New! Monthly Card Subscriptions!

To ring in the new year we are thrilled to announce our new monthly card subscriptions! It's easier than ever to write letters to friends and family and now you can get your favorite cards without lifting a finger. All you need to do is visit our subscription page, select how many months you'd like to receive three pre-stamped letterpress cards, and watch them arrive in your mailbox for only $12 dollars a month! The cards are all new or best-selling so you'll always be surprised. These subscriptions make great gifts for those who love to send hand-written notes, too. Order online today!

*Note this is only available in the US and UK.

Pin it to win it! Letterpress Holiday Cards Edition

We're thrilled to announce the next edition of Pin it to Win it! This time we're giving away a box set of letterpress holiday cards! Our letterpress cards are printed on a vintage press on 100% recycled paper, and in festive color palettes perfect for sending holiday cheer. To play, just pin any box set from this page of our website or an image from this blog post. Once you have pinned your image, leave a comment below this post with the URL to your pin so we can check it out.

Just like last time we’ll randomly pick one lucky person to win a free box set of 6 cards. We’ll announce the winner on Friday, December 14th. **A winner has been chosen and contacted via email. Thanks for participating and stay tuned for more Pin It to Win It giveaways!

Good luck!

Bazaar Bizarre San Francisco

Join us this weekend December 1st and 2nd for the annual Bazaar Bizarre Holiday Show! We'll be hanging out at our booth selling cards, gifts, and our new prints! If you haven't been to the Bazaar Bizarre before, prepare for total craftness. Vendors and retailers all gather to showcase their original gifts, just in time for your holiday shopping. There's also a huge list of delicious food vendors for your mid-day snacking pleasure. You can get your hands on awesome products like these printed totes by Shapes & Colors, and munch on some tasty cake pops by Sweet Lauren Cakes.

The event takes place at the Concourse Exhibition Center EAST HALL 620 Seventh St. (at Brannan) from 11am - 6pm and is completely free. And the first 200 visitors each day will receive a free limited edition tote bag with loads of goodies including letterpress cards from yours truly! Hope to see you there!

DIY Color Block Holiday Cards

It's hard to believe Thanksgiving has passed and we're in the home stretch toward the holidays. Over the Thanksgiving weekend we were thankful for down time with family and friends, but itching to get decorating and DIY-ing for what's next. This can be a hectic time of year, so we're all about keeping things simple. This DIY Color Block Holiday Card project is a simple and inexpensive way to send cheer to your loved ones. And, you most likely have the majority of the supplies at home. It was inspired by our Color Block Kids Party Invitation (also available in pinks!) made for the boys' 2nd birthday party earlier this year, but we also have a new Color Block Holiday Photo Card with convenient customization. With some quick snips of colored tissue paper, you can recreate this bold typeface design into a one-of-a-kind Christmas card. Instructions below!

Materials needed:

Tissue Paper - We used green and red, but any combination would work! Just one sheet of each color will be plenty.

Blank Cards or Card Stock paper - Most craft stores sell 5" x 7" blank cards and matching envelopes, or you can cut a 10" x 7" sheet of card stock and fold in half. Use some spare envelopes or buy some from the craft store as well.

Bone Folder - For trouble-free folding!

Glue Stick - Make sure the glue stick is new - or retains its moisture. If it's too sticky you will have trouble working with the tissue. Also be sure it dries clear.

Scissors - The sharper, the better! Cutting tissue paper is tricky because the paper is very delicate. Sharp scissors will make cutting a breeze.

Craft Knife (optional) - Some people are more comfortable cutting small pieces with a craft knife. Just be sure it's super sharp, to get a clean cut of tissue paper.

Step 1: Using just a small corner of tissue, start by cutting your shapes. For "Noel" each vertical line was about 2" x 1/4" and each horizontal line was about 1" x 1/4" but we say, the more imperfections the better.

Step 2: Glue your shapes onto your card, one at a time. This step can be frustrating, so bring on the patience. A nice, new, moist glue stick will be a tremendous help. We suggest using a blank piece of paper as a gluing surface. Gently (and we mean ever-so-softly) apply glue to one side of the tissue <insert frustrations here> It will be ok, just be gentle. Lay your piece of tissue down on the card and smooth with a glue-free finger. What we like best about the look of this DIY is the overlapping of colors. You can just apply glue directly on the card, then lay the tissue on top, but you will see the dried glue surrounding the shapes.

