became a part of the National Westminster Bank). Thus began R. K. Burt and Company, which started trading in January 1893.

With the experience of working for many years in the large city printing company of the same name, run by his uncle, he was ideally suited to begin supplying paper to a wide variety of customers, mainly in London. In the early part of the 20th century, the customer list included such names as The Bank of England and Lloyds of London, as well as very many printers and publishers who are now well known names in the trade. Some are still customers, and in the same way, many of the paper mills in the purchase ledger continue to supply the company, even though some have changed name and ownership over the years.

The sales of paper for commercial printing and publishing continue with thousands of tonnes per year being used for a very wide range of publications. R. K. Burt & Company provides a comprehensive stock management service to publishers for these papers which are delivered direct from paper mills to printers throughout the country.

However, in the 1960s R. K. Burt & Co. became London agents for Barcham Green who produced hand-made papers. Almost as a separate division, the company became the largest wholesale paper merchant in the U.K. specialising in very high quality paper for every type of use for artists, including printmaking.

From the 1970s onwards, R. K. Burt & Co. was the first wholesale distributor to introduce to the U.K. such now familiar mill names as Arches, Fabriano, Hahnemühle, Lana, Richard de Bas and Rives. When it was considered that these and other mills like St. Cuthberts, Canson and Zerkall left a gap in the range of papers which they produce, R. K. Burt & Co. has commissioned these and other mills to produce a paper specially to their own or their customers' specifications. It is our belief that the customer, particularly in the field of art, demands the widest possible choice of paper to suit his or her particular needs. This has resulted in a large variety of papers being stocked. The extremes include inexpensive sketch pads, sheets of hand-made Egyptian Papyrus, as well as rolls of 100% cotton paper 100 yards long and weighing nearly 55kgs.

Through the 1980s and 1990s, the range of papers for high quality work continued to increase with the introduction of Canaletto, a 20% cotton paper suitable for four colour litho printing of limited edition prints, as well as a large range of hand-made Indian, Nepalese and Japanese papers.

The 21st Century sees the development of this web site as a way of providing information about the wholesale supplies of our extensive stocks of specialist papers.

R. K. Burt & Company Ltd.