Holiday Collection from Paloma’s Nest

You guys are going to kill me for talking about holidays so early, but with so many designers releasing their holiday designs how can I resist?  And when it comes to the beauty that is the 2009 holiday collection from Paloma's Nest — from her wood gift tags and garlands to ceramic ornaments — well, then it's really just impossible to ignore:

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Palomas-nest-holiday-wooden-gift-tags

Palomas-nest-be-merry-wooden-gift-tags

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Palomas-nest-wood-monogram-ornament

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Check out the full holiday collection over at Paloma's Nest here.  So beautiful!
{image credits: paloma's nest}

2010 Calendar Round-Up, Part I

Okay folks, it's that time of year again — calendar round-ups!  There are tons of great calendars for 2010 and I have no idea how I'm going to choose my own calendars this year, but I've tried to pull together a few of the best calendars from my favorite designers, as well as a couple of new additions for 2010.  Just as a warning, this is a pretty long post, so go ahead and get yourself nice and comfy and ready for some calendar goodness!

Starting things off, Sycamore Street Press released an absolutely gorgeous poster-style letterpress calendar this year:

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{Sycamore Street Press calendar available for purchase right here}

On the opposite end of the size spectrum are these pocket calendars from Sandra Juto — available as a set of 8 or individually:

Sandra-Juto-2010-Pocket-Calendars

{available for purchase right here}

And as always, Linda + Harriett has produced a lovely letterpress calendar with designs that reflect the feeling of changing seasons from month to month:

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Linda-Harriett-2010-Calendar-all

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{Linda + Harriett calendar available or purchase right here}

For those of you who prefer a more modern look, the SeeSaw Designs 2010 calendar comes letterpress printed in four quarterly seasonal panels:

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{SeeSaw letterpress calendar available for purchase right here}

The Ink + Wit 2010 calendar is a super limited edition (only 125!) and will be ready to ship out on October 13.  You can e-mail Tara to pre-order your copy:

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{available for pre-order by e-mailing Ink + Wit here}

This is the first year that Suann from simplesong has created a calendar — and I can just about guarantee that her softly beautiful calendars will fly off the shelves:

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{2010 simplesong calendars available right here}

Maggie from Campbell Raw Press has created yet another 2010 gorgeous calendar – this time in a hanging, handbound, accordion-fold book with letterpress interior and different cover options:

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{the calendars will be available in the Campbell Raw Press shop later in October, but you can pre-order your copy by emailing Maggie here}

Dutch Door Press again went with a poster-size letterpress calendar for 2010, complete with an amazingly bold orange and purple color palette:

Dutch-Door-Press-2010-Calendar

{dutch door calendar available right here}

Satsuma Press created one of my favorite letterpress calendars in 2009, and the 2010 version looks as though it's going to be just as beautiful — I just can't get enough of Lynn's feather motif:

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{Satsuma Press 2010 letterpress calendar available for pre-order here and here}

The letterpress and screen printed calendars from Ilee are another perennial favorite — I'm really liking the folk art details in several months from the 2010 edition:

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{Ilee 2010 calendar available for purchase here}

A new favorite for 2010 is this limited edition letterpress calendar from Missing Q Press:

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Missing-Q-2010-Calendar-all

{Missing Q Press calendar available for purchase right here}

For something a bit more on the whimsical side, try one of these two calendars from Lisa Rupp — each design, "garden" and "circus train," is created by digitally coloring an original illustration and then printing onto upholstery-weight cotton fabric:

Lisa-Rupp-2010-Calendar-Garden

Lisa-Rupp-2010-Calendar-Circus-Wagon

{you can find both calendars in Lisa's shop right here}

The Linea Carta 2010 calendars are screen printed onto a natural linen panel, with one featuring a nautical theme and the other with a "love is in the air" seasonal theme:

Linea-Carta-2010-Cloth-Calendar

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{available right here}

YeeHaw has really outdone themselves this year — with at least a dozen different mini-calendar designs (I've included only a couple below – check out the rest here) and a larger poster-style calendar:

Yee-Haw-Press-Calendar-BanjoYee-Haw-Press-Calendar-Guitar

Yee-Haw-Press-Calendar-Poster

{YeeHaw calendars available right here}

The Delphine 2010 letterpress calendars come in a couple of options — on an easel or hanging from a ribbon:

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{Delphine 2010 letterpress calendar available for purchase here}

I'm loving all the hand-illustrated details in the 2010 calendar, screen printed onto white canvas, from Two Brunettes:

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{the calendar will be available for purchase in a couple of weeks right here}

I also love the bright colors and patterns in the Egg Press 2010 offset printed calendar:

Egg-Press-2010-Calendar-March

Egg-Press-2010-Calendar-September

{you can find your Egg Press calendar right here}

This color palette calendar from Melissa Design definitely appeals to the design geek in me — and would be so pretty to look at every day!

Vanhoose-Design-2010-Calendar

{available for purchase here}

And of course, I can't forget the a.m.a.z.i.n.g. wood veneer calendars from Night Owl Paper Goods:

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Night-owl-2010-pattern-calendar

{choose your favorite — critters or pattern — right here}

Believe it or not, but there are still a few calendars that aren't quite yet available (and I'm sure I've even missed a few myself), so I'll be doing another calendar round-up a bit later next month.  If you're a designer and would like to submit your calendar for the next round-up installment, please just shoot me an e-mail right here.

