This was a one color letterpress invitation suite for Penny and Brian. Penny was super easy to work with and so enjoyable. I have to say, the whole time I was designing this invitation I kept humming Penny Lane by The Beatles! I know, original. It’s like when people call out to my “Yo Adrienne!” from Rocky – I digress. Penny’s whole wedding will be wildflowers and outdoors in the wilderness. Since I’ve lived in the bedroom community of Jackson Hole, this was fun to work on because it’s right in the vein of living rural. We have a strip of grass on the outside of our driveway with an 80×6′ garden of wildflowers. It was so amazing last summer to see the California poppies, lupine, aster, hawkweed and more blooming in bright color in my front yard. Can you tell I’m itching for spring?!

If you are a budget bride looking for letterpress, but aren’t sure you can afford it, you should consider a one color invitation. This one is simple and minimalist however I’ve seen some really intricate and beautiful wedding invitations done as a one color as well. If you are interested in an estimate, don’t hesitate to ask!

After narrowing these mod wedding invititations down from the round I proofs and punching color to a brighter scheme, we explored some typeface options. This next round we looked at Memoir and Handsome Pro Classic along with illustration that gave a little more cirque d soleil and 60s vibe. The bride still can’t decide whether to have the layout done by a calligrapher so I tried to reflect in type as close as possible to what style she was going for.

The bride also wanted to explore incorporating a peony motif into one of the designs so here’s what we came up with on that regard. I can’t wait to see where these go for the final piece. They are going to be simply stunning when plated and printed letterpress.

These were inspired from the Beatles LOVE album and promo book for a truly mod wedding invite. The bride is looking for bright colors and handwritten typography. We established the layout first and are now on the hunt for the perfect calligrapher/handwritten touch on the first design.

The second has potential to be done in a calligrapher’s hand as well but I’m really imagining the potential of Buttermilk by Jessica Hische with the knockout and framed impression over the couple’s names…

The last option I revisited the hand-drawn mod swirly stuff (what would you call that – flourishes) with a more minimalist typographic treatment. It’s hard not to go overboard sometimes on these designs because I have to remember that the letterpress will change the whole dimension of the piece when printed. I tend to err on the less side in the design phases. We’ll see what the bride has to say!

I’m taking a short holiday break until the 4th of January, thus the no-posting on this here blog. However I thought I’d pass on some business card letterpress eye-candy until then to hold you over.

These letterpress business cards were printed 2/1 in charcoal and warm yellow. I liked how the client wanted to put a descriptive blurb describing the type of photography she shoots to differentiate herself, and immediately convey her style. The cards ended up being quite substantial as they were printed on 220# paper (required for double sided printing) and make quite a punch when handed out to clients. Lanne provided the design on these and pulled from my aspen mini notes for the backside imagery. After a few rounds of tweaking this was what we finally came up with together.

So I missed posting yesterday, too much letterpress jobs going out the door! To make up for it though,  I’ve got lots of free gift tag and place card goodies (personal use) for download this holiday season. Click on the image to be directed to my flickr stream where you can download the original image file direct to your desktop – there’s more after the jump so head on over and get some goods!

The original file is letter (8.5×11″) saved at 300% so just scale to size when printing out at home or the local print-shop and have fun! Cards measure 2×3.5″ when trimmed.

I don’t know if you are familiar with the story of the Twelve Dancing Princesses, so if not I’ll indulge you:

There were these princesses that seduced men and took them to an underground kingdom to dance the night away. The king was offering a reward to anyone who could solve the mystery of the twelve dancing princesses (and find out where all the other princes had disappeared to). The royal gardener wanted a shot at solving the mystery and a chance of winning a princess for his bride – so he befriended the youngest princess in hopes to get invited for a night of dancing. When finally invited, he was required to follow the princesses to the secret kingdom. While underground he passed through a forest of silver and gold and stole a branch of leaves off each tree. In a nutshell, the royal gardener solved the mystery, but only by passing through the underground kingdom and by bringing back proof to the king – oh wait and he stole the heart of the youngest daughter who confessed it all to the king in the end.

