Alice and Martin Provensen

 We've been recently obsessed with amazing husband and wife illustration team, Alice and Martin Provensen (found on Black•Eiffel and Book by it's Cover):

Love the vintage style (they worked for the Walter Lantz Studio - of Woody Woodpecker fame, illustrated several Little Golden Books, and did work for Disney, back in the day, when they were creating genius films like Alice in Wonderland (worked on by the equally brilliant Mary Blair, but that's another post!)

So cute and hilarious...

Love the color palettes too!

This chart of different types of eggs - so ridiculous!

Wouldn't this illustration make an amazing children's birthday invitation?  So fabulous....

Juju!

We've always been enormous fans of the whimsical style of Northern European childrens' clothes, toys and the general aesthetic, love anything that falls into the realm of fairy tales, and, of course, are mad for crafting.  Thus, when we stumbled across Juju (via Frolic!), we're were immediately obsessed.

Our Finnish is a little rusty (erm, that is, non-existent), but we gather that there are two books, Juju and Maja, that are filled with brilliant and creative ways to create wonderful things for children.  The books seem to emphasize being creative when choosing materials, as in this fabulous ruffled table cloth that appears to be made from dishclothes...

Maja is a book filled with adorable and amusing things for children.  Love this fabulous stage? Boat? Sigh, if only we understood Finnish - whatever it is, it clearly sparks the imagination!

How fabulous would it be to grow up in a room that has been transformed into a quirky forest?  Love the mushroom stools...

This butterfly mobile is so gorgeous and looks like it would be a piece of cake to make!

Ideas for animal costumes?  So much fun!  Especially love the hilarious racoon/Cheshire Cat/Lemur tail...

Juju has instructions for adorable children's clothes for everyday life, for weekdays and Sundays, for mundane and festive events. Projects include an apron for a novice artist, gown for a maiden or wings for a fairy. The designs are meant to be easy to make with a wonderful result.

Love this skirt that appears to be made from cute fabric and a scrap of lace (perhaps a bit of curtain, in the spirit of using random found bits?)

The quirky photography is fantastic as well...

So genius!  Sigh, we heart these books, even if we can't understand a word!

one girl cookies (mmm...cookies!)

 We are totally enamored of One Girl Cookies (oh, if only we could live on cupcakes and hot cocoa with handmade marshmallows...)  They have an adorable shop in Brooklyn, and for those of us not fortunate enough to be able to pop by for an afternoon cappuccino and pointy cupcake, they ship! (well, maybe not the cappucino).

The walls (and their bakery boxes) are decorated with family portraits.

Remember those awesome sheet cakes from the 70's shaped like teddy bears, Darth Vader, Care Bears  (like the Barbie cake where the cake was a giant skirt with Barbie stuck in the middle of it?), covered with delicious blobs of frosting?  That's what this reminds us of! Perhaps we just have glorified memories of such cakes, since our mother was prone to making healthy (ish) desserts like carrot cake - delicious, but just not the giant sugar bomb one craves as a child!

So delicate!  These would be great in a dessert bar. So cute in their stripey wrappers.

Love the cheery colors...a fun take on your standard wedding cake!

They make favors such as this cute, individually boxed, mini cakes

Hilarious and adorable animal cookie encrusted cake.

Coveting the retro coffee cup, and oh, that marshmallow....dreamy!

This photo says it all...

Official Tooth Fairy Kit

Every once in a while we come across a genius that product that gives us major design envy. Behold! The Official Tooth Fairy Kit!

We love the seriously gorgeous design and all the hilarious little details, including the following filing instructions (the idea of making small children go through ridiculous and unnecessary bureaucracy is so amusing!):

The kit contains one letterpress Certificate of Record for filing with your local Tooth Fairy and one reusable silkscreened cloth deposit bag for your first and all subsequent transactions. The official certificate keeps record of name, age, tooth lost, method of extraction and compensation information.

