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Lavender scented wedding invitations…..!!!

Jeri & ChristopheI have been slammed. I will be honest. It was as if everyone was getting married on the same day this summer thus sending out their invitations on the same day! Now, that isn’t at all true, but that’s how it felt over at the Tiny Pine Press studio.

In the hub-ub of the past month, I had many notable moments which I hope to share in the next couple of weeks. One notable experience was with this Lavender invitation. It was inspired by an invitation I did a couple of years back for Jeri Ryan & Christophe Émé’s wedding in the French countryside. (Though starred on Star Trek : Voyager, these are the most opposite of outer space invitations ever! Cotton, hand-made and old world as it gets with the hand letterpress!)

(Though actually, they were completely 100% tree free… and THAT is sort of like outer space, but I digress….)

This new client was very detail oriented and wanted two lavenders attached to this beautiful cotton handmade paper. I searched for the perfect lavender plants and found a really wonderful local farm who supplied a bounty of lavender stems to choose from. They smelled great. and when we glued them on, and stacked all the invitations, the lavender scent emanated from the papers to fill the room…. yum!

Sharon gluing Hidecote Lavender

(I hope the guests got a whiff of the lavender when it came in the mail. I have worked with dried lavender many times and this was the most fragrant batch. OH, the variety is called Hidecote.)

It was a fun afternoon of gluing. I had my good friend Sharon Lowe (who is a floral designer – smart right?) help me glue the lavenders. Sharon understands how the plants want to go… and even which ones. We chatted with the lavender stems all afternoon. And then a week later chatted them into the envelopes and off to the guests.. You know that plants have feelings too! I think these lavenders were happy in their more permanent home, glued on these elegant invitations. I hope!!

I think I am a pretty good communicator but if the lavenders aren’t happy, I fear they will get revenge on me by getting lost in the mail! or revolting and busting out of their envelopes or something. It happens (More on that subject later)!

See… I AM delirious! Personification of Plants. Not a good sign……..


Letterpress Name Stars

What does that title even mean??  

Today I printed a birthday part invitation – it was in two runs with clean justified type for Henry’s 40th birthday. 

The client asked for Red ink. Now, what you may or may not know is that RED ink is the most difficult ink to pin down in the pantone book. As I was printing this last bit of the invitation today, I told my office-mate that Red is my Achilles Heel. I had to pick the red, which I put off til the last minute. Why is that? why do I have such a hard time with red… Well, let’s look deeper for an answer……

Anne of Card Tricks Designs, my office-mate, was talking about color combinations one day. She had a client who wanted to use Orange and Blue. An oceany blue or kind of turquoise one. She instantly complained that she didn’t really like that combo, and wanted to shift the blue to navy or something. I actually like the original combo though it does remind me of the Miami Dolphins…. 

But then she revealed that Orange and that same kind of blue were her junior high colors. and that she always hated that color combo for that reason. 

henrys40thtestIt was at that moment when I figured it out. RED and white were the colors of the Marion Senior High School Hurricanes…. it is very clear. I don’t like straight red for the same reason Anne doesn’t. 

Incidentally, I also don’t particularly care for Kelly Green and white, the colors of Sugar Grove Combined School. Though I don’t really have a problem with Purple and white, the colors of Northwestern University. HMMMM???

I only can wonder if every graphic designer has the same feeling about their school colors. Maybe those formative years are just very color sensitive?

In any case, here is a little starburst of sillyness I printed today…. testing out the red and white for Henry’s invitations….


hanging out to dry…

I have this very favorite paper/fabric cotton organdi…. It’s the perfect fabric for wedding invitations because it is white, starchy, sturdy, natasha wagner invitationtranslucent, and has just the perfect feeling… a little like tulle and a little bit like canvas… I  have been using it for years… (here is my first wedding invitation for Natasha Gregson Wagner using a cotton organdi belly band).

It comes in a few different colors but white always seems to be the best. However, sometimes white is toooooo WHITE. Blaring white is no good for organic handmade looking pieces.

What to do? What to do?!

dieandvatWell, DYE IT!! That’s the answer.

The last two times I used this fabric, I tea stained it with Lipton. Those turned out lovely but probably a little dark for my current client. She wanted something more in a “cream”… a little less orangey than tea stain…

So today, a super sunny Sunday afternoon in California, I mixed up the RIT – a little taupe and a little yellow – in a big vat and dyed all these sheets…. Now they just need to be pressed out flat again and they will be ready to go cut and wrap up a pretty warm white wedding invitation…

 

fabricWhat a nice way to get back to my country girl roots, hanging out clothes on the line for the sunshine to dry. It’s kind of zen, creates a perfect embellishment, and allows the sun to do the rest of the work… oh, it’s kind of green, actually!