All done! You can get creative with this DIY and come up with any shapes you like. Our Color Block Kids Party Invitation had some fun arrows and scalloped edging, so we definitely wanted to include that in our cards.

We'd love to see the cards you come up with. Be sure to share any pictures on our Facebook page!

Happy crafting!

For more fun DIY ideas, visit our website!

SFMade Nationwide!

Have you heard the news? SFMade is expanding their pop-up shops in Banana Republic stores across the country! Last year's Banana Republic pop-up shop in San Francisco was an enormous success, so debuting our products in stores in Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York is icing on the cake. If you live in Los Angeles, the Banana Republic located on the 3rd Street Promenade (Santa Monica) and will feature our Happy Holidays from Los Angeles letterpress cards, among others. In New York, we're showcasing our Happy Holidays from New York cards at the Rockefeller Center location. And in Chicago visit the store on Michigan Avenue to get your hands on our Happy Holidays from Chicago letterpress cards. Of course, you can find our Happy Holidays from San Francisco cards at the Banana Republic location in San Francisco on Grant.

Here is a sneak peek into the shop at the Los Angeles Banana Republic!

And here's a look into the New York City location!

To our readers nearby and our readers far away, we encourage you to shop local this holiday season, and if you can, shop SFMade!

Holiday Sale & Open House! This Sunday!

Just a reminder that this Sunday is our big open house and holiday sale! We have so many fun things going on including letterpress demos - where people can crank their own holiday card, a huge sale on holiday cards and gifts, and three limited edition letterpress prints we designed just for the occasion! We're just showing you these two - you'll need to come see us to check out the third print!

We're so excited about these prints, hand drawn by Eunice and masterfully letterpressed with split fountain by James. We only printed 50 of each so be sure to come early and buy one!

Visit us at 977 Howard Street (btw 5th & 6th) in San Francisco. Our doors will be open from 11:30am - 2pm. Email info@hellolucky.com with questions.

Harvest by Darling Clementine

Has everyone been introduced to Darling Clementine's new collection Harvest? If not, we're delighted to do the honors. We've been huge fans of Darling Clementine since long before they agreed to be a guest designer for our 2011 Holiday Collection, and were thrilled when they wanted to work with our team. Harvest, a collection of prints, cards, gift wrap (and more!) is a perfect way to welcome the fall and winter seasons. The pairing of cool blues and grays with warm reds and pinks makes us melt with design envy. Check out the Harvest collection right here!

Set of 8 single greeting cards

Harvest gift wrap

Harvest poster

Set of 6 greeting cards

Harvest 2013 Calendar

 

And the Last Lucky Friday Winner Is... Oh my!

With such an outpouring of Lucky Friday Love, we couldn't choose just one winner! Instead we chose ONE LUCKY WINNER to receive the ten thank you cards— *PLUS* we're going to give away one card to FIVE OTHER LUCKY WINNERS!  Yay! We couldn't help ourselves. It's Friday!

So, without further ado (or adieu) here are the FIVE LUCKY WINNERS: Erica, Emily C, Tasha, Alisia and Richelle! We'll contact you each to receive a surprise thank you design.

And... drumroll please... the Luckiest Lucky Friday winner of TEN THANK YOU CARDS IS:

 MARY!

We'll contact all the winners early next week.

Thank you all so much for the Hello!Lucky love.

Stay in touch!

XOXO

 

 

Le Papier Studio

Coming up with a unique gift can be a difficult task, especially if you're on a budget. Almost anything customizable these days can cost up to an arm and a leg, but these new silhouette prints by Le Papier Studio are one-of-a-kind and they are affordable. This floral wreath silhouette print is the perfect gift for newlyweds and can be customized in just about every way possible. Vana Chupp, owner and designer of Le Papier, has mastered the art of the silhouette, and it's clear because all of her products are fabulous. We asked Vana a few questions about her work:

1. What inspired you to start Le Papier Studio?

The inspiration behind Le Papier Studio was my first born son, Nikolas. I started documenting his milestones by cleverly capturing his personality, emotion, playfulness and essence. I began using silhouettes to tell my own life story. Now that my second born, John is added to the equation, it's a love story that continues to blossom with both of them as my muses.