Available via the Office of the Tooth Fairy (ha!) for the bargain price of $16

via Oh Happy Day!

Giveaway Winner!

Thank you to all for all the wonderful comments!  And, the winner is (drumroll please).....Mandy Murphy who wrote:

I would love to be in the drawing! The new site is awesome! I keep using the personalize option to create invites. I just can’t pick a favorite because i like so many! I hope I’m the lucky winner!!!!

Congratulations Mandy!  Please email info@hellolucky.com for the prize code which you can use toward any custom stationery on our website.

Thanks to everyone for participating - and stay tuned for more opportunities to win fabulous stationery.  You never know when the mood may strike!

2009 Preview Party!

We recently held our 2009 Stationery Preview party and are thrilled to report that it was a huge success!  We collaborated with some of the most amazing wedding vendors in the Bay Area to transform our working letterpress studio into a beautiful event space complete with red carpet!  Above, the fab Morgan Doan, event planner extraordinaire and mastermind behind this event, and Sabrina chatting by the welcome table.  Our sponsor booklet featured our new Sparrow design by Joel Dewberry.

Guests arriving...it was a fantastic crowd - some of the best and brightest in weddings...

The studio on its way to being transformed. Got Light? did an amazing job with the lighting and draping - we were truly blown away by the difference a little "pipe and drape" made.  The back-lit bar was provided by Blueprint Studio Collection and Wildflower Linens provided the lovely table clothes. DJ John Jow turned the place into a mini-nightclub with his expert music mixing.

Jane Hammond Events provided the seriously delicious hors d'oeuvres, including bite-sized crab cakes, empinadas, and mushroom tartlets and the most amazing brownies of all time.  Andronico's Market provided the excellent wine (selected by the talented Jeffrey Porter).

We made these little buffet signs - the holder was just a standard restaurant sign holder that we spray-painted a matte pink and the orchid pattern on the sign is from one of our new collaborations with Joel Dewberry.

One of the things we were celebrating was the launch of our latest invitation collections including a collaborations with EIEIO, Joel Dewberry, Julia Rothman, and the always amazing Lab Partners.  They did a destination series featuring New York, San Francisco, Hawaii and London (London and New York pictured above).  We've already gotten such and incredible response, we're already thinking about adding some new destinations to the line!

Sharla Flock designed the gorgeous floral arrangments - we love her subtle use of color and texture.

She used pieces from our large collection of flea market found vases and bowls to create an eclectic look.

One of our talented printers, James, did demonstrations of the letterpress printing technique.

We were also celebrating the launch of our new website which we are SO excited about.  The dapper Mr. Daniel James of Three Rings and brilliant event planner, Lisa Feldman, check out the new look.

We had a whole selection of our work on display - this was a variation on our popular Cherry Blossom design - including fan programs, and round menus designed to fit into the dinner plates.  We were also introducing our new digital printing option - an excellent (and fast!) alternative to letterpress (or a budget-friendly way to augment beautiful letterpress invitations).

Gorgeous photography by Allure West.

Thank you so much to all our incredible partners in this event and to everyone who came out for the party!

Oh Orla!

We just read, on SFGirlBay and v that Orla Kiely, of whom we are big, big fans, has created a new line of fabulous home wares for Target which will launch this Winter. So drool-worthy, we had to write about it too (picture us jumping up and down and trying to contain our glee)!

Check out these fabulous tins - reminiscent of a stylish 70's kitchen but without all those awful appliances in "avocado"!

Love the trays - you can never have too many trays!

The new Orla Kiely Target collection will include tumblers, mugs, serving trays, dinner plates, storage crates and totes, place mats, napkins, floor and seat cushoions, and super adorable (and affordable!) aprons!

We can't wait for this collection to hit the stores!

London Paper! Read all about it!

