10/30/2017

The Best Walls in DC

I’ve lived in DC for nearly 15 years, and gosh this city has changed a lot over those years. One of my favorite changes is the emergence of colorful walls and murals throughout the city, so today I thought I’d share some of my favorites with all of you! You should definitely consider this to be “The Best Walls in DC: Part 1,” because there are lots more seriously cool DC walls on my list. If you’re local, feel free to share your favorites in the comments below â€“ and if you’re planning to visit DC in the near future, I hope you’ll include a stop at some of the walls below during your visit!

Let’s start with one of my favorites! Blagden Alley is full of murals, but my favorite is this rainbow mural by visual artist Lisa Marie Thalhammer that spells L-O-V-E over four painted garage doors. Bonus points if you stop to check out the murals on your way to one of the many restaurants and bars in the area, from the brand-new Calico to longtime favorite The Columbia Room.

Blagden Alley, between M and N Street NW and 9th and 10th Street NW

Union Market is one of our favorite spots in DC: we love grabbing a drink at Cotton & Reed, a quick bite to eat at one of the many food stalls, and shopping at Salt & Sundry or Little Leaf. But they also have two of my favorite murals in the city! The heart wall below was created by LA graffiti artist Mr. Brainwash in 2016 in honor of International Womenâ€™s Day. It’s so happy and colorful!

Just a few weeks ago, artist Dallas Clayton came to town to work his magic on another Union Market wall. This wall is in partnership with Instagram’s #kindcomments campaign, and is full of colorful shapes and happy messages.

Union Market, 1309 5th St NE

The Watermelon House is well on its way to being one of the most well known landmarks in DC. You can even find it on Google maps! The legend behind this wall (at least as told to me) is that the home was painted a bright pink back when the current owners bought it. They weren’t crazy about the shade of pink, so they decided to paint a few seeds and a green border on the side and turn it into a watermelon â€“ and the rest is history! And if that wasn’t good enough, the DCKiwi wall is right behind the watermelon wall! It’s the cutest little fruit-filled alley in all of DC.

Watermelon House and DCKiwi Wall, 1112 Q Street NW

As much as I love rainbows and fruit murals, I’m completely obsessed with the lettering in this mural by Ricardo Gonzalez for Pow Wow DC at the AVA NoMa building. And those colors! I could stare at this one all day.

Image by Pow Wow DC

AVA NoMa, 55 M St NE

All photos by Nole Garey and Anna Meyer for Oh So Beautiful Paper

10/26/2017

Well Said Type | 179

RARE BIRD SPECIMEN II

Created by Karla Lim of Written Word Calligraphy (and seriously the most gorgeous calligraphy font I’ve seen in a long time)

p.s. Have you heard about Fontacular happening over at MyFonts?? It’s a legendary font event with amazing deals on dozens of fonts, including some of my personal favorites that I use all the time here on OSBP. The event only runs through midnight tomorrow (Friday), so get in on all the deals while you can! You can find the full list of participating fonts and foundries right here!

10/24/2017

Behind the Stationery: Blackbird Letterpress

Kathryn from Blackbird Letterpress is a seasoned printmaker, stationer, and former teacher! Based in Baton Rouge, Kathryn has grown and built her business in Louisiana since her MFA days and has become known especially for her die cut greeting cards. Today Kathryn is taking us through how she’s grown and transitioned her business throughout the years. Welcome Kathryn! â€”Megan Soh

From Kathryn: When I finished my MFA in printmaking at LSU in 2003, I bought my first letterpress, a Chandler and Price 8×12. I moved the press into a friend’s house who had a large back room and started printing custom work â€” business cards, wedding invitations, etc. Before making Blackbird a full-time job, I taught adjunct at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette teaching drawing, 2D & 3D Design, and Art Appreciation. I moved back to Baton Rouge in 2007 with the press and type. In 2009, while keeping overhead low (my printshop moved into my husband’s metal fabrication shop) I decided to put all my energy into Blackbird. This meant expanding from custom and retail online & local markets to the wholesale market and exhibiting at trade shows.

Our printshop is located in mid-city Baton Rouge in what I like to call the “cemetery district” (we are next door to a 19th century cemetery). We moved into a new studio in 2016 and this expanded our space, almost tripling it in size. My husband and I renovated an old office building for about 4 years where we live upstairs and the printshop is downstairs.

We focus mostly on letterpress greeting cards, handmade notebooks, calendars, while also continuing to provide custom letterpress printing from business cards to fine wedding invitations. We print, die cut, bind notebooks, and assemble our products in house.

Many of our cards are die cut shaped cards (like the folded hand-shaped and skull-shaped cards). Our biggest sellers are the animal cards in which most are die cut to hold a gift card, money, note, or photo. We love to design things that move, like our perpetual calendars and volvelle info spinners (National Parks, Brilliant Women).