2. What's been the most rewarding part of running your business? 

Creating what I love, seeing it come to fruition and adorned by many.

3. Advice for anyone who is thinking of starting their own creative business?

Two words, "start now!". Often people will ponder and wait for the 'perfect' moment to start their creative business, wasting invaluable time.

4. What inspires you most? 

My friends, my family, my boys, are the reason I do what I do.

We're loving this family dates print and how each event can be customized by color. This is such a fun way to display all the important dates in your life, or a great gift for new parents. It's not just the prints that we love, Le Papier has endless goodies from personalized tote bags to dinner plates.

Know a pet lover? One of these personalized pet silhouette plates would certainly make it's home on a mantle or in a frame. Fido will be feeling proud with his own homage.

Vana has customized just about everything, even monogram napkin rings. You can take your tabletop from plain to preppy with the bold color choices, too. What will she come up with next?!

Be sure to check out the entire collection by Le Papier Studio here, and pick up a copy of the new! Pretty Paper Parties book, published by Chronicle Books!

Lucky Friday Finale!

Hello all you lucky folks out there! This is the Grand Finale for our Lucky Friday Giveaway!  Each Friday we've featured one of our letterpress greeting cards. This week, to celebrate, we're going to choose ONE SUPER-DUPER SPECIAL WINNER to receive a selection of ten beautiful thank you cards as our way of saying thanks for all your lovely comments over the years! Post a comment by 12 p.m. PST the following Thursday, and we’ll announce our extra lucky winner on the following Friday!

The winners from last week are (drum roll, please): Zoe, Brianna and Shay B! We’ll contact you soon to arrange sending your TYPE(FACE) SORRY card.

Design: We couldn't decide on just one—with so many dear and delicious designs to choose from— so we settled on a tall, short stack of thank-yous. Artist: From the Moyle with the Mostest, to Rockin' Rothman, our selection will be a short list of the finest designs. Inspiration:  We've been so inspired by all our gracious, gorgeous, globe-trotting, card-craving clientele— we wish we could thank you all! Who to send them to: If it's ten friends you want to high-five, or one friend who deserves ten times the love, you can savor choosing the lucky one or two or three or... Favorite detail: We could get lost in all the sweet details; it's nice knowing there's a thank you for everybody. Why letterpress? Our love of letterpress is what started the whole shebang, and for that we give thanks!

Don't forget to post your comment, and tune in next week to see our last, luckiest winner!

 

 

 

Lucky Friday # 82 TYPE(FACE) SORRY!

Hello all you lucky folks out there! This is the 82nd edition of our Lucky Friday Giveaway.  Each Friday we feature one of our letterpress greeting cards. We’ll choose THREE LUCKY WINNERS to get a free card.  Post a comment by 12 p.m. PST the following Thursday, and we’ll announce the winners on the following Friday!

The winners from last week are (drum roll, please): Randi Jensen, K Shaw and JoEllen! We’ll contact you next week to arrange sending your Hang in There card.

Design: TYPE(FACE) SORRY! Artist: Eunice Moyle Inspiration: We gave the project some face time, and when we typed the word "Sorry" we knew we had just the type of card we needed. Who to send it to: The type of person you need to face up to— or the type you would rather just send a cute little letter... and not face right away. Ideas we scrapped in favor of this one:  For the Christian congrats card, we couldn't decide on a good baptismal font. Favorite detail: Love the subtlety of the sad face. The Mona Lisa of frownies. Why letterpress? How could we honestly make typographic jokes without such graphic use of type?

Don’t forget to post your comment and tune in next week, same time, different stationery, to see if you’ve won!

Lucky Friday # 81, Hang in There

Hello all you lucky folks out there! This is the 81st edition of our Lucky Friday Giveaway.  Each Friday we feature one of our letterpress greeting cards. We’ll choose THREE LUCKY WINNERS to get a free card.  Post a comment by 12 p.m. PST the following Thursday, and we’ll announce the winners on the following Friday!

The winners from last week are (drum roll, please): Maggie, Csilla and Kendra Purnell! We’ll contact you next week to arrange sending your Chairs card.