We are always so happy to see our stocklists in London featured in the press - especially when they display one of our cards - and so it was with much delight that we came across this article from the shopping pages of The London Paper - a newspaper that is given away to commuters to ease the tedium of those homeward tube, train and bus journeys.  Alex Stacey, founder of online stationery boutique Papergrain, is fast proving what we knew all along - that there is a market for beautiful cards and paper and, moreover, that the art of letter writing and thoughtful correspondence is far from being a dying one.  We simply adore her beautiful selection of greeting cards and thank-you notes and a visit to her online boutique should keep you well-stocked on stylish and suitable cards for every occasion.  She even has a good selection of discounted Christmas cards at the moment for all of you obscenely efficient people looking to get ahead of the curve for 2009!

Our Snail thank you card! Hurrah!

Our New (Extra Fancy!) Website is Here!

We're so excited our new website is finally here - check it out!

You can now order wedding invitations and save-the-dates easily online!

Check out our new proof preview feature when you shop for wedding invitations or save-the-dates (additional products will have this soon) - you can play around with type, color, & formatting - our favorite feature is the ability to drag the text boxes around so you can change your text placement on the fly!

Browse our inspiration boards created by Kathryn from Snippet & Ink...

Learn all about the letterpress process...

Meet our awesome staff...

Shop for cute personalized stationery!

and greeting cards...

as well as fabulous gifts, including our new book, Handmade Hellos!

We are so thrilled with the way it turned out!  That being said, it's brand-spanking new, so there are a couple bugs here and there which we are fixing as fast as we can.  If you come across something that isn't working properly or have any feedback, we'd love to hear from you - please email us here!  Note to folks on Internet Explorer 6 - it's time to upgrade! Sadly, our site is now too schmancy for the abilities of IE6 - but you can download IE7 here...

Happy browsing!

Gifts for Guys!

Guys are notoriously tough to shop for, so we thought we'd round up some gift ideas for the boys! (We never shy away from a challenge!) Here are a few things we thought were cool, amusing, useful, or otherwise covetable. Audio Stuff

We don't know a single guy who doesn't have some level of audio fixation...

The iPod Gramaphone $395 Pretty pricey, but sooooo cool...

Building Block iPod Dock $60

Areaware Magno Wooden Radio $275 mp3 compatible and made with sustainable wood.

iWood for the iPhone (also available for iTouch and iPod!) $100

Spiff It Up

In the words of ZZ Top, every girl's crazy 'bout a sharp dressed man...

Anchors Away! Pocket Square $14.00

Cabin in the Woods Cufflinks $25

Space Invader Cufflinks $70 Relive the '80's in style.

Evergreen wallet $125

Topographical Error Tie $30

Edwin Jagger Razor $86 This razor made in England by Edwin Jagger isn't just an ordinary shaving tool, but an elegant reminder of the ages-old art of a good and proper shave.

Red Wing Iron Ranger Boots $298 Red Wing Shoes recreated these boots from a 1953 ad for J.Crew. Super cool vintage style.

Instant Button $1.50 Admittedly equivalent to receiving a pair of white tube socks for Christmas, but how genius is this? It's a stick on button that (according to the packaging) will stay on for 30 washes and it actually buttons! Perhaps a candidate for a stocking stuffer...

Weapons T-shirt $20

This kid doodle inspired collection of weapons range from the practical whatever's-around kind such as rubberbands, a broken bottle, a cast-iron skillet, an ice pick and a brick to the made-to-kill-and-mame kind such as a sawn-off shotgun, a kitana, a mace and a sling-shot. Hilarious.

Whale Belt Buckle $54 Super cool on. Check out their other styles too - we especially like the pirate ship, feather, and erm, beaver (raised eyebrow and smirk) options.

Other Stuff

Stencil 101 $24.95

Compensation for Missing Limbs Poster $20 Who can put a price on the leg that's been replaced by a wooden peg? This poster sets the standard for compensation for limbs lost via treacherous sailing incidents and other mishaps. One of a series of brilliant posters by Office. Plus, the purchase of this poster benefits 826 Valencia, a fantastic writing center for kids (and pirate supply shop - we recommend pairing this poster with a tin of Mermaid Bait or Repellant, or possibly a handy bottle of Scurvy Begone). A great gift and the spreading of Christmas spirit in one fell swoop!

