This Sunday, May 15, I am honored to be a part of something really sweet happening in the Cincinnati area: Love+Bash! This unusual "bridal show," if you will, is being hosted by an amazingly creative and cool local planner, Jen Pritchard, and an equally fun and artsy photographer, Nikita Gross. Picture a bridal show, but at one of the coolest venues around, showcasing the most unique and unusual ideas for tying the knot. If you are looking to make your wedding day something to be remembered, these local vendors are eager to help bring your ideas to fruition. I promise you will be inspired! There will be food, drinks, a fashion show, and lots of exciting giveaways.

Details in image above, or click on this LINK to the Love+Bash website! See you there.

My friend Marti approached me to create a very cool gift for a business partner of her husband's: personalized stationery! Her name is Gulnar, well, that is her first part of her long formal name, and she lives in Dubai. We wanted to create something that reflected the aesthetic of her culture, and her sophisticated personality. After a bit of brainstorming and lots of discussions with my fabulous printer, we decided to run these through two different presses using both letterpress and foil stamping.
Foil stamping is a printing procedure where heat, pressure, and a metallic paper (foil) is used to create an image on a surface. The pressure is created by using dies (or carved metal plates), to transfer the image. The die comes in contact with the foil and transfers a thin layer of the foil film onto the intended surface. As the metal plate is heated, the foil sticks to the surface only in the design of the plate and in the required areas with the desired imprint. The photo above is the metal plate (die) that was used for the gold damask pattern.
Here you can see the die sitting next to the final product.
We letterpressed her name on the cards in a bright peacock blue ink. The letterpress die is sitting here above her name. Letterpress is a very old process in which a raised plate or block is inked and then the impression (and ink) is "pressed" into the paper.
I love how these turned out! I am excited to use the plate again on another project using different colored foil and paper. Fun.

I love it when clients plan fun events that require unique invitations. Krissy came to me planning a really fun party to design for: a combination bridal shower and bachelorette party for her sister. All the festivities were happening in one day, so the afternoon shower was named "sugar" and the evening party was called "spice." Sugar & Spice: now that is fun! Krissy was thinking of just having guests email her for an rsvp and answer if they would be attending the shower, the party and/or staying with the group overnight at a local hotel. She was a little concerned that guests would absentmindedly omit one or more of the questions, so I suggested doing a response postcard and creating a tiered invitation with each event getting its own page. The set was stitched together with a zig-zag to hold it all together.

The invitation was mailed in a chocolate brown envelope. We created a white label so that the addresses could be written on the front in dark ink.

The stitching added a unique detail to the top in matching hot pink.

The bride wants all the guests to wear wigs to the bachelorette party - too fun.

I thought the perfect sugary graphic was this delicious looking cupcake.

The response postcard. This should make it easy for Krissy to keep track of the guests attending.

This summer has been quite busy at the inkery and at home. In June, my twin sister, Jenn, and her husband, Justin, brought home their daughter from Ethiopia! I must say, I am quite the proud aunt to my adorable niece, Samara. We have had such a fun time getting to know her. It's been especially fun for my son Urban, who is just a week younger than Samara. A few of Jenn's close friends and I threw a shower/party for them two weeks before they left for Africa. (International adoption is tricky - even though the process lasted over 2 years, their travel date popped up fast and we had to plan a shower very quickly!) Nevertheless, it gave me a great opportunity to create a fabulous invitation for them! I may have gone a little overboard, but I had lots of fun. We went with an African animal print theme for obvious reasons, so I used four different animal prints on the four different elements of the invitation - giraffe for the invitation, zebra for the envelope liner, tiger for the gift registry card, and leopard for the response postcard.

I am especially proud of the zebra liner. I just have a thing these days for zebra print!

I created a "registry" card to give guests an idea of their daughter's age so they could appropriately buy gifts.

I created an address label for the black envelope that allowed for hand addressing in black ink.

I loved receiving these little postcards back in the mail.

Close up of the registry card - love those little animals marching along.

Tracy Bellman of Tres Belle Cakes expertly matched the cake to the invitation!

