Spotlight Indy: Westwood Paper Company

Home Sweet Home Indy!

My new initiative is to focus on the growing and evolving Indianapolis events market. Therefore, often {if not weekly} I hope to put a spotlight on an Indianapolis vendor. My first profile is of Westwood Paper Company - owned by the fabulous Jill Sowder.

I find it appropriate to start my spotlight series with a high-end paper company due to my love of fine papers and the art of letterpress. Jill shares my taste and passion for paper, design and great fonts! Her store is beautiful and her product choices are the best of the industry. And, Jill herself is a guru! I was grateful for the hour I spent with Jill getting to know her and her store. I will certainly be a regular... and look forward to working with Jill and her team.

About: Westwood is a retail boutique located in Carmel, IN. They are specialists in designing invitations, announcements and personal stationery.

Paper Products: Boatman Gellar, Envelopments, Julie Holcomb, Prentiss Douthit, Real Card Studio, Snow & Graham, Waste Not Paper, Midori Ribbon, Truly Mom.

Gifts: Fabulous monogram gifts, stamps, planners, frames, seasonal items, calendars & more.

My pick: Custom wine and water bottle labels. Perfect for any event!

Where: online at http://www.westwoodpaper.com/ :: in-person at 20 Executive Drive, Carmel, IN.

Etsy for your wedding... and events

I love etsy.com. I could get lost on that site for hours! I find it the best marketplace for finding anything custom. I'd use these talented vendors for social and corporate events too!

-invitations
-monogram
-jewelry
-programs
-accessories
-favors
-decor
-and more!

Visit: http://www.etsy.com/category_top.php?top_tag=weddings

Tablecards by Cheer Up Cherup: http://www.etsy.com/profile.php?user_id=5534410

Fabulous Find...

These are so fabulous and cool! Cupcake flags! The perfect personalization for any event: baby shower, bridal shower or wedding. Check them out at http://www.notepolish.com/

Small Packages for Good Things

Karen Smallbone is a fabulous boutique favor company in Canada. Her ideas and items have appeared all over the Web and publications. I find her handmade favors to be a fun and refreshing departure from traditional event favors. Her custom labels are a great idea for a wedding, sweet sixteen, or baby shower. Website: http://www.karensmallbone.com/

Get Carded

I just love these Kate Spade place cards from Crane.com: Break the ice for your dinner guests as they take their seats at the table. These place cards tie the elegant tradition of pre-arranged seating with a tongue-in-cheek humor to get them talking. Or, use it as an excuse to play matchmaker by placing the "please chat with the person next to you" card in front of the evening's best catch. Set includes three each of four place card designs ("playing footsie is encouraged", "please have a second helping", "please chat with the person next to you," and "save room for dessert" ) in crane’s kid finish fluorescent white.

Rustic Chic

Michelle Rago is a guru and I am a big fan. I find her to be an inspiration to me and many others in the industry. I thought of Michelle today and specifically of a wedding she styled in Vermont. Her use of theme and material is perfect and not over-whelming.

The reason this outdoor, rustic wedding popped into my head was because I was working with a very fun and fabulous bride today who is having her own rustic chic wedding at The Fearrington House near Chapel Hill, North Carolina. We styled a fabulous Dauphine Press invitation on Crane Lettra paper with espresso ink, a champagne colored pocketfold, espresso satin belly band and gold leaf tag accent. The invitation is comleted by a foliate design in opposing corners and a small acorn between the ceremony and reception information. I can't wait to see the result - and the accompanying accessories! The layout will be similar to the sample below:

Font Envy

Since working at Salutations, I have become enamored with font. I’ve had the privilege of working with the best stationers and feel the proper use of font is one of the (if not the) most important part of a invitation design decision.

However, I am guessing that you are wondering how one could be so passionate about a typeface? Well, the right font can transform the entire impression given by an invitation, announcement, menu, mailer, or business communication. A font can turn a simple piece of paper from modern to traditional.

So, I hope you’re inspired and will give the fonts in your life some thought. My two favorite font sites are:

1. http://www.veer.com/


2. http://www.dafont.com/

And, my favorite fonts are:

Source: www.veer.com; Top (L-R) Burgues; Feel; Bottom: Wesley.

And, since I always like to include a little snippet of background on my posts, here’s some fun facts about the five of the most popular fonts:*

Bodoni: Giambattista Bodoni’s namesake font, often found in women’s magazines, came into fashion at the end of the 1700s and enjoyed a resurgence in the early 1900s.

Caslon: Designed by Englishmen William Caslon in the mid-1700s, this robust serif typeface appears in both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

Garamond: French type designer Claude Garamond created this typeface almost 500 years ago. It appears everywhere – from Apple’s text copy to ads for Abercrombie & Fitch.

Helvetica: Last year’s documentary Helvetica celebrated the 50th anniversary of this minimalist sans serif typeface, designed by Eduard Hoffmann and Max Miedinger for a Swiss type foundry.

Time New Roman: Commissioned by the Times of London in 1931, this tight, readable serif typeface is a popular choice for book text. All personal computers come equipped with this font.

*Real Simple, March 2008.

Letterpress Stationery

For my inaugural post, I thought sharing photos and inspired ideas from my favorite letterpress stationers would be an accurate reflection of my style and current passion.

Letterpress stationery, one of the oldest forms of printing, has recently made a comeback within the wedding industry but there is also wonderful designs for baby announcements, holiday cards, business correspondance and all of life's celebrations.

Why letterpress?* Letterpress is a method of printing which uses the raised surface of a relief plate to print an image or text. The image area on the relief plate is slightly higher than the rest of the plate surface, this allows the raised surface to be inked and then pressed against the paper creating an image in reverse. Only one color is printed at a time.

The beauty of letterpress is that the text or image printed is slightly indented into the paper, making the definition sharper and with a lovely tactile quality that cannot be achieved with other printing techniques. *(Source: http://www.whites-stationery.co.uk/)

Here is my inspiration board for letterpress:

Photo credits: First row (L-R): Dauphine Press; Elum. Second row (L-R) The Happy Envelope, Elum

Letterpress allows for intricate design elements such as beautiful damasks (a personal favorite) and fonts. My business cards (below) are letterpress. Printed and designed by the talented ladies of Dauphine Press (http://www.dauphinepress.com/).