Most days are full of nonstop packaging, binding notebooks, and printing, with some design or drawing thrown in somewhere. We have a board that keeps track of the list of card reprinting to do, as well as lists of orders to fill. Personally, as the owner/printer/designer/bookkeeper, my biggest struggle is getting it all done. I do all of our accounting, plus much of the printing and designing, so it can be difficult to fit it all in a day. I’m lucky to have a great team that focuses on printing, scoring, order filling, cutting paper, and custom printing and designing.

Most card designs start with pencil and paper, from sketches to the final drawing finished in black ink. The drawing gets scanned into the computer where it is formatted and then compositionally laid out in order for plates to be ordered for printing. As a team we discuss color options, as well as envelope color and packaging options. Plates arrive, paper gets cut, and then the card is on to print.

We have 5 presses in the studio, 8×12 C&P platen press, 10×15 C&P platen press, Vandercook SP15, and 2 10×15 Heidelberg Windmills. Each job or card is printed on the press that will print the design the best. Each press has it’s strengths and we use them accordingly. For example, the Windmills do the die cutting and quantity production printing and the Vandercook will print notebook covers and wedding invitations.

The printed pieces get die cut or trimmed and scored if needed and then move to their inventory place on the shelf until they are packaged and shipped to one of our retailers!

All photos courtesy of Blackbird Letterpress.

Want to be featured in the Behind the Stationery column? Reach out to Megan at megan [at] ohsobeautifulpaper [dot] com for more details.

10/24/2017

Southwestern Mixed Media Wedding Invitations

You guys, today is going to be a GREAT day: we have an invitation from Arley-Rose and Morgan of Ladyfingers Letterpress to share with you! If you’ve been reading OSBP for the last five or so years, you know that these ladies produce some of the most imaginative and beautiful custom stationery (including my first daughter’s baby announcement!). These stunning southwestern mixed media wedding invitations are no exception. Arley and Morgan incorporated non-traditional materials like mica, leather, sage, and wood to create a complete invitation experience. Amazing!

From Arley-Rose: It’s safe to say that most of our clients these days have already experienced firsthand the quality and creativity of our work before they hire us. They likely have received an invitation of ours from a family or friend and intimately know the thrill of receiving a commissioned Ladyfingers Letterpress invitation in the mail and want their guests to feel the same way.

A few years back, we had created pretty insane baby shower invitations for some close friends who are in the film industry in New York. A guest of that shower, Alex Bolotow, was dating the iconic fashion photographer Terry Richardson at the time, and when they became engaged, she called us up right away with tons of enthusiasm and ideas.

Alex and Terry were planning an intimate gathering at a remote and serene southwestern desert location outside of Taos, New Mexico and wanted to give their guests a preview of the warmth, love, and realness that they would soon be experiencing on their wedding day. A gift of excitement, a collection of beautiful things both close to their hearts and to the heart of the place they wed.

We worked together for ten months to create something that could hardly be deemed an invitation. A gift, maybe. More like a finely curated assemblage of meaningful things, like opening the lid of a close friend’s favorite collection of personal objects. Alex and Terry wanted the suite to be as personal, tactile and location-centric as possible. The concept took on a three-dimensional form, and the invitations were shipped in large hand-lettered kraft boxes that were carefully opened to uncover a sun-kissed wooden box overflowing with the invitation and supporting objects.

We hand lettered the invitation and foil printed it in gold foil onto sturdy and semi-translucent pieces of mica. Additional pieces such as their RSVP and Smudge Blessing Card were letterpress printed on thick cotton paper. We worked with local artist Pipilo Road to design and manufacture handmade wooden boxes out of reclaimed materials. The lids were hand painted and screen printed. We went through several iterations where we sent videos of different prototypes back and forth before a design was settled and the boxes were fabricated.

Soft, tobacco deerskin leather pouches were carefully designed, stitched and hand burned by Three Arrows Leather out of Taos. Alex helped us source sage bundles, quartz rocks, vintage matches from New Mexican locations and palo santo sticks to complete the suite and allow their guests to conduct a Smudge Blessing of their own. All of these items, plus a hand-drawn map of Taos and a celestial map of the night sky on the date of their wedding, were carefully tucked into the handmade wooden box which was designed to fit perfectly within an outer shipping box.

We got to know Alex over the time we spent working together, and now consider her a close friend. In fact, she and Terry surprised us with an invitation to their wedding, which we happily accepted. We’re still reeling from our time spent in Taos with this lovely couple and are happy to finally share these photos taken by Lauren Memarian with you! For more gorgeous photos of this suite, check out the Gallery of Commissioned Works at ladyfingersletterpress.com.

Thanks Arley-Rose and Morgan!

