Stationery Haul: Paper Part

Seriously – paper and pens and paper and pens!! Nothing gets me more spiced up. MM!

If you follow my blog – the outpouring of crippling depression, awkward social interactions and silent screams of help – you probably know I have few people to “talk shop” to. This is why I live tweet. And blog.

I happen to love pens and paper. I worked retail stationery for about four years? Maybe three. I have no concept of time. I love to touch paper, feel paper, write notes, see the artistry in this form. Letterpress, thermography, engraving, flat print –

Sending letters out is a lot like social media these days. I can write ‘em, but, I’m not going to get much back. This has sort of collapsed my whole system of writing notes. I find the most likely notes I send these days are thank you notes – because they require no follow-up from other people. And it’s pretty nice to find all sorts of ways to show admiration and appreciation for someone else behavior.

Let’s do a little paper fun, k?

• Folded Note: This is probably my least favorite paper vehicle. I guess because it’s so common. Cards, thank you notes – the whole world is folded.
• Correspondent Card: These are heavy flat cards. Originally meant to be used by men. Whatever. I love the substantial feel in my hands and how you don’t have to open up a fold. BAM the message is right there.
• Letter page: Most commonly the lined paper or printing paper size. It does vary by country. I don’t use letter paper, really. I get my feelings out on a single correspondent card and call it a day. I do love air paper, which is very thin. Again, we don’t use this much anymore. I have been known to use a tea length paper – which is long and narrow. Rarely.

When you get something printed or something is printed and you like it, there are some options as to how the ink was applied to the paper (just look some of this up, who knows if I'm 100% right):

• Engraved: A mental plate is made with the image or text you want. This is a reverse image - when the paper is run through, the image from the plate stands up. It's normally then slathered with ink. You can check out this post by ohsobeautifulpaper.com for more info.
• Letterpress: Same deal with the plate, but the plate has ink applied to it and is pressed into the paper creating the look (and feel) of the image or text being pressed into the paper. Did you know ohsobeautifulpaper.com did another article on this?
• Themography: This is where no plate is used (translation: cheaper process). Ink and powder are applied to the paper in the image or text and then baked. The ink puffs up and looks raised, like engraved. 
• Flat print (also called Offset): Ever print paper from a home or work printer? That's flat. Most greeting cards are like that.
• Foil Printing: This is coming around in style. It's on the line of letterpress but you can only have so many colors or images when using letterpress or engraving - with a die and some heat (and special metallic ink) you can get the same letterpress feel with more complexity. And on thinner paper.
• Embossed: This is more for an accent but artist are crazy about all types of things. You probably know embossed styles if you ever read a library book and it had that crest in it. You know. Or got a personal embosser? It's like raised paper without ink.

Now, I can easily tell the difference between these things types of printing. Most people can call out letterpress. Not everyone can tell the difference between thermo and engraved. Another type of printing is embossed - which is like letterpress but no ink is used.

The Card

I don’t like to buy cards for events. I like to buy blank cards. First, they can be fancier and I can turn them into anything I want. I can buy a bunch and save them for whatever event. Besides, in today’s world, nothing is every as cut and dry as “happy ____” or whatever. If you want to make a splash – stationarily – at a wedding or shower or something, getting a unique blank card is the way to go. Trust me, the people getting the cards are going to see the same ones over and over.

Get yo’self some blank cards.

The Correspondent

I normally buy a pack of cards in one color and envelopes in another so you have a whole display when I do send mail.

You can get different sizes and they give you either a little more or a little less space. Since you tend to just use the front  and never the back – or should – if you struggle with words, a smaller card will make you seem more full of thoughts.

People like this.

I like to get my paper from the bulk section of Paper Source. I pretty much walk around gathering everything and battling off sales people. I like them, they are cool – just, leave me alone. This is like my porn and no one wants to be interrupted when involved in their personal porn.

Customize Yourself

Minus actually gluing stuff on your notes, you can easily create a custom and fun look with stamps.

I love on my correspondent cards with stamps – which I also like. Stamps and stencils. The good thing about both is you can normally find a lot of styles and it’s not like the stamp or stencil will go bad. If you buy some nice paint markers you can use a stencil and a couple colors to make something artistic.

People dig artistic. Even if they don’t – just crush a stamp pad with a stamp and get your aggressions out by slamming that stamp on some paper. Then you say, “I @#$%ing made that. I MADE YOU!”

In Practice

I went to this new paper store - because they happen. And of course needed to buy anything that's tiny. I got these letterpress cards with baby envelopes and totally wrote them all up that night and hid them in the husband's stuff. 

He found one about 12 hours later. That's a stressful 12 hours.

Thoughts

Sure, we might all be hurling toward electronic efficiency, but I’ll make you cry like a baby with a hand-written note on some paper that feels like a sturdy hug and some custom art.