Tuesday, November 27, 2012

Hot off the letterpress ...


Ring, ring, a-ling. I fell in love with the pageboy/girl above from the moment I saw him/her in a nursery rhyme book that belonged to my late mother-in-law. I knew immediately that the illustration - unsigned, by the way - would make a wonderful holiday card. After scanning it, the colors were altered so the hat ribbon and feather became red; and the inside of the sleeves, pale green. I cleaned it up (look closely and you'll see that it's slightly out of register), resized it, printed it and sent it as a New Year's party invitation.

I couldn't get it out of my head. A year or so later, I revisited the image with the idea of paring it down to its essence and printing it on a letterpress. The result? See below. 

At the same time I was doing that, I scanned a half dozen antique and vintage card borders. The plan was to make business cards. By the time I finished printing them, though, I didn't want to use them as business cards. So, they sat in the attic, until a few weeks ago, when it hit me that they'd make terrific gift tags.

Look for both the cards and the tags - and more - at this weekend's annual Showcase of Arts at the Woman's Art Club of Cincinnati. I'll be there just one of two days: 10 a.m. - 4 p.m. Saturday Dec. 1.  



Letterpress printed. Blank inside. Packaged with an envelope.
$4 each.
Signed, limited edition.

Letterpress printed. Tied with red, green or brown baker's twine.12 to a package (two of each design); $8.
Limited edition.