Princess Lea Limited Edition Lithograph $49.99

We don't know a guy who doesn't have a thing for Star Wars, or at least the hots for Princess Lea!

Ash Yo-Yo $30

Snake Bike Lock $34 Ssss..step away from my bicycle!! A super snazzzzy serpent friend!

Custom Beer Carrier $20. For the beer aficionado, have a custom beer carrier made, engraved with an image of your choice!

Catapult $10 (ok, this might be pushing the envelope in terms of ridiculous gifts, but it made us accidentally snort, so we had to include it!)

Topsy Turvy's Fabulous Hats!

We always love an excuse to don a smart hat (don't you wish someone would bring back that trend? We do!).   The charming, vintage-inspired chapeaux from Oakland-based Topsy Turvy make us wish that hats were a de rigeur fashion accessory!

This Oh-So-Flirty Cocktail Hat was modeled after a vintage headpiece found at the flea market dating from the 1950's.

We love this sassy, burlesquey number...

Kim Brown-Dye, the sometime costumier & full-time milliner behind Topsy-Turvy makes a wide range of beautiful hats, with nods to a wide variety of eras and suitable for everything from a swank evening out to an outrageous costume party.  She builds each one from scratch using buckram & wire construction which is then covered & trimmed using the finest materials & hand finishing.

The Evelyn - Victorian Top Hat...makes us want to don our riding habits, slap on the side-saddle and ride off into the sunset!

Who wouldn't want to have an excuse to channel Marie Antoinette?

Leopard print pillbox!  So rock-a-billy fabulous!

Leather Bell Hop!

Rhinestone Mini Top Hat! Glittery!

Ah, glittery AND feathered...who can resist?  We are positively swooning - if only we could have one of each!

Check out a video on Kim's studio and her hat-making here!

The Affected Provincial's Companion

We were recently introduced to the works of Lord Breaulove Swells Whimsy (read his blog here), self-described Mammal of Paradise, a most amazing advocate for the benefits of a life of Grace and Beauty, which we, of course, are hearty champions of as well!  His book,  The Affected Provincial's Companion, Volume One, promises (and delivers, gloriously)  the reader the following:

Feats of Sartorial Cunning! Jaunty Verse! Deftly Rendered Turns of Phrase! Witticisms! Unbridled Pedantry! Dust Motes! Icy Hauteur! Well-Muscled Hindquarters!

The book is absolutely gorgeous through and through (as you know, Gentle Reader, we are great admirers of the classic, vintage-inspired book), from its leaf-green hardcover stamped silver foil to the charming magenta endpapers with a hilarious pattern of woodland critters, to the multitude of charming and enlightening diagrams within.  It was designed, illustrated and typeset by the author and we heartily applaud the results!

A must read for any man about town.  Above, a jaunty diagram accompanying a chapter titled "On the Perils of Sportswear.  Or, a Battery of Irrefutable Misgivings Concerning a Shambling Citizenery and Its Detrimental Effects on the Fostering of a Civil Society; Included is a Five-Point "Fopwa" That Might Spare Our Nation the Shame That Comes with Being a DEN of UBIQUITY."   See also, "Get Thee to Haberdashery.  Or, the GENTLEMAN as a Revolutionary Archetype and his Role in the Demise of the GUY (A Brief Meditation.) Diagram pictured below:

(Fig. 8:  The Guy (and thus a rascal)  Acne, coldsore; Fused vertebrae (guitar, girl trouble); Painted into a corner.    Fig. 9: The Gentleman  Perfect coif; Pockets full of the finest lint; Shoeshine seen from orbit.)

Diagram accompanying a chapter entitled "Now That You Are A Man.  Or, a Young Gentleman's Guide to the Proper Grooming of Facial Hair."

