Even though I’m a card-carrying liberal, I was very excited when an old friend and client asked us to work on a bookmark for Laura Bush. Steve used to work as a concert promoter, and we created many great posters for the shows he booked at the Dixie’s/Saji-Ya stage at Grand Old Day. Now he’s in event planning, and he’s got a big one coming up during the Republican National Convention: a luncheon in honor of the First Lady, celebrating her work with children’s literacy. Back in the day, we worked with Steve to create bold, gritty rock and roll ephemera. This time he was looking for something much more refined: a memorable bookmark to be included with a book that 700 luncheon guests would take home with them. How cool is that? The finished product, quite hot off the press (I finished printing it about 3 hours ago), is pictured to the left. It’s letterpress-printed in two shades of blue, on 110# pearl white 100% cotton Lettra cover, and feels so decadent and luxurious. I can’t believe we just made something that’s probably going to end up in the White House!

2008 has kept us so busy with custom design and printing projects like wedding invitations and personal stationery, we haven’t had much energy to develop new products for our nationally distributed wholesale line. But it’s always on our minds, and we add new designs when we can. We recently printed a couple of fun, random new cards. Like “Kiss my grits,” shown to the left (click on the picture for a larger view). I loved the sitcom Alice in the late 1970s, especially the star’s brassy co-worker Florence “Flo” Jean Castleberry. At my request, Katie the intern (who has, very sadly, moved on – now she’s designing stuff for the Minneapolis Public Libraries, and selling cards on Etsy) created this portrait of Flo, so we could help revive her catchphrase.

Also new: this tongue-in-cheek greeting, printed on 80# bright white vellum cover (which contains 30% post-consumer waste, though we don’t brag about it on the back of the card). I love the planet as much as the next person, and at Lunalux we do our best to recycle and use environmentally friendly products. But after hearing and/or reading so many sales pitches regarding the complicated environmental practices of various paper mills, packaging suppliers and gift manufacturers, I can’t tell any of it apart anymore. Hence the exasperated whale.

These goofy cards are already for sale in the Lunalux studio store, and will be distributed to our sales reps in short order. If there’s a card store near you that should have these in stock, let us know and we’ll send them a catalog!

Creating custom-designed letterpress-printed wedding stationery is a lot of fun because each project is unique. This one, especially so. It’s our first-ever wedding invitation for a lesbian couple. They read about the perforated invites we created last summer for my friends Laura & Ian, and wanted us to use that same format: invitation and RSVP on one card, 5.5 by 8.5 inches, perforated to fold in half and mail on its own, no envelope needed. The bride and bride, Gail & Marisa, purchased a bird painting and asked us to use that image on the invitations. I love the graphic, and had fun developing several concepts for their consideration. Click on the image to the left for a larger view.

After much e-mailing back and forth (they live in New York, but Gail remembers us from her days living in the Twin Cities), they settled on this design. We used brown and red inks on 110# natural white wove-finish cover, and created the pinhole perforations with our step-down perforator. Their return address, and a bit of Yiddish, is printed on the reverse. Gail wrote about their invitations on their blog – click here to read about how much they love them!

No trip to the Great Minnesota Get-together is complete without a tour of the Minnesota Newspaper Museum (I wrote about last year’s visit over here). Tucked away in the back corner of Heritage Square, itself in the back corner of the vast fair grounds, the museum offers visitors a peek at the past with its fully operational old-school print shop. This year I am proud to be volunteering at the museum. Monday August 25th and Monday September 1st, I’ll be spreading the good letterpress word from 2:30 to 8:00 p.m. I’ve signed up to run their platen press. I hope you’ll stop by to say hello! Hopefully, I’ll be standing near the front door, right where this dude is standing.

As the Minnesota Newspaper Museum celebrates the functional aspects of letterpress printing, a new exhibit at the Minnesota Center for Book Arts in downtown Minneapolis explores the cultural significance of letterforms. Face the Nation: How National Identity Shaped Modern Typeface Design, 1900-1960 explores how the desire to reinforce, redefine or transcend national identities influenced typeface design around the world. There’s a small proof press in the gallery, and guests are invited to try their hand at printing – the picture to the left shows both a flyer for the exhibit and the print I made.

The exhibit includes type specimen books, exquisite prints, and artifacts from type design and manufacturing. Of particular interest is the signage, which explains how cultural issues have influenced type design in various countries and cultures. This exhibit is interesting and informative, and highly recommended! While you’re visiting MCBA, be sure to dart across Washington Avenue to visit the new location for CorAzoN, a great shop full of jewelry, clothes, home accessories, original artwork, and paper goods (including Lunalux cards, of course)

The Minnesota Newspaper Museum is located on the Minnesota State Fairgrounds in St. Paul. The museum will be open from 9:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m., August 21-September 1, 2008. Face the Nation is on display through September 21, 2008. MCBA is located in the Open Book center at 1011 Washington Avenue South. Read more

Remember when Kitty joined the Lunalux crew last August as an intern? She’s recently been promoted to part-time employee, as she’s such a help around the studio, with everything from creating window displays to packing orders for our wholesale accounts. She’s a joy to work with, and more indispensable each day. Her birthday is this weekend, so do stop in the shop on Saturday to wish her another great year!

We recently made some fun calling cards for Kitty. Because she’s fascinated with Tiny Things, we made the card Very Small – it measures just 1.5 by 2.5 inches. But it’s also printed on 220# 100% cotton Lettra cover, making it both one of the smallest and one of the thickest cards we’ve ever created. We bind-embossed a folksy floral image all over the card, and then imprinted her basic info in black ink. With the soft paper and dramatic texture created by the deep impression of the graphic, the card feels remarkable. So much so, I’m kinda jealous – it’s maybe even cooler than my own business card!