Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Making Envelopes

This project was not typical of what comes through the studio but it was certainly a fun diversion. A very special client of mine from San Francisco put in her yearly request for year end gifts for the students at her daughter's school. This year it was these sturdy and colorful envelopes that will hold 4 x 6 photos taken throughout the school year.
Choosing the papers was the first step and of course the most fun. We met at my favorite paper store on earth, Flax Art & Design in San Francisco, and spent some time finding the perfect papers for the kiddos. Next, back in Long Beach, using PVA and a paint roller, I carefully laminated these very thin almost wrapping paper papers together with their much heavier liner papers and pressed them overnight. The next day after crunching the numbers, with a little trial and error, I creating a template out of bookboard and trimmed the now heavyweight paper to size.

Scoring, hole punching and eyelet setting were next and then came folding and gluing the paper into it's 3 dimensional form. The ribbon was threaded through the eyelets and finally the 21 name plates were laid out, printed and adhered to the inner flap of the envelope.

I really enjoyed having these colorful envelopes around the studio for a few days. They were a nice change from the standard black clamshell portfolio boxes that so often taking up the space on my pressing table.