Get thee to a bookshop (or order online here or here) immediately and add this wonderful book to your library - it is brimming with brilliant insight and amusing musings; a required volume for any aesthete.  You will not regret the purchase!   A far more civilized, beautiful life now lies within the grasp of your trembling fingertips...

Bazaar Bizarre!

This weekend we were peddling our wares over at Bazaar Bizarre, a fabulous (and busy!) art & craft fair sponsored by Craft Magazine.  There were over 100 vendors selling all sorts of handmade goods from the lovely to the hilarious.

Piperoid was at the next table over with their fantastic DIY paper robot.  They come flat packed in these ingenious little kits that require only a pair of scissors!

More robotic goodness...

I Heart Guts was there - they always amuse with their adorable plush innards, hilarious t-shirts and other gut-related goodies.  One of our favorite items was the "When Urine in Love" t-shirt sporting two perky kidneys mooning over each other.  Silliness is always so satisfying!

Eunice got this awesome crab necklace from our next door neighbor, The Brown Banana -  Gabriel Colaluca, proprietor of the Brown Banana makes all kinds of fabulous-one-of-kind jewelery from recycled materials such as watch faces, silverware, Scrabble pieces and more.

Another member of the banana family, BananaSaurus Rex, had adorable reversable bibs, gorgeous totes, wine wraps and more, all made from vintage tablecloths and the like and were handing out free lavender sachets with purchase, to boot!

The always inspiring Mara and Anna from Dutch Door Press had a wide array of beautiful things for sale - our favorite was their new series of prints of birds and flora from all 50 states (this is a new release and so far only California, Illinois and New York are available here, but we can't wait to see them all!)

Being knitting junkies, we couldn't resist purchasing some hand-dyed yarn from A Verb for Keeping Warm (despite our ever growing collection of unfinished projects and piles of yarn yet to be used!) The colors were so enticing, the voice of reason was immediately stamped out in favor of a couple of skeins of "Pink Octopus". If you're in the Bay Area, they are opening their new shop in Berkeley on December 6th!

Jocelyn Nguyen of Nous Savons had (as usual) a fabulous selection of jewelery, hair pieces, and clothing.  The Nous Savons aestheic can be summed up with these words: Like wandering in your crazy great-aunt's attic. Fabulous.

We also stopped by to visit the talented Sarah Adler of Hearts & Anchors.  Her whimsical, victorian-inspired notes (available here) are always a favorite of ours!  She is also one of the contributors to our new book, Handmade Hellos!  We were thrilled to see that the books were selling like hotcakes!

Book Love

Grace from Design*Sponge posted about this gorgeous, gorgeous  collection of classic novels from Penguin Classics.  We are avid collectors of vintage books, so needless to say the beautiful patterns in matte foil and super old-school look of these volumes are making us swoon!

They are an exclusive to Waterstone's in the UK (cue weeping, fretting and deep, deep envy, here in the U.S.), but they are available online, and may very well be worth the shipping charges!

Sigh.

Wendy Kromer's Gorgeous Cakes

You've likely seen Wendy Kromer's work if you have ever picked up a copy of Martha Stewart Weddings - she is an incredibly talented cake designer and has created some of our all-time favorite cakes.

Wendy has a bakery and design studio in Sandusky, Ohio which would seem incredibly inconvenient for those of us who covet her cakes, but much to our delight we have discovered via BFF Bridal that you can buy her gorgeous sugar flowers as well as cake kits (like the amazing Magical Marzipan Forest Cake featured above) so that you (or for those of us who are less daring, your favorite local baker) can emulate some of her most fabulous designs.  Shop online at  Wendy Kromer Specialty Confections.

If you're still dreaming of one of her cakes for your big day, she will deliver her wedding cakes throughout Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Indiana and Illinois.  If you're further away, no need to fret; they will deliver throughout the United States and even internationally!  All of their cakes are hand-carried on planes - it seems like a nerve-wracking job to us, but there you go!

