catherine & joel :: order of service booklets

Earlier this month we completed these super sweet order of service booklets for Catherine and Joel who were married at All Saints Chapel, Hamilton Island. We illustrated the sweet motif of the weatherboard chapel and competed this with typography to suit the invitations in which we had previously designed. Letterpressed on white 100% cotton paper in a mid tone grey ink, we then digitally printed the internal service pages and machine stitched the spine binding. Just lovely!

airmail and candy stripes twine

We've got exciting news - We've got two gorgeous new twines available in our online store!

Each of our Airmail and Candy Stripe rolls is full of old fashioned twine goodness and features 220m of 100% cotton 4ply twine. Available for $18 per roll here and here.

LOVE!

GoMA christmas market this saturday!

Brisbane folks - this Saturday is the gorgeous GoMA Gallery Store Markets. These are our last event in Brisbane for the year, and we are most excited to be showing our letterpress goodies amongst some of Brisbane's finest including Paper Boat Press, Loose.Leaf Paper, Penelope and Pip and more.

We might just see you there!

Saturday 26th November
9.00am to 4pm
Gallery of Modern Art
Stanley Street, South Brisbane.

showstopper

This little lady steals my heart every day. xox

letterpress kraft christmas tags/ornaments

Back by popular demand this year are our letterpress Christmas large kraft tags/ornaments. Letterpress printed on super heavy weight 600gsm kraft board our tags have been letterpress printed in two colours white and red and then die cut into the sweetest festive shapes. Measuring 86mm x 86mm they come with red and white bakers twine and are available in our online store as 6 packs for $15. Limited numbers available.

featured stockist :: shelf / life

Back in the summer of 2009 we started to work on building letterpress products which we could make available for retail stores. At the same time we were contacted by the most delightful Jess who was starting up her homewares and lifestyle store Shelf / Life in Sydneys Surry Hill's - it was a simply delightful case of perfect timing. One of our very first batches of retail goodies went off to her lovely store and over the past two years we have been tickled pink to send lovely parcels of letterpress goodness off to the Shelf / Life's shelves.

As our retail range has expanded, we have cherished the support from Jess and her team, and for us, it has been such a joy to watch the developments and growth of Shelf / Life (as well as Jess's house renovations and amazing wedding) over on their blog. It is also wonderfully exciting news (especially for us interstaters) that Shelf / Life have also just launched their own online store! 

The gorgeous Jess had a recent chat to us about Shelf / Life, and you can read the full details below.

Tell us a little about your store and its philosophy?
shelf / life has been open for almost 2 years now and we have recently launched our new online store as well. We offer a range of homewares, stationery and lifestyle products with a focus on ethical design and production. We believe that great design should encompass quality, integrity and longevity, and our intent is to provide products for everyday life which reflect this.

We support independent designers and artisans from around the world who can ensure traditional craft skills will be kept alive for years to come. We love to hear and share stories about how things are made - the techniques, the materials, the ideas behind a design - so that others can be inspired to make
considered choices.

What are some of your favourite brands in stock? What makes you choose these designers to showcase?
Too many to mention! I do love stocking products by The Dharma Door as their fair trade bags and baskets are not only beautifully designed but help to empower women in Bangladesh by providing employment. I adore Bespoke Press (of course!) for the tactility of the letterpressed cardstock and yummy colourways and Rifle Paper Co for their beautiful loose painterly designs. I also have a soft spot for Perch! Designʼs Mason Jar - probably my all-time favourite object in the shop.

Usually when choosing designers for the shop I consider a number of factors but obviously I have to love something to put it on my shelves. After that initial little burst of excitement that I feel I then ask
questions about functionality, quality and the designerʼs process to work out whether it will be a good fit for our store.


One thing you love the most about your shop?
Itʼs a tie between receiving and unpacking new boxes of goodies for the shelves and chatting to regular customers who always say the nicest things!

