How Paper Boxes Are Made / A practical and instructive book telling how the beginner may manufacture all kinds of paper boxes, with special chapters on the printing department for paper box plants, embossing, gold-leafing, label work, etc.

by Robert F. Salade

Face Powder Box with dome top—Covered with colored
enameled paper, leaving four gold edges.

Beck Doming or Embossing Machine.

The Charles Beck Company, of 609 Chestnut street, Philadelphia, make a duplex embossing press which has been designed especially for the “doming” of tops for round or oval face powder boxes. It is a hot press, and by means of brass male and female dies, it shapes round or oval pieces of box-board into convex forms for the tops of the boxes. The Beck Duplex Embossing Press consists of two complete presses which operate alternatingly. A set of dies is placed in proper position in each press. The operator places a box-top over the female die of one press, and as that box-top is being embossed, the operator places another box-top over the female die of the other press. In this way there is always a box-top being embossed, either on one press or the other. The box-top remains between the heated dies long enough to be firmly molded into a dome.

The printed labels for dome-topped face powder boxes are pasted on the round or oval pieces of box-board before the embossing is done, so that the labels will have the same convex form as the box-board. The covering is done the same as with flat-topped round boxes with projecting edges.

ODD-SHAPED FACE POWDER BOXES.

Fancy face powder boxes are made in many different sizes and shapes. Some have mirrors set in on the inside of the lids, so that the lady using the powder, when traveling, may see her face. Novelty boxes of this kind are “irresistible” to the fair sex. They are in great demand, and they bring high prices. Some face powder boxes are square with round corners; others have shapes like hearts, diamonds, etc. The odd-shaped boxes usually have wide flanges, or French edges, top and bottom, sometimes projecting as much as one-quarter of an inch. The tops are embossed, or are padded with cotton wadding before the covering is applied. The covering often consists of fine embossed paper, in rich colors like deep red, royal blue, purple, gold, pink, and warm brown.

All of these boxes are made entirely by hand from fine grades of cardboard, although the tops and bottoms are usually of the ordinary box-board, covered on both sides with glazed paper. Forms are used in making the odd-shaped boxes, and the work is done by highly-skilled operators who have had long experience on the one line of product.