Design: Hang in There Artist: Eunice Moyle Inspiration: Life and work is like a barrel of monkeys, and we know things go better if we all hang together. Who to send it to: A macaque who feels like crap, a monkey who's been feeling a little funky, or a Rhesus who fell to pieces. Ideas we scrapped in favor of this one: We were thinking of doing a new version called "Ecce Mono" in honor of the recently "improved" Spanish fresco. Favorite detail: Can y'all spot the one monkey who's just a teensy bit different from the others? Why letterpress? When it comes to printing primates, we prefer mano a mono.

Don’t forget to post your comment and tune in next week, same time, different stationery, to see if you’ve won!

Lucky Friday # 80, Chairs

Hello all you lucky folks out there! This is the 80th edition of our Lucky Friday Giveaway.  Each Friday we feature one of our letterpress greeting cards. We’ll choose THREE LUCKY WINNERS to get a free card.  Post a comment by 12 p.m. PST the following Thursday, and we’ll announce the winners on the following Friday!

The winners from last week are (drum roll, please): Frances, Jana and Chris! We’ll contact you next week to arrange sending your Sporty Birthday card.

Design: Chairs Artist: Julia Rothman Inspiration:  We took a load off, set a spell, and we fancied we'd honor the humble foundations of our inspirations. Who to send it to: Anyone named Anne, Louis, Chip, Dale, Chaise or.... Cherry. (?!) Or any antiques aficionado. Ideas we scrapped in favor of this one: The "Go for Baroque" pun fell flat on all but a few and the "Rockin' the Rococo" rocking chair card was... actually, we might re-consider. Favorite detail: Just can't decide which chair we'd most like to have and never sit in. Why letterpress? Antique chairs, antique presses— wethinks we see a pattern emerging!

Don’t forget to post your comment and tune in next week, same time, different stationery, to see if you’ve won!

UK End of Summer Sale

Big news! Our UK site is launching the End of Summer super sale! Now you can get up to 50% off your favorite greeting cards and gifts. And just a hint - many of our holiday cards are half off! Stock up now before winter begins and you'll have your Christmas cards ready before you can say the word "Santa." Check out the entire sale here, and don't forget the US summer sale ends this Friday, August 31st so shop the US sale now!

Lucky Friday # 79, Sporty Birthday

Hello all you lucky folks out there! This is the 79th edition of our Lucky Friday Giveaway.  Each Friday we feature one of our letterpress greeting cards. We’ll choose THREE LUCKY WINNERS to get a free card.  Post a comment by 12 p.m. PST the following Thursday, and we’ll announce the winners on the following Friday!

The winners from last week are (drum roll, please): Lydia, Angela and Lisa! We’ll contact you next week to arrange sending your Unicorns card.

Design: Sporty Birthday Artist: Lab Partners Inspiration: Must've been feeling inspired by all the Olympic feats of strength. Who to send it to: A trophy-toting-teen, a champion of a chum, a contender of a friend or an all-around good sport. Ideas we scrapped in favor of this one: We nixed the Valentine's design that featured trophies— seemed a trifle tacky. Favorite detail: Love the trophy case nostalgia. Why letterpress? Nostalgia is best expressed with an antique press.

Don’t forget to post your comment and tune in next week, same time, different stationery, to see if you’ve won!

Lucky Friday # 78, Unicorns

Hello all you lucky folks out there! This is the 78th edition of our Lucky Friday Giveaway.  Each Friday we feature one of our letterpress greeting cards. We’ll choose THREE LUCKY WINNERS to get a free card.  Post a comment by 12 p.m. PST the following Thursday, and we’ll announce the winners on the following Friday!

The winners from last week are (drum roll, please): Janet, Julie and Bethany! We’ll contact you next week to arrange sending your Whale of a Birthday card.

Design: Unicorns Artist: Julia Rothman Inspiration: We thought of making a pretty corny card about unicorns, but then thought to make a pretty, unicorn-y card that wasn't so corny after all. Who to send it to: Someone truly unique, someone named Charlie (remember him?), or someone you've been meaning to get on the horn. Ideas we scrapped in favor of this one: The "Sometimes You've Just Gotta Grab the Corn By His Horn" encouragement card. And the Austin Powers unicorn card— erm... we won't go there. Favorite detail: We fell for all the fanciful flowers; not sure which is our fave. Why letterpress? Letterpress is rare and beautiful— if not mythical, it's at least legendary.