Tell us about Surry Hills, what are some of your favourite finds?
Our little pocket of Surry Hills is a friendly neighbourhood with all its little shops and cafes tucked in amongst beautiful old terraces. There are a lot of creative businesses in the area as well so you always get to meet interesting people. My favourite find, which is probably very well known to Sydneysiders,
is Single Origin Cafe - delicious coffee and great food... and dangerously close to my shop!

Contact details
shelf / life
Shop 1, 50 Reservoir St
Surry Hills NSW 2010
02 9211 2858
www.shelflife.com.au
www.facebook.com/shelflifestore

Opening hours
Tues - Thurs 10am - 6pm
Friday 10am - 5pm
Saturday 10am - 4pm
(extended trading hours leading up to Christmas)

penny & glyn :: letterpress save the dates

 

We recently designed and letterpress printed these super lovely save the dates for Penny and Glyn from Victoria. They are planning a late Autumn 2012 wedding at the divine Stones of the Yarra Valley. With a chapel ceremony, converted barn reception, masses of white flowers with greenery and gorgeous rustic timber elements we love the plans they have for their day.

Penny & Glyn's brief to us was to represent their day through the use of rustic elements combined with classic styling and gorgeous typography.

We love their final chosen design - it's use of space and combinations of typefaces, as well as the vintage motif perfectly presents the letterpress impression and has resulted in a beautifully tactile save the date card. Just lovely!

love

Gosh I love our paper twines a hundred times over, Love, Love, Love. 

Now instore for you to love too.

aleisha & karl :: letterpress wedding stationery

Last Friday was the magical date of the 11th of the 11th 2011 - A pretty special day as far as numbers go. We had a few gorgeous couples getting married on this day and one of the was Karl and Aleisha from Western Australia.

We designed and letterpressed their wedding set several months ago to be classically beautiful yet tactile and beautiful to the touch. A blind impressed pattern was printed on our 100% cotton paper and teamed up with our sweet love heart and strong and simple typography. The suite included invitations, printed and lined envelopes (with address scalloped labels) reply postcard, gift cards and placesettings. 

We simply adored the blind impressed pattern - its simplicity yet small intricacies made it perfect for letterpress - blind impressed patterns are best suited with strong areas of negative and positive space inside of the pattern itself - so this one was perfect. We loved a hundred times over!

letterpress christmas swing/gift tags

Today we have some Christmas letterpress swing tag eye candy for you - we couldn't work out which images to show - so heck, we will show them all! Our swing tags come in three different designs, in four different colours and can be bought as 12 packs for $20 here.

You might also spot our double sided gift wrap in a few of the shots - we have teamed these up to be intermixed with our Christmas swing tags and colours - you can view the range here. 

 

 

japanese washi paper tape now instore

For quite some time we have been stocking our favourite Japanese Washi Paper tape - so we thought it was about time we jolly well listed it in our online store! We currently have 14 different patterns and designs in stock of this wonder tape.

Washi paper tape can be used for gift wrapping, book-marking, sealing envelopes, art and craft or attaching bills to the fridge. Once you start, you'll find it hard to stop. Utilising the characteristics of Japanese rice paper, each Masking Tape roll is textured and can be written on, is easy to remove and does not leave stains, offering an abundance of creative and decorative uses. We use this tape for so many uses in the studio - not only does it look super pretty, but it sure is super handy to have on hand!


Each roll is 10mm wide by 10 meters long and are available for $4.95 per roll right here in our little online shop.

christmas card 6 packs now instore

Yesterday we introduced you to the four cards in our Christmas card range, and today we have our 6 packs to show you! Our individual cards are $6 each, however if you have a few cards to send this silly season, our 6 packs can be a great way to go for $26.95 - that is less then $4.50 per lovely letterpress card!