Design: Ladyfingers Letterpress
Wooden Boxes: Pipilo Road
Leather Pouches: Three Arrows Leather

Ladyfingers Letterpress is a member of the Designer Rolodex â€“ check out more of their beautiful work right here or visit the real inviÂtaÂtions gallery for more wedding invitation ideas!

Photo Credits: Lauren Memarian

10/23/2017

DIY Moon and Stars Pumpkins

Last year, I made these really fun swirly galaxy-inspired iridescent pumpkins. This year, I wanted to do another spin on a celestial-inspired pumpkin using my new favorite material: hologram vinyl! So today I’m teaming up with one of my favorite crafting partners, Fiskars, to make these beautiful DIY moon and stars pumpkins. This DIY couldn’t be easier â€“ all you need are some scissors, a few craft punches, and vinyl! Oh, and pumpkins of course. And since the vinyl essentially functions like a sticker, it’s also a super fun activity for kids. Are you ready? Let’s go!

I always like to incorporate hand drawn shapes into my projects, so these pumpkins feature a quirky crescent moon and cute little stars that I cut by hand using my favorite Orange-handled Scissors â€“ which just celebrated their 50th anniversary! (Did you catch the Matisse-inspired garland that I made to celebrate??) For those of you with little helpers at home that are anxious to help out, they can cut a few hand drawn stars using Fiskars Kids Scissors! I made the rest of the stars using the Fiskars Star Thick Materials Shape Punches and mixed them with the hand cut shapes. I love the idea of having one big pumpkin with the crescent moon surrounded by lots of little pumpkins with tiny hologram foil stars!

I’m always drawn to black and white pumpkins for Halloween, but for these moon and star pumpkins I added dark navy blue and charcoal gray to the mix. I’m all about those non-traditional holiday color palettes! You can use faux pumpkins and/or real pumpkins for this tutorial (I used both), but the hologram foil is particularly striking against dark colors, so I’d recommend painting any real pumpkins with navy blue or black matte craft paint before applying the hologram foil stars.

Supplies

Fiskars Original Orange-handled Scissors

Fiskars Kids Scissors (for those of you with little helpers!)

Fiskars Star Thick Materials Shape Punch in small, medium, and large

Hologram vinyl, hologram glitter self-adhesive sheets, and matte white vinyl

Pencil

Real or faux pumpkins

Matte craft paint and paintbrush

To make the DIY Moon and Stars Pumpkins:

Step 1. Paint your pumpkins using a matte craft paint in a dark color (like navy blue, charcoal gray, or black) and allow them to dry completely. If you like, you can also use faux black pumpkins and skip this step!

Step 2. Use a pencil to lightly sketch the shape of a crescent moon on the back of the white vinyl. The size of the crescent moon will vary depending on the size of your pumpkin, but my crescent moon was just over 5″ tall on an 8″ tall faux pumpkin. Use the Orange-handled Scissors to cut the crescent moon shape from the white vinyl.

Step 3. Use the Star Thick Materials Shape Punches to make lots of stars in varying sizes from the hologram vinyl and hologram glitter self-adhesive sheets. You can also punch some stars out of the matte white vinyl and add those to the mix!

A couple quick tips for punching the star shapes from the vinyl: I found it easiest to cut 3″ strips of vinyl from the roll using my Orange-handled Scissors, then punch the star shapes from those strips. When operating the punch, I had the best luck when the vinyl was facing up and I moved the blades really quickly. If you try to punch the vinyl too slowly, the vinyl can get stuck in the blades and create rough edges. Punching quickly creates nice clean edge lines!

Step 4. Use a pencil to draw some stars on the back of the hologram vinyl and glitter sheets, then cut those by hand using the Orange-handled Scissors. If you have little helpers, they can also cut out a few hand drawn stars using Fiskars Kids Scissors!

Step 5. Peel the protective backing off the white crescent moon and apply the vinyl shape to your largest pumpkin. Then peel the protective backing off the star shapes and apply them to your pumpkins one by one. Try to cluster a bunch of the smallest stars together and incorporate the larger stars in random patterns, just like you’d see in the night sky. For the smallest pumpkins, use only the smallest star shape and place them in a staggered line around the pumpkin. Continue placing stars (and punching new stars as needed) until you’ve covered all of your pumpkins!

Aaaaaah! These are so cute I can barely stand it! And so pretty when mixed with a few undecorated white (or even orange!) pumpkins. Add in some colorful fall flowers and you’re pretty much guaranteed to have the prettiest front porch on the block. Happy Halloween crafting!

p.s. Printable Halloween favor bags and a fun DIY eyeball Halloween door cover!

This post was created in partnership with Fiskars. All content and opinions are my own. Thank you for supporting the sponsors that make Oh So Beautiful Paper possible!

Photos by Nole Garey for Oh So Beautiful Paper