Spikey/Soft

I know, I know…. it’s been awhile since the last post…. I have been very busy busy on lots of projects for the past three weeks! 

The other day I had a good reason to have a bunch of photos taken of my apartment… It was fun, mostly because I had a professional photographer, Joshua Targownik, snapping the pictures. He did an amazing job and took this particular one… (more are forthcoming, I promise)dandelion spiderweb….

I wanted to talk about this understated set though it it probably understated compare to the rest of my colorful surroundings full of phones and flowers. I took a copper etching class a couple of years ago and found it completely delightful even though I am a letterpress printer for a living. It was a chance to play and make art completely without a computer (usually I do the artwork & typesetting on the computer and then print… you know…). 

Anyways, I got into the idea of juxtaposing two similarly shaped things which had the same lines but completely different meanings. Now, I am not sure if my idea comes across totally, but I etched out a dandelion puff and a spider web. Mind you, they were scrapped freehand completely in copper using a sharpish needle… I didn’t exercise a lot of control over my lines but I liked the look. was trying to use the same kinds of lines in both images but in different directions… sort of.. they both have the same base structure but the small lines either connect to one another or puff out… I think maybe the dandelion puff is the feminine and the spiderweb is the masculine. the same, but different…

Then using a very simple but wonderful process & press, I printed these on handmade paper. This is so yummy because the copper plate completely mushes the texture out of the paper, leaving the area around it smoooooooth. I love that part! yum!

I  mounted them on pale yellow handmade paper with a natural deckle and taped some string to the back and then I had two new pieces of art for my walls. Lovely!


I am goodbye, too…

I went to film school. That’s no secret about me. I LOVED working on films in college. I was the laborious production designer and/or editor on many films during my time at Northwestern…. There is a nice stash of VHS tapes next to my TV to proove it. Too bad the VHS may not even work anymore!

The first actual “film” I made was a collaboration with my friends John Randono and Abbey Rothstein. The assignment was to shoot on a Bolex an in camera edit which would be processed and then screened in front of class to a song of our choosing. The catch was that this screening would be the first time we would be seeing the film so there was some pressure. Long story short, our group decided on “I am a Cinematographer” by Palace to be the song and it was so perfectly in sync that I took it upon myself to contact Will Oldham (Palace, Bonnie Prince Billy) to ask him if we could actually use his song in conjunction with the film with his official permission. Shortly I received a phone call and a yes (this was 11 years ago).

Next thing I know, by a strange pattern of coincidence, I have made two videos for Will’s “The Letting Go” record (Ebb Tide and Strange Form of Life) which were shot and edited very very very cheaply and consumerly… mostly because I believe it is the skills and the quality of the work that speaks strongest about a piece of art…. Quality doesn’t rest in the medium. does that make sense??

When Will asked me about doing a third video for his latest record “Beware”, I was excited to once again do a music video for just fun… It’s great to have a break from letterpress and print and to be able to use my eyeballs for a moving form of art… (though technically, stationery does move through the mail, right?). I pointed Will’s attention towards another college friend/filmmaker – Leif Johnson – who frequently positions his eyeballs behind lenses of film and video cameras.

I wasn’t present, but I hear that the wrap party was longer than the shoot since they only had a fraction of daylight left to get the singing and walking in…. Leif gave me the footage and about a week later, I had put this little ditty together on Final Cut Express. Just a little exercise of my college education!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5__UQbZVcMU&w=320&h=240]

That film school really is paying off…. yup… I got really good at syncing Mr. Bonny while he chomped on chewing gum singing along with himself in harmony…. I am putting THAT on my resume… Enjoy!


The Telephone

Anyone who has been to my living quarters in the past 12 years could tell you 1 thing about me. I love telephones. I have 50 or more rotary telephones in my apartment. Lots of different styles and colors. Every room as more than a couple of different stles sitting around. It can be a bit overwhelming. Ask Joanna, my former roommate. In our old apartment, I think her bedroom was the only one not taken over by my collection. And I probably even tried to sneak some in there at some point when she was out of town……

I love the uniformity of rotary telephones from the 50’s thru the 70’s. They had the same exact shape for years. Different colors would come out but there was really only one style. I have almost all of the colors in that same style except pink…. (just so you all know whomever is reading this and wants to know what to get me for my birthday……..

telefon_01

This morning, my neighbor two doors down, Brian sent me some links of overwhelming pleasing rotary telephone art. I almost exploded with smiles. The fact that they have this many of the exact same telephone just is terribly pleasing. The artist is Rune Guneriussen. and I am gathering this person is from Norway… There are many other cool shots on this site so check it out…. 