Don’t forget to post your comment and tune in next week, same time, different stationery, to see if you’ve won!

End of Summer Sale!

We're having an enormous end of summer sale! It's time to clean house and make room for all of our wonderful new greeting cards and gifts. Lots of our favorite items are marked down up to 50% off! Now is the time to get those chalkboard word bubbles you've always wanted, or fill your home with handmade letterpress prints at half price. Click here to browse all sale items. Sale ends August 31st so shop now!

Design Evolution: Greeting Cards

We have two very different parts of our business, our greeting card line and our custom design line. It's rare that the two cross paths but occasionally they do meet and we love seeing the results. We design and release new greeting cards twice a year, and one of the most exciting parts of our job here is coming up with themes and puns for our greeting card line. But the truth is, some of our most popular designs are already out there, and they just need to be revisited. Often times we'll look at what's done well in our wedding line and we'll use those designs as inspiration for new greeting cards.  It's fun to see the variations and to be able to offer up some of our most beloved designs to people who aren't looking for wedding invites or birth announcements. We've paired up some of these design transformations below so you can check our the evolution for yourself!

Above is our Seagulls Greeting Card recently created after we felt the success of our Seagulls Wedding Invitation. The cool beachy theme fits well as a wedding thank you card, but also as a thank you for a gift or gesture. For those of us that live on the ocean, having a set of six at home is necessary!

It was easy to turn our most popular Nouveau Peonies Wedding Invitation into a greeting card. The  Nouveau Peonies Greeting Card is a feminine and classy note perfect for every occasion.

We're proud of our city. And we're proud of our other most popular wedding invitation San Francisco Skyline.  The new San Francisco Skyline Greeting Card is perfect for visitors of the city by the bay, for moving announcement cards, or just a friendly hello.

Everybody loves Big Day! There's something about the double sided Big Day rsvp card that gets people smiling. We knew the friendly illustration would lend itself well to a thank you card. Our Many Thanks Greeting Card has been around quite awhile and is definitely a favorite.

Did you know all of our Visit series save the dates are available in letterpress greeting cards? The Visit New York Greeting Card is one of the originals, and a best seller in our New York City stores. It was recently featured on Time Out New York in a roundup of NYC themed stationery and greeting cards! Woo hoo!

After our designers created the Inchworm Birth Announcement for Kelly's baby Elliot, it was an easy decision to turn the bright baby announcement into the Inchworms Thank You Card. Suitable for a boy or girl!

We'll be sure to cover more of our design evolutions in the future! If there are any wedding/baby designs you'd like to see as a letterpress greeting card, just let us know!

Lucky Friday # 77, Whale of a Birthday

Hello all you lucky folks out there! This is the 77th edition of our Lucky Friday Giveaway.  Each Friday we feature one of our letterpress greeting cards. We’ll choose THREE LUCKY WINNERS to get a free card.  Post a comment by 12 p.m. PST the following Thursday, and we’ll announce the winners on the following Friday!

The winners from last week are (drum roll, please): Linda, Julie Glassman and Lexy! We’ll contact you next week to arrange sending your Gallant Birthday card.

Design: Whale of a Birthday Artist: Julia Rothman Inspiration: We were trying to brainstorm Moby Dick themed humor cards that were appropriate... Who to send it to: Seafarin' bretheren or sister'en who lived to tell the tale, a dolphin lovin' doll, or anyone named Herman, Mel, Moby or Willy. Ideas we scrapped in favor of this one: "Have a Kracken Good Time" was suggested for our UK store, but it must've gotten lost at sea, or lost in translation. Favorite detail: Love the swirly sea and pretzel-y, pretty clouds. Why letterpress? Letterpress backwards read "sserprettel" which makes us think of sea serpent, pretzel and pretty. There must be a message here we need to decode.

Don’t forget to post your comment and tune in next week, same time, different stationery, to see if you’ve won!

Featured: Pregnancy & Newborn

Hooray! Our Inchworm birth announcement is featured in the latest issue of Pregnancy and Newborn Magazine! With so many adorable announcements readily available, we're honored they chose our playful new card. The design was so popular we decided to transform it into a folded thank you note! It comes in single cards or packs of six so if you have a bunch of thank-you's to write, we've got you covered.