This weekend we’re hosting Stationery Saturday at our studio – July 31, from 11a.m. to 6p.m., we’ll be creating personalized letterpress notecards for customers while they wait (click here to visit our Stationery Saturday page and read all about it). As long as the press is up and running, we’re going to print a few extra sets to give away! So here’s the deal. Click here to visit the Lunalux blog; find an interesting post from the last few months, and leave a comment (it’s got to be more thoughtful than “I hope I win the contest!”). Comments must be submitted by Friday, July 30, 2010, at noon central standard time. And be sure to put your e-mail address in the comment form. Friday afternoon, we’ll put the names of all the commenters into a proverbial hat and pick 4 winners. The winners will be contacted Friday afternoon, to find out what they want printed on their cards. Pictures of the winners’ stationery will be posted on our Facebook page next week.

The fine print… Only one entry per person will be accepted (but you won’t be disqualified for leaving multiple comments – comment away!). If you don’t include a valid e-mail address in the comment form, you won’t win. We reserve the right to edit comments. Winners will be notified via e-mail on Friday afternoon; winners MUST respond to the notification e-mail by 10a.m. Saturday 7-31-2010, or no dice. Good luck and have fun!

This weekend we’re hosting another Stationery Saturday at our Loring Park studio. If you haven’t made it to one of these personalized-stationery-while-you-wait events, this is a great one to start with! For this mid-summer Stationery Saturday we’ve designed refreshing little folded note cards. Simple, modern icons are pre-printed on bright white 3.5-by-5-inch folded cards. We’re offering four options: teal duck, tangerine owl, honey bee, and lavender fleur – you can choose your favorite, or a combination of multiple designs. We’ll use 10-point-Clarendon type to set the name or phrase of your choice (up to 20 characters/spaces), and letterpress-print the cards in cool gray ink. You can watch while we make the magic happen on our printing press, or spend some time shopping in the shop or strolling in Loring Park while we take care of your order. The cost? Just $29 for 10 cards. We think these petite notes are ideal for August correspondence: “A note from the lake…” “You host a mean cook-out.” “Looking forward to our trip to the State Fair.” Splurge on yourself, or get some as a sweet treat for the paper hound in your life. As always, we’ll have coffee and homemade cookies too. Check out our Stationery Saturday page for all the deets. And we hope you’ll help us spread the word – you can invite all the stationery hoarders you know using the event listing on the Lunalux Facebook page. Click on the images below for larger views of this weekend’s designs.

Two new books  include spotlights on Lunalux. Our little shoppe is featured in the second edition of eat.shop twin cities, a guide to the best local shops and restaurants in Minneapolis and St. Paul. You’ll also find a few photos of our work in Impressive: Printmaking, Letterpress & Graphic Design, an overview of contemporary design in letterpress and screen printing. Lunalux was included in the original edition of eat.shop twin cities (published in 2007), and we are honored to have made the cut the second time around. Once again, the editorial staff did a top-notch job selecting the most interesting Minnesota-grown shops and eateries. The design of the book, the artistic photos of all the businesses, and even the quality of the paper it’s printed on, all help make this the most irresistible local guide, great for natives and newcomers alike. The book is available in the Lunalux studio store, along with eat.shop guides for many other major U.S. cities.

Impressive is more of a coffee table book, bursting with letterpress- and screen-printed eye candy. Designers from all over the world are included in the tome, with a focus on Europe and North America. The styles vary from crusty wood-type posters to polished business collateral to dreamy arty prints. The 200+ pages of images are studded with interviews with innovative printers (including Ben Levitz of Minneapolis’ own Studio On Fire). We particularly love the text-based posters of Douglas Wilson, and everything from Mike Burton (“The Cranky Pressman”). One of our thank-you cards is featured on page 15, while page 98 is devoted to a series of wood-type ice cream signs we printed for Izzy’s Ice Cream in St. Paul. We’re not carrying this book in our shoppe, but you should be able to find it at a giant bookstore near you.

Click on the images below for larger views of Lunalux pages in these books.

Helen & Erik live on the east coast, but they discovered Lunalux while visiting Erik’s family in Minneapolis. Erik gets credit for designing their wedding invitation suite, including the fantastic tree illustration. I suggested a few minor edits to the text and the layout, but my main contribution was calligraphy on the invitations and envelopes. The hand-written names are letterpress-printed along with the rest of the invitation text; I wrote the bride and groom’s names over and over again, until each curve was just right, then scanned the best versions and dropped them into the layout like a graphic. The full set – wedding invitation, rehearsal dinner invitation & response card – was letterpress-printed in black ink on pearl white 100% cotton Lettra 110# cover, with matching invitation and response envelopes. When all the work of printing and trimming was finished, I set to the hefty task of hand-addressing the envelopes too, so the mailing address matches the text on the invitations themselves.

I have worked at my penmanship for many years, so it’s a great honor for me to share it with my clients. I have addressed a few wedding invitations in my time, and have occasionally incorporated my handwriting into greeting card designs, but this is the first time that my lettering has been letterpress-printed on an invitation. And it was such a thrill to see the finished product! Since this project was completed a few months ago, I have taken on a few other exciting hand-lettering projects – I look forward to featuring them here in our blog in the coming weeks.

Curious about our letterpress-printed wedding stationery? Click here to read more about our design and printing services. You might also enjoy browsing through our blog archives, where we’ve featured many of our favorite wedding projects.

The alley behind Lunalux, lined with old brick buildings, has long been a hot spot for photographers in need of a romantic urban backdrop for engagement photos or fashion shoots. Now it’s been made even more picturesque. This spring, the ragged pavement was replaced with cobblestone, transforming the once-gritty space into a lively corridor. Many businesses in the neighborhood have contributed to the bustle back there: Loring Corners, the company that owns most of the buildings on the block, spearheaded the renovation project and sprung for the new flower boxes and hanging plants; Olson & Co. has tables at the far end of the alley, so the advertising peeps get to enjoy their brown bag lunches al fresco; Nick and Eddie added seating in the alley, covered with a new currogated tin roof to shield diners from a few of the elements; and we beautified our back door with hibiscus plants and a little cafe table (look for Lunaluxers out there on coffee breaks). The spruce-up even garnered the attention of the Downtown Journal newspaper and Channel 5 news. We’re thrilled to see our block made even more gorgeous (we never thought it was possible) and are enjoying the additional energy and excitement this project has brought to the ‘hood.