{images from their respective sources}

Hello, Fall…

It's definitely started to turn into fall here in DC — the temperatures are cooler, the sun is setting earlier, and I'm expecting to see the leaves start to change next.  Halloween and other Fall decorations are everywhere, including these cute little bat coasters from 12fifteen:

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And while we're on the subject of Halloween decorations, I love this idea from Martha Stewart about dying eggs for Halloween! Check out the instructions here.

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{apologies for the small photo!}

And as promised, I've got the first installment in my 2010 calendar round-ups coming a bit later this morning — so be sure to check back soon!
{image credits: 12fifteen and martha stewart living}

Danielle + Greg’s Vintage Cinema-Inspired Wedding Invitations

So last week was all about music-inspired invitations, and this week I’ve got some totally awesome real wedding invitations inspired by foreign cinema!  Kathryn featured Danielle and Greg’s wedding a few months back, and I was so smitten with her vintage cinema inspiration that I asked Danielle, the talented designer behind Tallu-lah, if she’d be willing to share her invitations and paper ephemera in greater detail.  Lucky for us, Danielle was more than willing to oblige, so let’s get right to it!

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Danielle and Greg’s foreign cinema invitation theme was inspired in part by their wedding venue and in part by their shared love of vintage lettering and illustrations.  With these two ideas they started the creation of a vintage movie themed event:

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From Danielle: Since we’re both in the wedding industry — I work as an event planner for Samantha Smith Productions and Greg is a wedding photographer — we knew we wanted something unique and fun.  After a year and a half of being engaged and looking at venues all over the United States and Mexico, we finally found a place very close to our personalities and home, Foreign Cinema.  More then just one of the best-known restaurants in the city, the venue includes an outside courtyard where movies are shown drive-in-speaker style and a modern art gallery.  The décor is industrial chic meets Northern California.

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Once they settled on their vintage cinema theme and wedding venue, it was time to get to work on their Save the Dates.  To give their guests their first glimpse into the cinema theme of the wedding, Danielle and Greg created a Save the Date in the style of a movie poster:

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We created the look and feel and Hatch Show Print of Tennessee made it come to life though old vintage images and the process of letterpress printing.  We used words on the save the date to give guests the feel that they would be coming to a show.

Danielle’s designs for Tallu-lah are all letterpress printed, and she knew she wanted the wedding invitations to be letterpressed too.  For the invitation design, Danielle and Greg turned to Hello!Lucky to help bring their vintage cinema inspiration to life:

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The rest of the paper goods (invitations, playbill, ceremony programs, cocktail napkins, seating cards/tickets, menu, reception cards and parting gifts, Poco Dolce candy boxes, thank you cards) were created by both Danielle and Eunice Moyle of Hello!Lucky.

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I asked Eunice if she would take on the project of designing for us, I couldn’t think of anyone better to ask — she was the perfect designer for the project and was already a great business friend living in the same town as me, San Francisco.  She out-did herself, they were perfect!

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Once designed, my stationery company, Tallu-lah, printed the invites on over-sized, extra thick paper and included special details like a hand drawn map of San Francisco by calligrapher Mo Seder, a list of the top 10 things to do in San Francisco, hand stamped RSVP envelopes, and customized postage stamps – all assembled in a glassine sleeve packaged in a star-studded lined and letterpressed envelope.

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Other vintage movie items were added into the wedding like truffled popcorn before the ceremony and “hooray flags” for each guest to wave when Danielle and Greg walked back down the aisle at the end of the ceremony:

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I love that Danielle and Greg carried their cinema theme through to the escort cards – which were designed to look like vintage movie tickets and then hung for guests to find on their way to the reception:

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Danielle and Greg printed cocktail napkins to match the flow of their wedding, from the ceremony (“The Show”) in the outside courtyard, to the cocktail reception (“Intermission”) to the dinner and after-party (“The Final Act- It’s A Wrap!”) in two separate lounges – one for Mr. Piché and another Mrs. Piché – that the newlyweds created:

Danielle-Tallulah-Napkins

Mr. Piché’s lounge (in the courtyard) is where our guests could watch “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” on cozy furniture and snack on movie treats from the “concession stand” or mini cones with salted caramel and lavender ice cream (Ed note: yum!) – while singing along to the live music of Syd and Matt York. For guests wanting to dance, Mrs. Pichés lounge (in the art gallery) offered a hip local DJ, as well as the opportunity to watch “Grease” and try treats from the dessert bar including a wedding cake covered in 300 truffles, Poco Dolce chocolate tastings accompanied with port, and an array of French macarons baked by the chef.

The vintage cinema theme was also incorporated into these reception cards, which were provided on each dinner table and contained both the menu and details for each lounge:

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As a final touch, favors from Poco Dolce chocolates packaged in a little paper box printed with the saying all old movies end with “And they lived happily ever after.  The End.”  Such a nice touch!

Danielle-Tallulah-Favor-Bags

Do you all love Danielle’s invitations and wedding stationery as much as I do?  I love the foreign cinema theme – and both Danielle and Hello!Lucky did an amazing job in translating the inspiration into a beautiful design.  For more photos from Danielle and Greg’s wedding, be sure to check out their feature on Snippet and Ink right here – and a huge thanks to Danielle for sharing her wedding stationery with us!

Letterpress Initial Note Cards

I'm totally smitten with the sweet details on this letterpress initial stationery from Delphine:

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I love the soft, muted color combinations and, even though they don't come with the cards, the vintage stamps used to help style the shots.  At $17 for a set of eight cards, these would make such a lovely present or bridesmaids gift.  Check out the rest of the alphabet right here.
{image credits: Delphine}