These adorable baby shower invitations come to us from Jessie and Jen of Shipwright & Co. – and they’re for Jessie’s own baby shower! The shower doubled as a co-ed pool party and barbeque, so Jessie and Jen wanted to avoid anything traditionally “baby” for the design. They drew inspiration from antique storybooks, incorporating whimsical illustrations and hand lettering. Beautiful!

From Jessie (and Jen): These invitations were created for a co-ed baby shower doubling as a pool party and barbecue for an expecting mom (me!) who wanted something a little different for her shower. We set out to create an invitation that would be child-like without being overly cutesy. Our inspiration came from storybooks from the 1930s and ’40s, whose beautiful and whimsical illustrations conveyed the sense of childhood that we sought.

 

 We printed the moon and animals in a light gray, set against irregular bubbles of overlapping color, to play around with the lovely way in which the translucent inks interact with each other on the lush cotton paper. The details of the party sit within each bubble in hand-drawn text. We loved the way the text pops against the background color and how the pressure of the press raises it up slightly, giving the whole piece that lovely tactile quality you get from letterpress.

Lastly, we printed the envelopes in the same light green color as the invitations with more hand-drawn text and a different illustration of woodland creatures — this time a happy pair of dancing frogs. This project was hand printed on our 1911 Chandler & Price letterpress on Crane’s Lettra pearl white paper.

Thanks Jessie & Jen!

Photo Credits: Shipwright & Co.