You can also check out more of her cakes the new book she co-authored with Martha Stewart, titled Martha Stewart’s Wedding Cakes, where over 100 of her cakes are featured.

NameBirdie!

We just came across NameBirdie on ritzybee and felt we had to spread the word!  Getting married is fun and all, but there are certain elements that are, frankly, a real drag.  Paperwork is right up there on our list (ok, well, Sabrina and I grew up with a dad who was a bureaucrat with the U.S. Government and spent a lot of time as kids "playing" with old forms and such, so I secretly sort of love filling out forms (sick, I know), but, boy, do I hate looking for the right forms to fill out!)

NameBirdie is a brilliant service that allows you to change your name in a fabulous, no hassle, stress free way for the bargain price of $24.95 or $29.95 for their super fancy package.  Normally, a name change involves an attorney (expensive!) or collecting a myriad of forms and getting them all filled out properly.  With NameBirdie, it takes no time at all, and their service even creates notification letters to your banks, credit card companies and so on. Brilliant, genius idea!  Plus, though not as cute as some tarty lingerie from Agent Provocateur, they offer gift cards that make a fantastic bridal shower gift!  They are also doing a giveaway via ritzybee which you can enter here.  We heart them!

Real Wedding: Liz and Ryan

Thanks to Audrey of Urbanic Paper Boutique for sharing these adorable photos of her friends' wedding.  The couple coordinated their invitations with Audrey and chose our Classic Cowboy letterpress wedding invitation.  We love this invitation (no bias here, of course) and were especially pleased with the eye catching color palette they settled on.

The invitation, in pool and lucky red inks, makes such a refreshingly cheery and bold statement for what is sure to be a festive day.

The crisp color palette was evident in the the rest of the the thoughtfully planned details on the wedding day.  The cool blue of the Pacific Ocean provides such a lovely backdrop for the ceremony though we have to say that the popcorn bag seating cards take the cake!

Such a quaint, fun and creative touch...details like these make for such a warm and memorable celebration.  For more firsthand info about this wedding and others, please visit Audrey's blog.

And, if you're in the area, be sure to visit Urbanic Paper Boutique for greeting cards, personalized stationery, unique gifts and more.  Check out photos of the space in Venice, CA  here.

In Memoriam: Tana

Sad news today - Tana, the beloved dog of Hello!Lucky employee Kelly B. passed away this morning. Tana was a much-loved fixture in our studio. She spent her days sleeping under desks, watching the passer-bys and occasionally receiving snacks from other employees when Kelly wasn't looking. She was even known to participate in the occasional brainstorming meeting, giving her silent but meaningful consent as we developed new stationery designs.

Tana, you will be missed.

Memorials to Tana created by our staff (above).

Fabulous cake stands

Ah, cake stands! They can be the life of the party, especially when mixed together with lots of delectable cakes. One of our new favorites is this woodsie cake stand from Bell'ochio ($175 and up) - it would have been perfect for the Alice in Wonderland theme party we threw last year...

Above:  French porcelain cake stand ($70); Fenton milk glass cake stand from Robbin's Nest (vintage, $75).

Simple silhouettes: Hand-pressed milk glass cake stand ($74.95); White scalloped cake stand ($42 - $52); String of pearls cake stand ($24.99); Thistle pressed glass cake stand ($49.95);

Whimsical birds on wire cake stand ($32.95); blue blossom 2-tier stand for small cakes and trifles ($19.99).

Gorgeous white bird cake stand  ($80 - $130) and scalloped cake stand ($85 - $145), both by Bay Area artist Whitney Smith (available in a range of colors).

Pakhuis Oost Coathanger Squirrels

We love shopping at San Francisco-based Rose and Radish. We recently noticed these colorful squirrel-shaped coat hangers from Dutch home & gift studio Pakhuis Oost on their website. So delightful!