These letterpress gift cards/enclosures/escort cards reminded me of what I had imagined the forest of gold to be like. Bright, gleaming, and elegant you can get these as a set of five or order in bulk for an event if you’d like!

Note to the right that some changes are going on in my side-bar. To the right you’ll notice a lovely Colorful array of dingbats. If you click on any of those lovelies you’ll be directed to all the work I’ve produced with those ink colors, so pick your flavor and check it out! >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

To celebrate the start of autumn, PoppyTalk will be hosting Autumn Week and has invited their market place booths to participate as well. Today will be devoted to the delicious color yellow, which has been quite dominant this last year in fashion (think all those yellow/grey combos out earlier this year).

This week there will be 24 hour specials so check back everyday to see how you can score DP items at a discounted price! Today only, 10% off any product printed in yellow ink. Make your purchase and I’ll refund 10% on all yellow items via PayPal. For CUSTOM orders take 10% off too if you want yellow ink on your order!

All around with cold fall nights setting in on my rural plat of earth, I think of fall and the smell of musty leaves. If you liked these, then you are sure to like what is new! I think my fondest memories of childhood is hearing the crisp brittle and dry aspens blowing in the wind as they are changing from green to yellow then fading to black. Occasionally if it’s an area with a lot of redrock or iron in the soil (think Utah) then the leaves will go red/orange in color before falling off. If only I could be a poet, I would write about autumn in all my pretty prose. Lucky for you I’m not, so without further adeu:

Available in the shop in : yellow | red | orange | green

You may have remembered this giveaway a few months back or these I did for my dad. Colleen, the winner, chose this great crown for her dingbat and I am FINALLY getting around to posting the photos from her set of 25 Traditional Dingbat that she won.

These were a hit last year during the holidays – shameless I know to even be mentioning the holidays – but I’m already starting to fill up my press schedule for custom gifts! To order some for you or as a gift you can click on to check out the full listing.

So we are blessing Charlie over Labor Day weekend (how appropriate) and I’ve got a serious entertainers itch when it comes to family events and entertaining. Maybe it’s because I live oh, 300 miles away from all of them. Or that the rural-ness that I live in breeds PARTY in me every once in awhile, but I’ve been ah-experimenting. For Charlie’s big day, I’ve been having fun with how I could use some letterpress goods and show you what I was thinking these could be used for when I designed them! (Since every one thinks they are book-marks or something :)

You’re probably asking me “Where did you get that acid-green cocktail?” To be perfectly honest? Mountain Dew tastes a 110% better in a fluted champagne glass than it ever did in a can! And it matched those aspen tags perfectly. Thank heavens my man keeps it regularly stocked in the refrigerator.

So I’ve had a couple of retail orders go out recently and these were some of the hot items that I printed a lot of. From the Animalia children’s and baby collection these gift tags are great for a baby shower gift or to adorn tea cups, prizes, napkins or whatever suits your fancy. Introducing:

Elephants, Ava. as a set of 10.

Butterflies, Ava. as a set of 10.

Sharks, Ava. as a set of 10.

and Froggies, Ava. as a set of 10.

To win just comment below what your favorite animal is for a chance at one set of each!
The GOODS:
1 set of each of these tags (10 tags/set) in each pattern (40 total).
2×2″ letterpress tags with 1/4″ rounded corner and 3/16″ punched hole.

Giveaway ends Midnight on Thursday the 13th of August, TIMES UP! winner will be drawn at random and notified via email as well as updated on this post!

CONGRATS SUSAN!

I finally got around to printing the Bread and Buns letterpress recipe cards from the Forage collection and I have to say, they look delish!

Now if only I could be successful at baking bread myself! Any suggestions? I need a mixer recipe, that rises WELL (we live at 6,500 feet) and is preferably somewhat whole-wheat in nature.

Click on the photo to link to the shop and grab some of these for your baking adventures, Happy Friday!