What really happened when I saw this is that I got a hankering for a phone from Norway… just like these. AND I really wanted my telephones to be shot as little pieces of art…. 

I do have LOTS of foreign phones from my friends’ travels. Represented are the following countries: Thailand, England, Egypt, Denmark, Germany, South Africa, France, Serbia and Canada…. so maybe one day I will document them all… 

tiffany blue princess black and white

In the meantime, I was reminded of the photos I took the other day testing out a semi broken 35mm camera… here is one of my phones. It’s not foreign, but since you can’t tell from the black and white photo, it’s a tiffany blue princess phone. I love it…..


Is it post-modern to blog about a blog about Tiny Pine?

My friend and one of my favoritest picture-makers Gia Canali has a blog and she just interviewed me a couple of days ago for it. I thought it would be fun to link to the blog because that would maybe become a blog vortex of clicking and no one would ever leave! yay!

It was actually really fun to do the interview. I did fell a little funny that my answers would be on the internet but I then i realized that I am already talking on the internet…. so I must be a little bit entertaining if YOU are reading this right now? right? Hopefully I can come across sort of knowledgeable too! (Don’t tell me any differently, please!)

I was a little surprised when I read back over my answers in some spots… particularly the Ugly Betty comments – you will have to read her blog to know what I am referring to – because I had just seen an episode a couple of days before and I felt maybe that I was misinformed about soy inks, or that the writers didn’t research very well… I think it was the latter.

here's the card i did for gia

Here's the card I made for Gia's Business

I loved talking about Verdie, my press, and I think I come off a little more chatty than I am on this blog about myself…. if you can imagine that. It’s easier sometimes to answer questions than to just make up what you want to say……..

But enough about me and Tiny Pine, let’s talk about GIA! She is a great photographer. We have both been apart of a couple of weddings as the vendors. She is super organic in her style and aesthetic. She uses both film and digital photography (kind of like how I use letterpress and laser or inkjet) and she does a variety of printing processes and treats her photos in lovely ways. I think we are sort of fraternal twins, maybe. We come from the same place but we do different things. (We were just talking on the phone about how we both are from the country and mountains and if that comes across in our work…)

Anyways…. I am so glad she decided to feature me in her blog…. I will do the same for my fraternal twin… Gia Canali is great. take a look at her site!


happy heart day!

Love letters are probably why I am in this business. I am sentimental and romantic and when someone puts love into a scrap of paper, whether it is only friendly or something more, I cherish it. Words, images, craftiness. I have a little box where I keep these little things… paper pieces from old romances – letters, postcards and notes. I think I have a piece of paper where an old flame had mailed something to me…. I cut my address out of the box, like when you have to send in the UPC seal of a product. I have that little memory of a thought.

So, it’s Valentines Day tomorrow, and all the little romantic bits of me are getting drummed up… That paragraph above is a perfect example! And all I can think about is writing love letters. It’s almost worth it to be far away from the person you love so you could send and receive love by post…. What’s so nice is that the words are very permanent and tangible. And then you can put them in a little box and one day someone will find them and isn’t that just romantic?

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When I was working at soolip as a designer, we created a product with the perfect, I mean PERFECT love letter materials. I helped design it. It really has everything you need except a pen and nice thoughts. It has onionskin paper – which is not being made anymore – a handmade and printed shimmery and soft Dirty Byrd envelope (one of my bestest friends) AND one of my favorite things of all times…. Vintage Stamps. 

I swear, if someone gave me one of these, I would shower them with kisses. And I designed this thing. So. that should give a clue about how much I love the love letter kit…

You can order them from soolip.com, but really, you don’t need this kit to tell someone how much you care… so in lieu of time, get out a sticky note, a legal pad or the back of a bill and let them know!

If you haven’t posted your letter by the time you are reading this, you may be late and there may be an slightly sad or annoyed valentine on the other end…. so you better give that person some chocolates too… along with your love letter!

xoxo,

jennifer