Wedding inspiration - Rumana and Devan

I am excited to finally be able to show you a beautiful letterpress invitation suite designed and printed here at Meticulous Ink for Rumana and Devan's Asian wedding. A joining of two cultures inspired the mendhi design at the top of the invitation, with the text kept simple. 

An added sparkle with a Swarovski crystal made the perfect finishing touch. 

The invitations were letterpress printed onto soft Somerset 100% cotton board, along with 

matching reply cards and return envelopes, all held together with a personalised wrap and tissue lined envelopes. 

The bride looked absolutely stunning on the big day, with a change of outfits for the evening celebrations. We hope you too will be inspired and wish the happy couple all the best.

Letterpress stationery suite, designed and printed by Meticulous Ink 

33 Walcot Street, Bath, BA1 5BN. 01225 333 004

Charity wedding raffle.

Having agreed to recently take part in a very exciting stationery donation, it was only fair for us to let all you brides and grooms to be know about this amazing competition.

We have donated an entire stationery suite worth £1,247 to this charity wedding raffle, the raffle itself is raising money for the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit for premature babies at Bath's Royal United Hospital, through the Forever Friends charity. The Forever Friends charity raises funds for state of the art medical equipment and facilities over and above that provided by the NHS.

The wedding is worth in total over £20,000 and included in the first prize winnings is the venue at Bailbrook House, reception decor, photography, coordination, traditional stationery(ahem), videography, dress, bridesmaid dresses, evening entertainment, flowers, rings, prop hire, cake, childcare and hair and make up.

Our contribution to the first prize is the wedding stationery. This includes 50 letterpress day invitations, 50 letterpress evening invitations, 100 reply cards and 100 information sheets. We will be selling raffle tickets at Meticulous Ink H.Q. from the end of June, and the raffle itself will take place at Bailbrook House, Bath on the 22nd of October. We will also be keeping you all updated on this competition and blog with lot's more examples of the kind of thing we will be donating. Keep those peepers peeled!

For much more information please visit Snapdragon Weddings site here.

Here are some pictures to whet your appetites.

Friday finds - Antique stationery items

These splendid items were bestowed upon us by some relatives to offload some unwanted but un-throwawayable beauties.

I've always enjoyed the look of older pencil cases, such as these two cardboard cases, beautifully designed in a straightforward bold and almost austere fashion. We like it though, it talks volumes of the kind of design we love and always try to take inspiration from.

My favourite piece in this array of goods is the 'Weldon Roberts Eraser'. I love the design of this, and it's odd style too. Many of these pieces came from a relative who was an engineer during the 50's I think so perhaps this eraser is specific to engineering? Are we wrong to think this? Anyone?

Also along the line of engineering I'm almost certain these tiny rulers were used for that purpose. Well only because one has 'engine divided' on it. Also one has 1552 carved into it, surely not from the year 1552 is it?

Also included here is a pen nib box, pencil refills and some very old pattern binders which we presume were used for clothes pattern assembly. I must confess our knowledge on these items is restricted so if anyone can shed any light or interesting details about them we'd love to hear! 

Ridiculous vintage cakes.

We had to blog about this, just after looking through some inspiration for a circus themed birthday invite we are doing and came across this.
Not only is it the most dazzlingly simple cake decoration it is also strangely satisfying, and perhaps even slightly unsettling. We now have the urge to make one or two of these splendid vintage cakes!

                                                               Via www.modernkiddo.com

Friday Finds - Book embroidery by Jillian Tamaki

A virtual find today, and one we are extremely excited about.
We stumbled upon this through a tweet from @CrankyPressman - an openly stern and old fashioned letterpress print shop and bindery in Chicago, Illinois. They have a fantastic website and blog and take pride in 'breaking their backs to make you look good'. Great stuff.

The tweet linked to a blog posted back in March this year, but we just had to blog about this after stumbling upon it today.
Jillian Tamaki is an illustrator and cartoonist based in Brooklyn, NY. She teaches Art at the School of Visual Arts there and illustrates for magazines, books, newspapers and websites. She has also had a few books of her personal work published, including her debut publication with the always fantastic Drawn and Quarterly.

These pieces are particularly magnificent. They are not going to be sold as embroidered books(I don't think), but as high quality printed and embossed covers of these penguin classics. Not sure if they are available over here, but we're almost certain it would be worth the trip to pick one up!

More from Jillian on here blog and website.

Stationery by Rachel O'Reilly

We have the utmost pleasure in revealing the new line of letterpress correspondence cards designed for us by Miss Rachel O'Reilly. 
There are 5 new sets available, and as she puts it - "The motifs illustrate some of my favourite things; Dorothy's Ruby Slippers, The Ubiquitous Little-Red-Number, Jet Setting, Playing Your Cards Right (or keeping them close to your chest!!), and no range would be complete without the Cherry On Top!"
Rachel is a very talented designer, and also a fantastic jazz singer! More from Rachel here, and also to hear her dulcet tones listen here.


Each set includes 8 beautiful letterpress correspondence cards on a soft 100% cotton board. They also include matching deckle edge envelopes in red and a light dusty blue, 4 of each colour in a pack. 




Available now in store, or call or e-mail to order; 
info@meticulousink.com • 01225 333 004.


Etsy shop coming soon!

Friday finds - Wayzgoose finds

First of all, apologies for the lack of blogging lately. We've been very busy here and have struggled to find time for posting due to all the printing work we've had on. Recent printing work blog coming soon!

Last week I visited a Wayzgoose in Chipping Campden in the Cotswolds. Originally a Wayzgoose was an event marking the start of the season of working by candlelight, where entertainmant was put on by a master-printer for workmen around August.

It then later transformed into a yearly festival held by printing establishment employees. Now a Wayzgoose is a day for printers guilds to show and sell their work and/or equipment. Exciting stuff, well for me anyway.

The annual Wayzgoose in Chipping Campden is held by the Oxford Printers Guild and showcased a variety of the letterpress worlds finest printing presses and most important figures.

Lousia Hare/First Folio Cards 

I first met Lousia Hare, a lady who we have dealt with regularly before as we stock her fantastic letterpress Shakespeare greeting cards. She runs a Heidelberg using blocks and type to create these wonderful letterpress cards.













I then met Alan Brignull. Alan works mainly with Adanas to create beautiful letterpress prints. Especially stamps. He told me he usually has an old stamp dispensing machine with which he usually has these stamps available for purchase, a lovely idea, shame I couldn't see it though.
Alan runs Hedgehog press, Adanaland and also prints his 'Rambling Urchin' postcard keepsakes. More here.

Alan Brignull/The Hedgehog Press

I then managed to meet Graham Moss from Incline Press who I had come across from seeing his beautiful jam and marmalade labels. He runs workshops and sells beautifully printed books from his studio in Oldham.

Graham Moss/Incline Press

It always amazes me the size of the letterpress world in the UK, lovely people for a great resurging industry.

A lovely day - and if you haven't visited Chipping Campden before - I recommend it, fascinating place.