Stationery Saturday: personalized notebooks

It’s time for the final Stationery Saturday of 2010. Saturday, December 18, 11:00a.m. to 6:00p.m., we’re creating personalized matchbook-style notebooks. These three-by-five-inch booklets are perfect for stashing in your pocket, bag or glove-box (or someone’s stocking!). Blank covers in ruby, cornflower and ginger are ready to go; the name, initials or brief phrase of your choice will be printed on the front panel using black ink and sans serif lettering. The notebooks are filled with off-white recycled pages, perforated for easy removal. You get a set of 5 matching notebooks for just $29.00 (additional notebooks with the same imprint are $5.00 each). You can watch while we set the type and print your notebooks on our vintage Heidelberg Windmill letterpress, or shop and enjoy MorningStar coffee and home-made cookies while we complete your notebooks, or place your order and make arrangements to pick them up next week.

We’re thrilled to share the event with a couple of visitors as well; Erin Kate of ekate designs will be selling her Modern Locket collection, a modular selection of charms (some of which can be personalized on the spot!) from which you can choose to assemble a very personal necklace. And Barry Rubin, the pen-fanatic behind Ink: the Pen Store, will be selling a selection of modestly priced writing instruments. AND as if that weren’t enough excitement already, we’re throwing in a sale too: all boxed stationery and notecards (excluding holiday cards) will be 15% off the regular price.

Our Stationery Saturdays page has more details about this and other Stationery Saturday events.

If you’re a fan of Lunalux and/or Stationery Saturday, we’d love your help in spreading the word about our events. We’re created an event listing on the Lunalux facebook page, so you can share the information with all your paper-loving pals.

Design + Print: Loop notebook

Mohawk Papers unveiled the Feedback Loop collection of notebooks this week – limited-edition notebooks created by designer/printers from across the country. Mohawk donated the paper (printers’ choice from Mohawk’s new line, LOOP), the printers donated their work, and 100% of the proceeds from notebook sales go to School: by Design, a youth mentoring program developed by Design Ignites Change and the Designers Accord. We were honored to be invited to participate in this innovative program, but it was a little scary too. Mohawk gave just basic guidelines regarding the size of the notebooks, but the design could be anything we wanted. It’s fun to have a little creative freedom, but also intimidating when you know that your work will be on display with sky’s-the-limit output of two dozen other unidentified but presumably very skilled craftsmen. What is everyone else doing? How will mine compare? Are my ideas awesome or lame? Mohawk is promoting the program all month on the Felt & Wire blog – and we’re thrilled that our notebook is featured there today. Click here to read a mini-interview, and view a video of our press in action. Now that it’s all out in the open, it’s fascinating to look at what everyone else has created. I love our design, but I wish I’d upped the ante in the binding department. My favorites (other than ours, of course, which you can buy here for just $15), are the ruler-covered notebook by Cleanwash Letterpress; the exposed-stitch composition from Igloo Letterpress; and MK Printers‘ book covered with a montage of olde-timey lettering. If anyone’s looking for an over-the-top present, consider ordering a library of all 20 notebooks. That’s $300 to a good cause, and a library of amazing designs! Photos below courtesy of feltandwiershop.com

Stationery Saturday: Pocket Notebooks

This week for Stationery Saturday, we’re printing pocket-sized matchbook-style notebooks. Hello, perfect Valentine’s Day present! You get your choice of red, blue or brown covers, imprinted with three lines of silver text (approximately 9 letters per line, max) – our samples show a first, middle and last name, but we’re counting on our customers to come up with clever wording such as nick-names, inside jokes, or sweet nothings. Finished notebooks will be staple-bound with 20 perforated pages. These three-by-five-inch notebooks fit in the tiniest of places, and are great for to-do list and notes on the go. You’ll get 6 personalized notebooks for $29, and additional notebooks with the same imprint are $4 each. You can watch as we run the Heidelberg Windmill for a one-on-one letterpress demonstration, or enjoy a cup of coffee and pick out a few Valentines while we do the dirty work.

Stationery Saturday runs 11a.m.-6p.m. on Saturday, February 13. Check the Stationery Saturday page for more details. If you can’t make it this weekend, plan ahead for the next event; we’ll be hosting another Stationery Saturday on March 27. Watch for pictures of next month’s design to be posted here in a few weeks.

Design + Print: sweet promotional notebooks

I’ve worked with Lucas Saugen in a variety of ways over the past four years. As a rollergirl, I’ve submitted to his photographer’s gaze in various derby-related photo shoots. And he availed himself of our services a couple years ago when we printed his bare-bones business cards, which he rubber-stamped with his trademark red star. So I was happy to see Lucas at our doorstop this spring, on the hunt for ideas. He wanted swag to promote his photography business. Something useful, small, unique. The winning concept: matchbook-style notebooks. He restricted his creativity to our pre-existing notebook covers (over-runs from a wholesale project), composing around blue cardstock that had already been cut and scored to fold down to a 3.5×5-inch notebook. We sourced lovely and affordable stock for the interior pages: Strathmore elements lined 70# text, with its super-smooth surface. His logo and business contact information is letterpress-printed in red ink. We assembled the books for him too, binding about 20 micro-perforated sheets into each cover with our heavy-duty step-down stapler.
If you want to see some of Lucas’s work head to Pizza Lucé in downtown Minneapolis; his beautiful, eerie urban landscapes are on exhibit there through the end of August 2009. Or check out his work on his website: www.saugenphotography.com.

Raise your hand if you love French stuff

Turns out, the French make a lot of cool stuff. This, I guess, is no surprise, as we’ve been selling Rhodia pads, G. Lalo stationery and J. Herbin inks for years – all imported from France. But now the Lunalux store is stocking some fresh modern paper goods for all you Francophiles out there. Like these petite flip-top notepads created by French designer JC de Castelbajac. Measuring just 3×5 inches, they tuck neatly into your handbag or shirt pocket. We’ve also got address books and larger hard-cover journals featuring these same designs.

Can’t decide of you like old-French of new-French stuff? These notebooks give you both, sorta. They’re reproductions of very old French cahiers. The slim volumes sport lovely vintage designs and bold colors. The corners are rounded, and the edges are even faded, as if the notebook were decades old. But it’s not, it’s new. Surprise! Four fun designs available.

If you’re in the market for a more substantial journal or sketchbook, consider one of these hard-cover books from Clairefontaine. Overlapping botanical silhouettes in yummy covers are printed all over the sturdy covers, which snap shut with a magnetic closure. Available in two sizes: 4.375×6 inches, and 7×8.75 inches.