You Are Here: The Beauty of Real Hackney Dave’s Maps

There’s a particular kind of magic in a map that’s already been used. Not a fresh, flat, unmarked one — a map that’s been folded and refolded, tucked in a glovebox, spilled coffee on, annotated in someone else’s handwriting. A map that’s been somewhere.

Thats the exaclty the raw material Dave Buonaguidi AKA Real Hackney Dave works with.

TWO LIVES, ONE PIECE OF PAPER

Every print in his collection starts long before Dave touches it. He sources vintage maps from all over the world — old, worn, sometimes complete with notes and scribbles left by whoever owned them first. That’s layer one: a stranger’s journey, printed into the paper itself.

Then Dave does what he does best – bold , floor, screen printed straight over the top with his signature pink and red type. Two layer hand pulled and unmistakably his. Thats layer two : the artsits own voice, loud and irreverent, laid over some else’s history.

Some artists find their way to screen printing. Dave Buonaguidi — better known as Real Hackney Dave — found his way to us.

Before becoming one of Britain’s most recognisable contemporary printmakers, Dave had spent decades at the very top of the advertising world. Then, in his fifties, he walked into Print Club London for a one-day screen-printing workshop.

It changed everything.

What began as an experiment quickly became a new creative life. Dave returned to the studio, developed his unmistakable visual language and began making the bold, irreverent, brilliantly colourful prints that have since become synonymous with Real Hackney Dave.

Print Club London has been part of that story from the beginning.

We’ve watched Dave’s practice evolve from those early experiments in screen printing into a body of work collected and exhibited around the world. Our relationship with Dave is rooted in the studio itself — in ink, paper, colour and the wonderfully hands-on process that sits at the heart of his work.

Today, we’re proud to represent and sell a significant collection of Real Hackney Dave’s prints, continuing a relationship that began with a single screen-printing workshop and grew into one of the most enduring creative connections in our studio’s history.

His work is funny, provocative, nostalgic and unmistakably his own. And, perhaps most importantly, it remains true to the thing that started it all: a love of making prints.

Welcome to the world of Real Hackney Dave, through the studio where the story began.