Our Red/Silver 6 pack features
- 3 cards of our Red ""May the sparkle of the stars, and all the peace on earth by yours this Christmas"
- 3 cards of our Silver "In this loveliest of seasons, may you find laughter and merriment and dashings of good fortune, for a fabulous new year to come"

Our Orange/Turquoise 6 pack features
- 3 cards of our Orange "Wishing you laughter and love, and all things merry and bright, for this most wonderful time of the year "
- 3 cards of our turquoise "May you have blessings of love, the sweetest of joys, stuffing's of treats, and stockings full of sweet cheer this Christmas"

Each pack includes 6 kraft envelopes and are boxed inside of a protective plastic casing. Available in very limited numbers here and here.

letterpress christmas cards now available!

Do you send Christmas cards out each year? It seems like one of those dying past times that in our technological age that is slowly becoming forgotten.

I love the joy of receiving Christmas cards - the envelope in the mail box with a hand written address - a festive stamp and that tell tale "Card Only" sticker which brings a little flutter to your heart - it is always such an exciting moment, especially when it is hidden between bills and all that other boring mail which normally fills the box. A hidden joy that Christmas is just around the corner.

I must admit several years ago, life got too busy and sending Christmas cards was one of the first things on my Christmas list of things to do which was forgotten. But with a love of sending and receiving cards, this year we are determined to be organised and to sit down and to write to our loved ones. We hope it brings a little Christmas joy to their day.

In the spirit of reinventing the Christmas card tradition for the last few months my brain has been ticking over thinking of the perfect wording to reflect the joy, the love and the happiness of Christmas. With a little touch of humour, lots of heart warming and a touch of quirk we are pretty happy with the end result!

We designed and letterpress printed 4 different cards for this Christmas season. Utilising a mixture of typefaces we gave them a little vintage vibe through the combination of three sweet typefaces and we letterpress printed them on Herbie our 1972 Heidelberg Platen in 4 colour ways - Red, Orange, Turquoise and Silver on our 100% cotton ivory stock.

Each card measures 95mm x 130mm and comes complete with a brown kraft envelope. Our cards  are available as single cards $6.00 (visit: red, orange, turquoise, silver) or as 6 packs $26.95 (here and here) in our online store - Available in limited numbers only.



Do you have a favourite? I particularly love the orange ink, but adore the simplicity of our red wording, but then again the silver ink is quite a delight and turquoise just never goes out of fashion. Which one do you like the best?

christmas stationery now available!

Over the past few months we have been busy little bees (elves?) here in the studio designing and printing our 2011 letterpress Christmas range! Over the next few days we will introduce you to our range of letterpress cards, swing tags, gift wrap, twines, ribbons and paper tapes. But if you can't wait out that long, you can get a little sneaky peak you of the range here!

thank you brisbane!

The gorgeous Old Museum Building and the sweetest Bunting by the Sneaky CafeGorgeous homewares by Elkhorn (love their stuff so much!!) and yummy Macaroons.

 

Our new bookmarks (to be launched in our online store soon) and those AMAZING peonies.

Oh my Brisbane, what a marvellous weekend! A very big thank you for all of those who stopped by and said hello at our Finders Keepers Stall. We met so many lovely people, saw lots of familiar faces and had a delightful time!

A very big thank you to my gorgeous friend Louise for all her help setting up and for arranging the most amazing Peony flowers for us (I can't even count how many times I declared my love for them over the weekend). A huge thanks to the gorgeous Mr H who makes the most wonderful shop boy, and with whom it is so fun to share in this journey with. To Sarah and Brooke with whom it is both a pleasure to work with - The Finders Keepers is such a magical community and it is such a joy to be able to help do my part to bring the Finders Keepers love to town. And finally a very big thank you to all those who support our letterpress goods, it is such a joy to be able to share our love of letterpress with you.

Sydney - it is your turn next! We will be seeing you at Carriageworks on the 2nd and 3rd of December! You can find out more details here.

My goodness, Thank you Brisbane, you sure are one fabulous city!
xox