Close up of the response card

Back in April I was approached by Kristen Sekowski of Yellow Canary to take part in an Inspiration to Reality photo shoot she was heading up for the fabulous wedding blog Style Me Pretty. I jumped on the chance to be involved, one because I love the blog and two, for the chance to collaborate closely with other wedding professionals on a project. When working on a wedding I am often told what the other vendors are doing, but rarely do we get to work together to create a consistent approach to the design of the day. This shoot gave us the opportunity to collaborate and create together, something I greatly miss from my days working in the corporate world. I had a great time! We found this lovely inspiration board on the site, and designed a "faux wedding" if you will, that reflected the themes brought forward in the board.
We chose to locate the shoot at the fabulous Cincinnati Museum Center, the former Union Terminal. As a former architect, I always love bringing in a sense of place to my stationery designs. When a couple is getting married at an architecturally significant location, I am always urging them to include some detail that reflects the space. Not only does it give guests a sense of what is to come, but it creates a sort of literal framework for the whole event. Union Terminal has always been my favorite building in Cincinnati, and I was so excited to create a piece that showcases its magnificent dome. I drew over a photo of the actual building in Adobe Illustrator to create the die-cut for the top of the invitation. I used the window layout to create a striping pattern we were incorporating directly from the inspiration board, and carried a bolder version of those stripes to the envelope liner. Also, I added the detail of the clock, which is a major focal point of the building. I felt this was also a great way to bring the circle motif into the printed pieces. The save the date included a photo of the façade filtered to look like a vintage postcard. The menus also reflect the shape of the dome. The escort cards doubled as a favor with a delicious lollipop holding the printed piece, again reflecting the black and white, stripes, and circle themes we developed from the inspiration board.
We loved the tiny hints of red in the red hots from the board, so I included a red 4 bar response envelope in the set.
The envelope liner with the clock feature.
The menu.
The "table number." Notices the tiny spots of red!
The save the date was actually created from a photo I took on my iPhone from our scouting mission! I used the colorcross filter on my "Camera Bag" app to give the photo the vintage feel it has. I was just goofing around in Illustrator with the image as a mock up and realized the quality was good enough to actually use!
The inspiration board was actually named "Mint chocolate chip" so we knew the actual ice cream had to make an appearance...
Favor / escort cards in a flower base.
The table setting.

To see more photos of the shoot (outside just the stationery items) visit the first post here, and the second post here. The fabulous photography was taken by Jacalyn Mains of JMM Photography.

I love fireworks. LOVE them. As a child, I loved driving down to the riverfront each July 4th with my family to watch my humble hometown's display along the Ohio River. Even though Evansville is a fairly small city, we always had a top notch show. I loved how the lights reflected off the water, and how we could literally see sparks fly off the barge in the middle of the river where they were setting them off. After college I moved to Cincinnati and was thrilled to discover the amazing WEBN display on Labor Day. Once we sat close enough to get actual physical debris from the fireworks flying into our faces!

Today at the local ABC (Assoc. of Bridal Consultants) luncheon, John Greer of Zambelli Fireworks International presented to the group about hiring their firm to set off fireworks at your wedding. YES, I said FIREWORKS AT YOUR WEDDING. I can't even imagine the coolness. I have chills just thinking about it. They can do custom colors, shapes, and all sorts of fantastic stuff. How amazing would it be to have your own PERSONAL fireworks display on the night of your wedding?! You are probably thinking it would cost a small fortune, but surprisingly it's pretty affordable to hire them for a decent display.

Contact John at 513.478.6475 or JohnGreer@zambellifireworks.com for more information.

Fireworks over the Ohio River in Evansville.

Last weekend my family visited us here in Cincinnati, and my mom brought my 5 month old son the most wonderful gift from my Great Aunt Vernie: a hand-painted china baby bootie. Aunt Vernie (Urban's Great-Great Aunt!) is 82 years old, and has been painting china for 40+ years! I hope that I am still creating 40 years from now. I love the dainty cursive writing she used for Urban's name, birthday and height/weight and the vintage look of the flowers. What makes this gift so utterly special to me is that my identical twin sister and I have little booties with our names and birthdays painted on them from Aunt Vernie as well. I got mine out to compare with Urban's, and the painting is just as beautiful on the the new bootie as it is on my 32 year old one. What sort of handmade gifts do you treasure?