Consider this my leave application: as of tomorrow morning, I’ll be heading stateside to visit family for a couple of weeks. Don’t worry. The blogging will undoubtedly continue as there is very little else to do where I’ll be going, save for roaming the 24 hour Walmart and stuffing myself on all the food I can’t find here. Chocolate teddy grahams, you will be mine.
I’ll also be making my way over to a little something called the National Stationery Show, which I’m seriously excited about despite having no real concept of what to expect. Well that’s a lie – I’m expecting it to be mind-blowingly inspirational, and well worth the crazy hotel rates I’ll have to put up with to attend. I hate to gripe on here, I really do, but when a shoe box-sized NYC hotel room with a lumpy bed costs the same a private beach-front villa in Phuket, whining seems kind of justifiable don’t you think?
Back to some last minute packing for me. Goodnight all, and see you on the other side!
Photo by Adam, from our last trip to the big apple.
Speaking of waking up somewhere else, I stumbled upon these photos of the Ames Hotel in Boston this morning and haven’t been able to stop gawking since. Modern refurbs of old buildings just get to me like that.
Especially when there are barrel ceilings, mosaics and chandeliers involved…
I love how all of those fairly traditional elements are offset here by the near-industrial starkness of every other surface, and that that balance is then echoed in the furniture selection throughout. Spot on.
Also brilliant: the uplit pressed-tin tile ceilings.
Too bad I don’t have plans to be in Boston any time soon – it’s one of my favourite US cities, and I’m years overdue for a visit. Maybe I’ll convince Adam to drive us up there when we’re in New York from next week till mid-May. A four-hour drive sounds pretty different to a Singaporean (me) and an American (him) so there’s a good chance I’m not asking too much here!
You know how sometimes you see a photograph and want to…I don’t know, move in? I’m harboring an intense desire to be this right now:
I admittedly get that feeling about any picture in which there is a girl completely and impractically overdressed for whatever it is she’s doing. Then again, I’m writing this at 3:00am, in the same grubby clothes I left the house in at 10:00 this morning. So I’m allowed to dream…especially if it’s about cocktail dresses!
Photo via Harper’s Bazaar
I apologize in advance for all the gushing, but I just can’t get over how cool these cards are. Maybe you’ll share my view once you’ve gotten the design tour – let’s see!
Jennifer came to us with a crystal-clear vision. Being a designer by trade, she’d already decided on the card design and the pantone colour for the edges.
Sadly, the photos don’t do the neon pink justice at all, so you’ll just have to take my word that it’s a stunning colour in real life.
The design employed two variations of letterpress text – a standard impression…
…and a reverse impression, where the text appears raised against the depressed block it sits in.
Though the initial request was to print these blind, we were a little concerned about legibility issues for the areas of her name and title. On the other hand, simply printing these in a colour would have killed the overall effect.
Solution? We hand-mixed a custom ink for Jennifer that reflected grey on some angles, but showed up completely colourless on others – the best of both worlds.
Here’s two photos of the same stack of cards taken from different angles to demonstrate the effect.
So, so neat. I always keep a sample of this job in our portfolio to show how legible “blind” printing can be if you’re willing to make certain allowances.
Thank you Jennifer for giving us the chance to execute such an awesome design!
A majority of my weekend went towards packaging an order corporate gifts. The requirements were that the packaging had to be beautiful and gift-ready, yet compact, light and fuss-free enough to be packed into a suitcase without hassle or the possibility of damage.
Personally, I love how these turned out: though minimal, the detail of the die-cut edge and contrast of grey grosgrain make these gift-ready despite the lack of traditional wrapping paper and bows.
Tucked inside each package was 5 notecards, letterpressed with the image of a bird perched in a sprig of flowers. They were paired with matching envelopes, lined in the same sunny yellow as the ink colour.
Here’s some close-ups of the print, with the super-fine details shown on the left.
These were so hard to hand over – I’d grown quite attached to the little birdies after working on this project. Here’s hoping they have a safe flight to Japan and their new owners there!
Hello world!
We’re finally going to be getting back to regular programming with this post, after weeks of virtually round-the-clock printing and not much sleep. Not that I’m complaining of course – it makes me so happy to be spreading the letterpress love – but man. I’ve come so close to bringing an air mattress to the studio, it’s scary.
Dubious accommodation choices aside, I can’t wait to share all the fantastic projects we’ve been swamped with lately; the slightly abstract header photo is a little hint at what’s to come. Can you guess what it is?
